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Isaiah 6:1-8; John 3:1-17
A number of years ago I went to a community dance on mid-summer's night in the resort village of Lit, outside of …stersund, Sweden. It did not get dark any of those nights and the sun rose about 2:00 a.m.
All ages of people were there and whether we liked it or not, were married or single, all of our party were eventually grabbed by some Swedish maiden who strong-armed us onto the dance floor. I seem to remember only two kinds of songs: at least half wer e sung in English, renditions of the popular Swedish group "Abba." The other half were describable only as Swedish polka. Is "Swedish polka" an oxymoron?
The singing group Abba is an acronym of the names of the two male, two female members. I found the name curious for it is the Aramaic word for "Father", an intimate title, almost like our "Daddy".
Jesus is reported in the Greek Gospels to have used it as his name for his Father, and Paul would also use the word as the proper address of God in prayer. Quickly, Abba became the universal word for a spiritual director or spiritual father. The head of a monastery is still an abbot, a derivative of the word.
God the Father is a problem for many Christians today. Calling God Father reeks of sexism and male chauvinism. It excludes half the population from being able to receive the full benefits of God's reign; indeed, the fact that God was the Father has often been used as a fundamental reason why women are not allowed to be ordained into the ministry, as we have seen with the Southern Baptist Convention.
Calling God the Father survives, however, and on this Father's Day it is a good opportunity to understand why. The best reason God is the Father, the First Person of the Trinity, is because it doesn't make sense. Nothing could be more sensible, however.
Nicodemus was a member of the ruling Jewish Council, the Sanhedrin, in Roman-occupied Palestine. Something stirred up his imagination about Jesus and his new interpretation of the Israelite faith. Nicodemus, though, wanted Jesus to make sense to him. It had to be his sense and logic, according to the rules of his academy. "We know, Nicodemus is not here on his own, that you are a teacher who has come from God; for no one can do these signs that you do apart from the presence of God." Nicodemus and company were interested in domesticating Jesus, his message and ministry, to fit their own agenda which was to maintain their own slim power against the ruling Romans.
Jesus figures he has to lay it on the line: "Actually, if the presence of God is really with you, you have to start by being born again, that is, born from above, from heaven." We all have our ideas and our culture has its ideas about "born again," but what Jesus is declaring is there is a divine intrusion upon our human way of thinking and acting when God really is present. Business is not as usual. We don't just have to change; we must be renewed and be a different person.
Nicodemus wanted his religion linear, orderly, fill in the blanks, and under control - his control, of course. But when you are born again, from heaven, you are not the one in control. You are grasped by a powerful hand.
Every attempt by human beings to routinize, control, domesticate our relationship with the Divine, the Ultimate Concern, the Ground of Being ends up blocking and shielding us from the grace of God. In other words, the more we try to be in charge, the more we assume religion begins with us, the more we can't feel God in charge of us.
The people who wrote about Christianity, its practices and ideas in the first few centuries A.D. have become known as the "Church Fathers," which brings us back to our theme. Throughout the first five centuries they made a big deal out of the Trinity; they knew the idea of God as Three Persons in One was true and important because they themselves could never quite describe it clearly. They knew that God is never completely understandable by human beings. If we had a perfectly understandable definition of God, it would not be God, but an "opiate of the people" which is how a 19th -century economist Karl Marx once described Christianity.
The Jews had referred to God as Father, so the Church Fathers didn't change. Yes, seeing God the Almighty as Father fit well the patriarchal society and the suppression of women. It still does, if you want it that way, and the Southern Baptists apparently still do. But that's the way Nicodemus thought about it, not Jesus.
Sure, God the Father can be seen as the top guy in the hierarchy, the person who rules the family and whose every word is law, right or wrong. It does not take much ingenuity to come up with that linear approach to thinking about God. God is not where we start; we start with the father of a patriarchal clan, and God in heaven backs up his authority.
Yet Jesus called God "Abba." Loving, caring, gentle yet strong, always there when you need him, a person who will let you grow, but will always draw the line to protect you. If God is Abba, where then is the Mother? A good father never replaces a mother, but carries through a mothering attitude and behaviour as well. God is the Father and the Mother, and although we have typically meant the inclusion of Mother in the First Person of the Trinity - just as we have always said "mankind" includes both women and men - we simply have not said it that way.
God is Father in our church language, on one hand, because it doesn't really fit our experience. Let's face it, most parental problems have been overwhelmingly the fathers. If tradition had made it "God the Mother," it would have made perfect sense, and we wouldn't have thought about it much more - God would always be with us, right or wrong.
But heads are turned when we say, "I believe in God the Father...," for earthly fathers do not model that character very well as a whole. It should force us to think. Our fathers who have been the loving, benevolent Abbas in our lives almost stand out as exceptions and so we pay special attention and honour to the way they have molded us.
Add to the idea that God is the Father the reality that God is the Son without being on a lower plane, and that God is the Holy Spirit still present and working among us, and that all three are equal without distinction, then it is no wonder that this is a mystery, a riddle which no human answer can be the solution. Nicodemus wants a punchline in black and white, in 25 words or less. Yet when you are born again, the answer is both black and white.
Speaking of Southern Baptists, there was a radical, salty, provocative Southern Baptist minister Will Campbell. He attended the trial of a Klansman who was accused of murdering a black man. A newspaper reporter noticed that Campbell, during the recesses, appeared to be on close personal terms with both the accused Klansman and the murdered man's family, and spent a lot of time talking to both parties.
The reporter couldn't stand it any longer. "How is it possible," he confronted Campbell, sounding a lot like Nicodemus, "that you are friendly to both this hateful murderous racist and his victim's family?"
Campbell was not known for his patience, and exploded at the reporter, "Because I'm a g-d, sob Christian, that's why!"
Does that make sense? Yes, just don't use common sense to figure it out. God is the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, Three in One, which common sense laughs at. God has no common sense. But when God makes you over again, gives you birth again, then you too will live as if you have no human sense.
Preached by Robert Kitchen
Knox-Metropolitan United Church
Regina, Saskatchewan
June 18, 2000
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