Remembering the Past...
        Planning the Future

    Park Christian Church
                                                                    (Disciples of Christ)

March 1, 2009

Sermon:           “God’s Great Experiment”

            Tohu Wabohu.

            Say that with me.  Tohu.  Wabohu.  Tohu wabohu.  That’s it.

            Sounds kind of primal and mysterious, doesn’t it?  Tohu wabohu.  Say it again.  But, say it like you mean it, you know.  Give it kind of a dark and menacing tone.  Tohu wabohu.  You might need to shake your head back and forth a little bit and let your voice rise and fall.  Tohu wabohu.

            That’s your Hebrew lesson for the day.  You can leave church and say to your friends that you know a little bit of Hebrew.  Tohu wabohu.

            It shouldn’t come as a surprise that the meaning really matches the sounds of the words.  Tohu wabohu.  Kind of like darkness and chaos swirling around.  Tohu wabohu.  Chaos.  Bewilderment.  Darkness.  Swirling.

            In the beginning when God created the heavens and the earth, there was nothing but tohu wabohu.  Darkness covered the face of the deep.  A wind from God swept over the face of the waters…Then God said, “Let there be light!”  And there was light.

            Doesn’t it lose just a little bit without saying tohu wabohu?  Formless void is how it reads to us.  But, when long ago the children of Israel would ask their elders how things came to be, the reply would start with tohu wabohu.

            From the empty, swirling, chaos, the tohu wabohu, God began this creating.  Bits and pieces here and there.  Light.  Darkness.  Water.  Land.  Animals.  Plants.  And then there was you and me.  All the while is this God who is just making a way through it all, step by step, looking at it all and saying, “ahhhh.  It is good.”

            That’s the beginning of the picture of God we get from the Bible.  To me it’s something more of an artist God that creates.  Then God stands back every now and then and says, “yes, yes.  It is good.”

            Tohu Wabohu.

            Some people used to say that God fought with and defeated a great dragon in the sea.  Leviathan.  Just bits and pieces of this story in the Bible.  A couple of Psalms mention it briefly.  And that story about Job brings it up.  The prophet Isaiah did, too.  But, the whole story is someplace else.  Says that God slew the Leviathan in order to make room for the creation of the world.

            Now, if you told folks some time ago that Jesus walked upon the waters, they’d know what you were telling them.  Only God puts the beasts of the deep, the chaos of the unknown, Leviathan and whatnot—only God can put these things under foot.  So, what are you saying about Jesus that he walks upon the waters?  Walks upon the waters while they are raging in a storm.  Walks upon the waters and calms the tohu wabohu.  What are you saying about who this Jesus is?

            Anyhow, all of these stories say something about God getting a bit involved with things even as they are chaotic, unpredictable, and falling apart.  It’s a God that, frankly, isn’t necessarily in control of things.  Does that sound dangerous to you?  God isn’t in control of everything?  Involved?  Yes.  In control.  These stories don’t say that.  They say that God has to get control.

            It’s almost as if God has designs on what this world, and we who live in it—it’s almost as if God has designs on the world, but has to experiment on how to get us all there.

            God’s working on things, you know.  And it strikes God to scoop up some dust from the ground.  Dirt up under the fingernails, and God get the idea to shape a man’s body out of it.  And being God the breath forced into those nostrils become the man’s life.  A living, breathing man.  A man that might not always do what God wanted.  But, this is an experiment of sorts, you see.  God’s got ideas about what should happen.  But, it’s an experiment.  Might not go that way.

            But, God plants this great garden.  All the food this living, breathing man could need was right there.  “Eat any of it,” God said.  “Eat any of it except for this one tree.”  Things might not go the way God planned it or wanted it.  You see that?  It’s like an experiment with this God.

            Here’s what I mean.  God then notices that the man needed some help tending to the garden, tilling the ground and whatnot.  And God sets about making all sorts of things that might work.  The story goes, in fact, that God made every kind of living animal you could ever imagine.  And God, you get the idea, is very excited about each of these things.  God makes one, brings it over to the man, and then let the man give it a name.  Now, all of this is in search of some living creature to be a helper, a partner for the man.  That’s what it says.

            So, God makes a pigeon.  At some point, God makes a pigeon.  I’m filling in the blanks a little bit here.  God makes a pigeon, brings it over to the man in the garden, and says, “what about this?”

            “Well, let’s call it a pigeon,” the man replies.  “I like how it flies.  I can’t fly.  A flying helper would be good.  Thanks for the pigeon, Lord.”

            But, after a short time the pigeon couldn’t really do a whole lot.  Flying was a big help, but the man couldn’t speak with the pigeon.  And the pigeon made a mess.  Terrible mess.  Besides which the pigeon couldn’t carry hardly a thing.  It wasn’t a good partner for the man.

