God’s Idea of ‘Nice House’ To Live In
King David sometimes reminds me of the apostle Peter. That is, he seems well-intentioned, but often misses the mark. In today’s first lesson, 2 Samuel 7:1-14a, the story of David offering to build a house for God leads me to wonder about the ways in which we can learn to hear God more clearly.
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Transcript
“In all that time that I led you around, protected you, cleared the way for you, did you ever once hear me ask you for a house?”
In Padraig O` Tuama’s book titled “In the Shelter: Finding a Home in the World”, each chapter is named with a greeting to a state of mind or being: Hello to the Imagination; Hello to Change; Hello to the Shadow, etc. Along those lines I would probably title this homily “Hello to Wondering”; that is to say that the longer I sat with the lesson from 2 Samuel, the more it morphed in a surprising direction, having begun in a sort of strange place to begin with — King David concerned that God had nowhere permanent to live.
Giving God features that mirror human features goes back way beyond these texts. Not only physical features like a face or a nose or arms, but moods like ours — fatigue, hunger, restlessness.
The Sumerian creation story, for example, much older than either of the Genesis creation stories, begins with the gods not being able to sleep because of all the noise below the heavens that humans make while partying with lesser deities. The action goes south very fast, but suffice to say that I know lots of young parents who would identify with the story.
When we use language that attempts to make God like us, it makes us feel a little better about being us: like, when we are so disappointed in the way things are going that we consider just destroying it all and beginning again. Plus, we can say “well, I may have temper but I never wiped out a whole world.” In other words, if God is like me and God is God why should I try to improve my character?
But there’s another reason we tend to make God like us, so that we have a sense of controlling God, or at the very least, knowing where God is at all times, like belling a cat, or keeping a genii in a bottle.
Even King David felt badly that he finally had a nice place, and wanted to build one in the same neighborhood for God. Eventually he will begin the process and his son Solomon will complete it. But, all of Israel will learn in the end that God never liked that house or considered it home.
And it isn’t that God didn’t appreciate David’s gesture. God did, indeed, want something from David. But not a palace of cedar and stone, silver and gold. God wanted David; his heart, his mind, his leadership.
The “house for God’s name” to which God refers is David’s life. And, our lives. Like a great house, however, such a life doesn’t just happen because we wish it. Building such a life requires a careful design that takes into account our setting and its natural limitations; the right materials, which must be available; the best skill set, which will likely involve others who are experts in areas that we are not; and labor, including lots of sweat equity.
Now, I fully own that the way God made me is to rejoice in making lists and setting myself at tasks. But, that’s just my “natural terrain.” Your terrain may be very different. It doesn’t matter. Because however God designed the terrain of your heart as exactly the place where God intends you to build the house, whose name will be “God lives here.”
A couple of weeks ago, tropical storm Beryl hit the Houston area where my son and daughter-in-law live. Most of these storms that make landfall that far inland cause barely a blip. But this one was different. Uprooting a very tall pine in his backyard, its fall demolished his garage before finally landing in the center of his next door neighbor’s home, completely destroying it. People and pets all survived, thanks be to God. They were ten days without power, sleeping in a tent in the backyard…in Houston…in July….
As sometimes happens, this physical devastation acted like a magnet suddenly pulling toward the center earlier tragedies in his life, and my son called in great agony, clearly grief stricken about so much more than property damage. In short, the storm revealed some remodeling that needs to be done on his house. And we will need some experts. We will need to learn a few new skills. And one way or another we are all in for some work.
These “houses” we are talking about naturally require remodeling over time, even without a tree falling on them. What we know about ourselves and what little we fathom about God shifts as we age.
And that’s ok to admit. Dear God I hope we can absolutely admit it. The God of our childhood, so often confused with Santa or the Tooth Fairy, will hardly carry us through the vicissitudes of life. Doll-sized houses will not suffice to shelter adult lives from a storm.
But oh do we keep trying!
And then life happens. It is not God that changes, but we change. God’s steadfast faithfulness endures forever. God’s promises go from generation to generation. And because of God’s faithfulness, we can trust that God will be there when the only tree for miles around manages to fall on our house.
This is more than just allegory or simile for our lives of faith. It is the magna carta, outlining what it looks like to belong to the King of a Kingdom that is still breaking through to this death star we live on. Even the letter to the Ephesians speaks to how the foundation of our houses begins with the lives of the prophets and apostles, with Christ Jesus as the cornerstone that holds the structure together. We do not build this house alone, ever. Nor, is one life held together by only the stories of that one life, but one life’s stories are the sequels to earlier stories and the prequels to stories still being composed.
It is why we live in community with each other. But the work begins in solitude. So, here is the challenge for us in times of solitude.
Through prayer and ruthless honesty, figure out what your natural terrain is; that is, how did God make you. What activities interest you and give you joy? How can this setting best reflect the splendor of God’s work?
What would you like your life to look like? What do you see yourself doing? How do you want to contribute to the greater good? By what will you be known and remembered? What would you like your legacy to be?
What practices do you need to learn or strengthen to bring this about? And what experts will you need to call on to help you figure it out?
And finally how will you nourish yourself to do the labor? A good beginning is at this table for regular Holy Communion; daily Bible study and prayer where you engage questions and follow the thread of God’s presence throughout the generations; accountability to another believer; and as Jesus recommended to his disciples in today’s Gospel, make regular times for rest and renewal.
Because, just as there are storm seasons in meteorology, there appear to be storm seasons in life where trees fall one after another. In fact, just before the tree fell, a delivery truck driver crashed into my son’s small car, totaling it while he was on his way to take supper to his wife who works as a nurse in a care home.
I mention that fact about her being a nurse because he kept mentioning it to the traffic police who arrived on the scene, as though somehow being crashed into while in route to take supper to a nurse ought to have earned the truck driver a prison term rather than a traffic citation. The unfortunate car crash preceded the arrival of the tropical storm by only a few days. Storm season.
The Talmud says that “we do not see things as they are, but as we are.” The stories we tell also tell us.
So, as we think about the choices we make, and how those choices affect the lives we live, or in this morning’s context, the houses we live in, what do these homes say about us?
Hello to wondering….
Amen.