+Thursday afternoon my niece, a senior in college, texted me to ask, “Is God perfect?” Apparently they’d been discussing this in class that day and she was still struggling with the question. I quickly responded that the notion of perfection was a human construct and that I don’t think we can apply such a value judgment to our Creator, because what God is, ultimately, is all that is Good in the world. God is Good. Good cannot be without God. God is Good and Good is God.
I think she was satisfied with that answer. I answered quickly because lately I’ve been thinking a lot about God. Actually I’ve spent a lot of time defending God. God’s motives, God’s character.
You see, when something the world considers bad happens to you, people are quick to bring God’s character, God’s motives, into play.
Cancer, the disease, is a bad thing. The killings in Tucson, the destruction of hurricanes, and the horror of oppression are all bad things. But bad things are not God. The world is not perfect. God created the world, but God doesn’t rule the world. That’s our job. And we aren’t perfect. But we all can be good. Because we are all creatures of God and God made us out of goodness.
God didn’t give me cancer, but the good I have found in cancer? That’s all God. All the good things which have happened as a result of this cancer---the world-class treatment I receive at Roswell, the love and support of family and friends, the strength offered through your prayers---all of that is Good. And all of that is God. Each and every person who’s a part of my treatment team, each person who prays for me, serves as an instrument of God’s grace—God’s goodness---in this world. And that goodness, that grace, fills me with an exuberant gratitude.
An exuberance which makes me want to, as God told the prophet Isaiah in today’s first reading: Shout out do not hold back! Lift up your voice like trumpet!
Each week when I stand in front of you—I want to shout out, “God is so Good. God is so wonderful, We’re so incredibly blessed.”
But you know what? Such excitement, such exuberance, can get boring after awhile. How many different ways can I say:
“God loves us more than our human brains can comprehend? And in response to this Love we must go out and do as Jesus has commanded us to do—we must go out into the world with that Love—that incredible Goodness which is God---and spread it around!”
Even Good News can lose it’s punch after awhile.
But then I read Eugene Peterson’s modern translation of our Gospel reading for today and in it was a wonderful metaphor for this message. A terrific new way of looking at just how our response to God can help spread the Good News, a new way of describing our role as the instruments of God’s Goodness on this earth.
The opening verse of the Gospel, in the translation we have in front of us this morning, reads: “You are the salt of the earth; but if salt has lost its taste, how can its saltiness be restored?” But in Peterson’s translation the same verse reads: “Let me tell you why you are here. You’re here to be the salt-seasoning that brings out the God-flavors of this earth.” (The Message Matthew 5: 13).
We are to be seasoning---we are to, like a pinch of salt, bring out the fullness of God’s flavor in the world. We are to make God’s Goodness palatable, noticeable, enjoyable—tasty!
Our actions, like the chemical reaction of salt in food, brings out the God flavor of this world.
Have you ever eaten something without enough salt? Take a pot of soup- even though if it’s loaded with vegetables and a rich beef stock, without seasoning, like salt, it will taste really bland. But add some salt and let it simmer awhile longer.
What a difference. The salt really brings out the blend of flavors that had been trapped within each of the ingredients. The salt sets the trapped flavors free.
In today’s Gospel, in this portion of the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus says that, as God’s instruments on earth, we are to set the full flavor of God free.
We are here to bring out the God flavor of the world.
The people at Roswell, all the people who are praying for me, helping me along the way, each one of them—of you---is salting God in my life.
Through our good deeds, through our behavior as decent people in the world, we bring the fullness of God out. We shine a light on God’s grace when we do God’s work in the world. By doing good things, we let the world know that God—perfect or not---is always, always good.
That’s the unifying message throughout today’s readings .
God is in, and of, all the good in this world, but the only way people will notice it, the only way people can taste and see that the Lord is, indeed Good, is for us to season the world with that Goodness. To free the flavor of God so that the entire world can be seasoned with the Love of God we all cherish so much.
I think we take salt for granted---when it’s used well, we don’t notice it---but when there’s not enough (or, for that much too much) we notice!
So my challenge for all of us, is to notice the saltiness of others and to be salty ourselves. To take Jesus’ challenge to be --and to notice others—being God’s instruments in the world. Being the Good which is God. Being the salt that lets the full flavor of God out in the world.
Help others, notice when others help…be aware of how a mundane day can suddenly be full of life---can become so full of God’s flavor, through a simple act of kindness, of common human decency. Notice all the little things that we do, or have done to us, or see people do for others which lets them, lets us, lets everyone fully know the love of God, in all it’s robust, intricate and wonderful flavor.
If we want to keep God trapped in the blandness of human language, we can proclaim God as perfect. But if we want to take the challenge Jesus lays out for us [the challenge Eugene Peterson translates for us] then we can free God from the limits of our human constructs by seasoning God’s goodness through our own acts of kindness toward others. For when we do that, we let the full flavor of God’s grace free to season the world. +
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