Intimate Divinity

September 8^th, 2013         “Intimate Divinity”         Rev. Heather Jepsen

Psalm 139 with Jeremiah 18:1-11

          Our texts this morning present us with a very interesting image of the divine.  Rather than the absent God who sets the planets spinning and sits back to watch; this morning’s readings ask us to imagine an intimate God.  The readings invite us to wonder about a God who molds and shapes us; a God who knows our very mind and heart, perhaps even before we know them ourselves.

          Psalm 139 is often thought to be a prayer of defense against the charge of idolatry.  When faced with the accusation of having drifted from the worship of God alone, the Psalmist declares all the ways that they have been familiar with God.  The psalmist pleads for God to examine them and declare them innocent of such misdeeds.  If God knows the psalmist so well, then surely God knows that the psalmist’s heart has not strayed.

          From the microscopic to the cosmic, the psalmist envisions God present in all times and places.  From the cellular level of early life to the far reaches of earth and space, there is no place or thing that is not known to the divine.  God is the one who has created all of life; and the life of the psalmist in particular.  Not only has God knit us together in our mother’s womb, God has seen our very bones as they were being woven together in the center of the earth.  From the known process of gestation and birth to the wonder and mystery of the life of the soul, God has been privy to our every moment.

          In life the Psalmist cannot escape God.  God knows all the actions and thoughts of the writer.  God knows when we sit down and rise.  God knows all our thoughts, deep secrets and prayers.  God knows the plans we have, the hopes we hope, and the dreams we dream.  There is not a word we say, or think, that isn’t already known by our God.  Such is God’s amazing level of intimacy in our lives.

          As the Psalmist writes, “God surrounds us – front and back.”  There is nowhere to hide from such an intimate love.  We cannot get away from God.  The Psalmist imagines heading to all edges of the known world to escape the divine eye.  But there is no escape from God.  If we fly to heaven, God is there.  If we go down to the grave, once thought to be beyond the reach of God, God is there.  If we fly on the wings of the sunrise to the far edge of creation, God is there.  Even if we try to hide in the darkness of the blackest night, God is there.

          We cannot get away from God.  And as the Psalmist tells it, where God is, reading our minds and knowing our thoughts, God is controlling our lives.  Even in our best hiding places, in places where we have hoped to be alone, God’s hand is guiding our lives.  God’s strong hand is holding us tight.  Making sure that all comes to pass as it was written on the scroll of our lives while we were still a twinkling in the eyes of our parents.

          Incomprehensible, vast, overwhelming; such is the knowledge and presence of this God who seeks us out.  As the psalmist says, “This kind of knowledge is too much for me.”  And you know what?  I think it’s too much for me too!

          It doesn’t take too much study of this psalm to start getting uncomfortable.  Who is this smothering God, this creepy God, this watching God?  A God we cannot get away from?   Where is the comfort here?  Like the NSA God is watching our every move.  God knows not only what I bought on Amazon, but why I bought it.  God knows not only who I call on the phone, where I call them from, and what I say; but why I called them and what I was hoping to say.  Like Big Brother, there is no escaping God.  God knew of me before my birth and planned out my life.  God is watching my every moment and like the thought police, God is searching my mind and heart.  God is hemming me in on all sides and there is no escape.  God is smothering me.

          This image is especially frightening when paired with our reading from Jeremiah.  Like a potter at a wheel God is busy crafting.  If we read this like many preachers do, and the pot is a person, then I believe we are all lost.  If this Big Brother God knows all my deeds, all my thoughts, and all my miss-steps then I don’t stand a chance.  If God is crafting me in judgment, then I am lost.  Like all people, I am a sinner.  There is nothing for me but to be squished down and destroyed.  As Jeremiah writes, the clay has become spoiled in the potter’s hand.

          Needless to say, I don’t like that traditional reading.  I don’t think we are the pot, simply waiting to be crushed by the hand of a judgmental and frustrated potter.  No, I think that in this metaphor the pot represents the plan or perhaps the hope that God has for our lives.  In the text God speaks of changing God’s mind about judgment for Israel just as a potter changes their mind about the work they are creating.  It is judgment and blessing that are being considered and re-crafted here, not the people of Israel themselves.

Perhaps, just as a potter has an idea of a work of art, so too God has an idea of a work of art that would be our lives.  A work of art crafted from blessing and suffering alike.  As the potter works the clay, with a delicate or firm hand, the clay responds.  Too much or too little pressure and the clay collapses.  The potter molds and shapes the clay and what appears may or may not resemble their hopes for the piece.  It is a living process between the potter, the clay, and even the working environment. 

          So too, God turns and shapes not us, per se, but a pattern and hope for our lives.  Too much or too little pressure from God and we begin to become misshapen.  Perhaps, the message of the text is not that God destroys the wayward pot, but that God is continually crafting and the pot is never finished.  God is continually adjusting the artist’s technique, learning how best to deal with each separate piece of clay.  Where some need to be pushed, others need to be pulled.  Where some need a firm touch, others need the gentlest of nudges.  When the hands of God push us out of place then we are reworked.  No clay is wasted, no lump is tossed.  All clay is of value and the artist continues to shape each piece into its truest form. God is not afraid to start over again. 

          And how does God the artist work?  Through this intimate relationship with us.  From our first cellular moments to our final dying breaths God knows us and is forming us into better people, into the best works of art our lives can be.  The story illustrates the malleability of God’s plan for us.  The divine mind can be changed, and the creation of a perfect life story is a push and pull between the creator and the creation.  While our stories may have been written before our births, we are constant co-creators of that story with God.

          If we envision the smothering God not as Big Brother, but as an artist, then we can find some hope in what can be a frightening Psalm.  As an artist values their creation, so we are valued by our God.  Not for what we may become or even what God’s hopes for our lives are, but for what we are right now in this very moment.  If we imagine God’s overwhelming presence as a blanket of creative love, rather than an all-seeing eye of judgment, then perhaps we can find comfort and peace.

          When things go wrong and our lives are not what we hoped they would be, this can be a word of grace to us.  Sometimes when we are in tremendous pain and despair, it can be too hard to pray, too hard to speak to God.  In those times it is a blessing knowing that we don’t need to speak at all.  God knows our thoughts and hearts.  God is with us in our suffering, even if we are not able to name our sufferings out loud to God.  Like a warm blanket, God’s presence surrounds us to give us comfort and peace, calming our hearts in a world that so often incites us to fear.

          We find this comforting presence of the divine artist here at the communion table today.  If we believe the words of the Psalmist than we know that God has followed, if not preceded each of us here this morning.  God knows why we have come and what we need.  God knows how we hunger and thirst.  And so, God meets us here at the table in bread and juice.  God meets us here in spiritual nourishment.  “Yes, I know who you are,” God seems to say.  “I know who you really are, and I have gathered you here today so that you may be fed.”

          Rather than an artist who crushes down and throws away clay that will just not cooperate, God is ever patient with our lives.  Forming and re-forming, God is continually working out the plan and hope for our existence.  And together we are discovering just how much pressure is the right pressure for God to apply in each situation.  We are co-creators with God, forming a more perfect creation.

          Yes, God sees and knows our very self, but not in a desire to watch and judge.  God sees and knows us in a desire to be close to us in love.  It is true that we cannot escape from God.  But rather than being a threat, perhaps this is a comfort.  For there are times in our lives where we don’t know or care to know God, and there is grace in the fact that God knows us anyway.  And God loves us always.  Thanks be to God for this intimate divinity.  Amen.