When I read the parables in which Jesus likens God to an abusive landlord* or an overbearing boss, I cringe. This righteous, angry, vengeful God is the one that too many churches use as an excuse to silence anyone who asks too many questions, to restrict leadership opportunities for women, to refuse to recognize the full humanity anyone of a different skin color or ethnic identity, and to drive out anyone who does not conform to confining gender roles. This God, some people say, condemns sinners to everlasting punishment while the saved spend eternity in heaven.
This is not the God that I want to believe in. I want to believe in the God of love and grace, of forgiving seventy times seven, of open-handed abundance. I want to believe in the God who pays the latecomers the same wage as those who show up early, who sends the rain and the sunshine to the good and the evil equally. I want to believe in a God who sees the value of every person, regardless of age, gender, or skin color. I want to believe in a God who takes everyone into a great web of love when they die, and hell is simply an old-fashioned threat used by those with power to keep other people in line.
On the other hand, when I think about how much power is abused in this world, how much hurt and fear are absorbed by those who are poor or weak or outsiders, how much damage continues to be done to the environment, maybe I do want a God who is just and powerful after all. Maybe I do want a God who is willing and able to punish those who take advantage of others, who use their strength to harm the weak, or who stripmine the land while consigning the miners to dangerous working conditions and black-lung disease while destroying all that is good and beautiful about the surrounding countryside. Maybe I do want a God who will turn the world upside down, righting all the wrongs, humbling the rich and uplifting the poor, healing the sick and wiping away every tear.
Of course I want a God who loves and forgives me unconditionally. But, when I am honest with myself, do I really want a God who forgives everyone, no matter what evil they have done? How can I reconcile my yearning for justice with my faith in forgiveness? What is Jesus telling me in these confusing parables and stories?
-Deborah Sokolove, Seekers Church
For Further Reflection
For more to think about, read what David Lose says about God’s “Crazy Love” for everyone in Working Preacher at Crazy Love (a.k.a. Preaching Matthew Against Matthew) – Working Preacher from Luther Seminary
See also Jan Richardson’s meditation on our human propensity towards violence in her Painted Prayerbook blog entry, Violence in the Vineyard [The image is also titled Violence in the Vineyard © Jan L. Richardson, janrichardson.com]
