“God’s Willingness”

We hear the price of eggs has gone up, way up, south of the border. I have been getting my chicken eggs from a backyard on the MacDonald Road. I can peek at those hens from the driveway when I go to pick up a dozen eggs, every once in a while, now for $5. 

I’ve never been a farmer, and don’t know much about raising animals, but the biblical images of animal behaviour and of farming crops seem so clear, so understandable. And though we may think it primitive, I suppose it is not that far back in our animal brain that the ideas of animal sacrifice are hidden away. The Jewish Old Testament is full of animal sacrifices as worship, as offerings to God. & more. 

Of course, any animals have to be ‘sacrificed’ in order for us to eat them. I remember so well the time a young family I knew from church invited me over for lunch, when I was their Pastor. They had a mini farm in their yard. The children toured me around: three girls, aged 5 and 7 and 9, I suppose. Here are the geese. Here are the baby chicks. Here and the chickens where we get the eggs. Here are the turkeys. Then the littlest girl pointed out a large flat cross section of a log. “This is where Daddy cuts their heads off!” she said, quite matter-of-factly. 

Anyway, we might figure out what is going on in this scene with Abram and the Almighty. Did you hear all that? Remember it, or follow along, in Genesis 15? Elderly Abram is promised by God that he and Sarai will have a child together, the beginning of a huge, innumerable family, a family to bless the whole earth. The promise of descendents as numberable as the stars comes in a nighttime ceremony. A young cow, a goat, and a ram are sacrificed, each cut in half, and a turtledove and a pigeon sacrificed. Once all is dark, between the carcasses a smoking pot and a flaming torch are seen passing through. 

This is actually a typical, ancient ritual for ‘cutting a covenant,’ that is, making an agreement official. And some of the ancient thinking, of course, is basically, “May the same happen to me, if I do not follow through on my promise.” 

But in this case, only one of the parties walks through - God. Abram does not ritually pass through the sacrificed meat. Only The LORD. In other words, it is only God who is required to keep this promise. Only Yahweh will be held accountable. It does not depend upon Abram and Sarai. God is perfectly willing to bless this couple, without requiring any special promise from them. It is a divine promise to them.

The willingness of God stands out to me here, today. We find a God who is willing to give, to promise, to care, to provide, in the face of the uncertain, the unclear, the unbelievable. You know those moments when you started to give up on what you thought God would do in your life? When some disaster or pain, maybe some dullness or drudgery just took over what life was supposed to be like? Then we hear a voice, telling us the Lover of our Souls is still there, and still willing to guide our way forward. 

I also see this in that scene with Jesus, which happened a couple thousand years later. In that moment when, among other things, Jesus says of His fellow Jews, “How often have I desired to gather your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you were not willing!”

You may have caught more than one contrast here. One is Herod Antipas who gets called ‘That Fox,’ and Jesus, on the other hand,who is like a hen with her chicks. 

The other contrast is how Jesus found the people unwilling, but He was still willing to gather them, to be vulnerable, and would be, of course, willing to sacrifice Himself for them all. 

Jesus as a hen. It is a striking and powerful image He uses. We don’t often think of the chicken as a noble beast. It is seen as silly, as cowardly, sometimes as cruel, maybe as dumb and dirty, and occasionally scary. We have the chicken dance, Chicken Little, avian influenza now, and ‘Why did the chicken cross the road?’ jokes. (To get to the other side!)

But the way Christ uses the animal is in her most endearing moment, as a gentle and determined, protective parent. I love the photos of many kinds of birds where you see a hen with a bunch of chicks hidden in her feathers, sometimes with the feet sticking out the bottom, if she is standing, or the little beaks peeking out from the feathers. Sometimes it is the male bird that does this too.

Writer Debbie Blue in one book has a chapter about this, about Jesus being like a hen. She says, God allows Godself to be domesticated–chooses to be near to us. In this he lays himself open to the possibility of endless misinterpretation. (p. 181) This is so true. For two thousand years, we people have domesticated and redefined all sorts of things about Jesus. We have fought a lot about who He is and what He means to say. God was willing to become one of us, and have us twist the story around and around in some foolish ways. 

But it is the willing vulnerability of God in Christ that is so powerful, in a sort of powerless way. God gives up power to redeem us. God suffers and dies to give us life & victory over pain & death. 

In her book, Consider the Birds, preacher and author, Debbie Blue, tells the story of a woman named Phyllis who came back to church after forty five years away. She’d been living according to Christ’s teaching, providing therapy for the underprivileged and abused, speaking truth to power, but could not bear to align herself under Christ’s name. This is because she was abused by a powerful Christian father and because she couldn’t bear the talk of some of the nastier, patriarchal Christians she’d known. 

After she came back, Debbie Blue was so happy to hear Phyllis preach the sermon one Sunday. She spoke about the text that comes after Jesus teaches about his flesh and blood, in John’s Gospel. The Scripture said these were hard sayings, and many disciples drew back and no longer went about with him. Jesus looked at the Twelve and said, “Do you also want to leave?” This seemed so vulnerable to Phyllis–so unlike the God who needs nothing, so almighty is he, and it opened her heart to him.

“Receive me,” Jesus pleads. Jesus asks us to receive him. This is so different from a king demanding his subjects to bow down. (pp. 185-6) It is a God who is not forcing, not demanding, but is simply willing. Willing to take a chance on us. Willing to let us be free to choose. “Come to me, all you who are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.”

Like a hen who, well, is waiting for the chicks to come to safety under her wings, even when they don’t come. She lets them be free. But she is still there. Still ready. Still protective. God is willing to keep promises without our promise. This is grace. This is mercy. 

As I conclude, allow me to change metaphors completely. God’s willingness to be good to us is partly like something going on in Halifax this very weekend. The removal of bridge tolls in HRM. Both bridges are closed now so that the toll booths can come down. After a fee for each crossing of the MacDonald Bridge since 1955, and the MacKay since 1970, the fees are gone. They are free.

I wonder if, for some people, realizing and knowing the amazing grace of God is like this. After years of thinking and feeling there must be some things to be earned to get right with God, some way to pay up, suddenly they see there actually is no toll booth. Or, we could say, Jesus has paid the toll, from now until forever. 

Thanks be to God, who is completely willing to pay the toll! All it is up to us to do is take that road across the bridge to the Kingdom of God. 

The chicks are free to run back under the feathery wings of love.