Sermon at the Sung Eucharist on the Sixteenth Sunday after Trinity 2016

Here’s a piece of advice offered to a small girl by her older and wiser brother: ‘If you want a kitten – ask for a pony.’

We can imagine the ensuing bargaining - which you will also know to be a feature of adult life too. Some of you may, like me, be fans of Kirstie and Phil. If you don’t know about them, they’re the hosts of a TV programme in which they find homes to buy for clients who are usually difficult and uncompromising. Eventually, when a suitable property is identified, a game begins. The purchasers make a low offer, which is rejected. The sellers make a counter offer – and with luck eventually a compromise is reached and the deal is done.

If we have listened carefully to this morning’s Old Testament reading, we may think that Phil and Kirstie could take lessons from Moses. Moses finds himself in a tough situation, and it takes all his powers of persuasion to get out of it. Let me remind you of the story.

The people of Israel have spent many generations in servitude in Egypt, working on Pharaoh’s building projects. God arranges their release, by sending Moses to lead them. They have escaped miraculously from Pharaoh’s pursuing army, and travelled into the wilderness. They are free, and on the way to their own homeland. But they are not entirely happy about it. The wilderness is a frightening place, where it seems there is never enough to eat or drink. Sometimes they wish they were back in Egypt, where at least there was food. Sometimes they say so. God is already getting angry with them. But they make it as far as Mount Sinai, and there Moses meets with God to discover the next steps. In Moses’ absence the people decide they need a better form of god, one they can see and touch, and they make a golden calf.

That’s it. God has had enough. ‘Go away,’ God says to Moses. ‘I’m going to destroy the whole faithless, ungrateful lot of them. I’ll make a new nation out of your descendants instead.’ But Moses stands his ground, and prepares to talk God round. ‘Don’t give up on them,’ Moses says. ‘Think of the consequences. What will the Egyptians think of you if it all ends in disaster? Anyway, you made promises many generations ago. You have already put a lot of effort into these people. Are you really going to break your promises and start all over again with someone else?’ Moses is convincing, and his arguments work – although as the story progresses we realise that the Israelites’ faithlessness is not without its consequences. But for now, God is persuaded. The Israelites’ journey will continue.

It’s a strange story, this account of Moses arguing with God. It assumes that God can lose his temper, and can be talked down. It seems to us a rather primitive view of God. But it raises important issues for all people of faith. Does God get angry? We’re happy enough to talk about God’s love, but are we assuming that God feels emotions? And if God gets angry, is there a danger that we may be in the firing line? Down the ages all kinds of things have been interpreted as God’s punishment, from earthquakes to AIDS - but do we really think it works like that?

Exodus tells the story of how God and his people form a relationship. The relationship is often stormy, but that is because it matters so much to everyone. God’s purposes for the world will not be fulfilled unless Israel can learn what it means to be the people of God. Israel is in constant danger unless they retain God’s protection. In the context of the story, it is understandable that this relationship is seen as one that can fall apart at any moment. In the telling of the story, we see authors and editors working out what it means to be God’s people, and to live in relationship with this God – the God who is first encountered in the fire and smoke of a desert volcano, and who threatens the destruction of his people. But who then is persuaded to change his mind; and ultimately remains faithful to his promises.

By the time we get to the stories Jesus tells, God seems to have stopped losing his temper – though we should not think the New Testament is free of references to God’s punitive anger. But this morning’s gospel reading looks at the question from another angle. Does God feel emotion?

Philosophically, that question is impossible to answer. Our language to speak of God is limited; our capacity to understand our creator is bounded by our creaturely-ness. But our human relationships always involve a degree of emotion. So we naturally describe our relationship with God in the language of profound emotional commitment, and speak of God relating to us in similar terms. And, yes indeed, we are told of divine joy when a straying sheep is returned, joy when a lost coin is found, joy when one of God’s children comes back to the family. Jesus portrays a God who never destroys or abandons his people, who always goes searching for them when they stray, who never gives up on them. This God would never threaten to destroy his people, or abandon them. This God will seek them out, cajole them, bring them back with love and rejoice over them for all eternity.

So what of us? As people of faith, how do we respond to these stories which speak of God’s rage and of God’s committed love?

Perhaps we can think of it like this. If God cares about the world at all, there must be things in it that make God angry, are contrary to God’s will for creation. And if God cares about us, there must be things about us that make God angry, and are contrary to God’s will for us. But if we take into account the life, teaching, and death of Jesus, we have to believe that God’s anger never has the last word. Even without the calm and rational voice of Moses in his ears, God chooses the option of forgiveness and love, and comes looking for us to bring us back to himself, every time.