            And God makes a deer, too.  Trying to find a good helper for the man.  And the man said to God, “just beautiful, Lord.  I’ll call it a deer.”

            “Deer.  I like that, man.  But what do you call more than one of them?”

            “Seems like deer.  Deer for one of them.  Deer for many of them.  It’s a funny word.  But, it seems to fit, doesn’t it?”

            “Indeed,” God replied.

            But, the deer wasn’t much help at all.  It could run the day long, but the man couldn’t keep up.

            God really thought the solution was in hand, though.  God made this cute little, furry animal with longing eyes and a wagging tail.  “Man will like this, I’m sure of it.”

            And the new animal snuggled up to the man, licked his cheek, and the man was instantly fond of it.  The man said, “Lord, I think you’ve done it.  This is a dog.  And he’s my best friend.”

            God rested for a while after that.  The two had a big time together.  But, then the man came back to God and said, “truth is, Lord, that this is more work for me than it is for the dog.  He’s not a helper.  I always have to get his food and clean up after him.  I love him.  I’ll keep him.  But, he’s not a helper and not a partner.”

            And God thought through it.  What the man needed was an equal.

            So, God caused the man to sleep very deeply.  And God reached into the man’s body, pulled out a rib, and formed this beautiful and mysterious creature.  To that the man said, “Lord?  Wow.  I think you’ve got it.  This at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh.  This one shall be called Woman.”

            Now, did you ever imagine God would have such a time?  Trying this.  Trying that.  Not everything always worked like God imagined it would.  Did you ever imagine God would have such a time?  But, that’s what the Bible says.

            One time, you know, God decided to just pretty much start over.  Said the whole world was just filled with violence and abuse.  So, God was frustrated that it hadn’t all worked out the way it was supposed to.  As if God was in control of things.  And God made a flood to wipe the slate clean.  Did you ever imagine God would have such a time?  Put one family of each living thing in a big boat, and just started over.

            You can hear it if you listen.  God says, “what’ll happen if I do this?  And what’ll happen if I do that?”  You can hear it if you listen.

            “What’ll happen if I reveal myself to Abram?  Will he believe in me?”

            “What’ll happen if I save these imprisoned people from Egypt and make them my own?  Can I change the entire world?”

            “What’ll happen if I send a prophet to warn my people about their abuses?  Will they listen?  Or will I have to watch them suffer?”

            “What’ll happen if I show them all just how much I truly love them by sending this man to suffer and die like a criminal crucified on a wooden cross?  What will happen?  Will these people see it and believe and give their live responding to my incredible love for them?”

            It’s an experiment with God.  How will people respond?

            You might not have been taught to think of God as experimenting with things.  I know that.  Experimenting and not exactly being in control of how things turn out isn’t the way everybody has talked about God.  God’s all powerful, you know.  Omnipotent.  And this experimenting doesn’t sound like omnipotence.  It might not go like an omnipotent God planned.  Well, you heard the stories.  Maybe this all powerful God is able to do anything, but the results depend on finicky and unpredictable variables.  Things unpredictable like human hearts.

            And you’ve heard that God is all knowing.  All powerful.  All knowing.  God knows what is going to happen.  Right?  God knows what you’re going to do before you do it.  It’s the kind of stuff that led people to once say that every human soul was predestined to either be saved or eternally punished.  Anything else would be a blasphemous violation of God’s all knowing, or omniscient nature.

            God once sent a prophet named Jonah to the city of Ninevah.  Terrible place that was, too.  Corrupt.  Violent.  Abusive.  Ninevah.  Worse than Jeffersonville.  And Jonah eventually got to the place and proclaimed that God was going to destroy them for all their wickedness.  You know what happened?  They repented!  Put on sackcloth and ashes like it was Lent.  All of them.  Even the king of the place.

            Now, I ask you.  If God always knew what was always going to happen, why does the Bible say that God “changed His mind about the destruction He was going to bring upon Ninevah” when those people repented?

            Sounds to me like God is experimenting with how to get folks to respond the way it was intended.  Always trying different things.  The results are in question.  But, God’s intimately involved with it.

            “What’ll happen if I do this?”

            “What’ll happen if I do that?”

            Here’s one.  “What’ll happen if I send a bunch of wonderful children to Park Christian Church in New Albany?  How will that change things?  How will they respond?  I wonder if they can discover a new purpose and a new vision for themselves.”

            Now, I say that because there isn’t any other way to explain what’s happened here lately.  Must be that God is experimenting with how to do something new in this wonderful old congregation.  Must be.  Must be part of how God does new things.

            And if God is trying to do something new, should we be open to trying some new things ourselves in order to take care of these kids?  I mean if God’s open minded to seeing how things turn out with a twist here and a twist there, maybe we can learn a thing or two about how to approach the world and our ministry to it.

            So, I invite you to experiment with me a little bit.

Rev. David James Brown

Park Christian Church (Disciples of Christ)