June 5, 2005 Tenth Sunday in Ordinary Time Proper 5 Contributed by Helene Russell

See also: [2008]

Hosea 5:15-6:6
Psalm 50:7-15
Romans 4:13-25
Matthew 9:9-13

Hosea 5:15-6:6

Hosea is one of my favorite prophets. Its richness reveals the embodied nature of God’s love for us.  A bit of context will help our study. God tells Hosea to love a woman who is a harlot and to have children with her. A parallel is made between the relationship of Hosea and his wife on the one hand, and the relationship of Yahweh and Israel on the other. Israel has betrayed Yahweh. She is unfaithful to Yahweh in worshipping other gods and in not following God’s statues. In chapter 4, God accuses Israel , saying there is “no truth, nor mercy, nor knowledge of God in the land.” Israel commits adultery and its people steal, kill and swear. (4:2).

The temptation to be avoided is to make this parallel to be between Israel and a wife, or between Hosea and God. Rather we should attend to the more complex correspondence between the two relationships of love and the trials through which that love abides.

When we arrive at chapters 5 and 6, God speaks like a spurned lover, saying I will go back to my place and wait until Israel comes to her senses and remembers that I am the only one who truly loves her and takes care of her. Then she will return to me (repent means to turn and change one’s direction) and receive with appreciation my forgiveness and gifts of rain and salvation. In turn she will give me her steadfast love and know me for who I am. I have heard that having a marriage partner is like having a witness to ones life. In this plea for Israel to know God, maybe God is asking that Israel be such a witness.

Here God is revealing God’s self as an eminently relational God. God desires Israel ’s love and understanding. God has hope that she will return to him much like a lover in a torch song. God is “hopelessly devoted” to Israel . I can almost hear God singing: 

I know I'm just a fool who's willing 
To sit around and wait for you ( 5:15 )
But Baby, can't you see
There's nothing else for me to do (6:4)
I am hopelessly devoted to you.1

This passage reveals three significant characteristics of God.  First, God is relational and desires reciprocity and mutual trust and faithfulness. (6:6) God uses the complexities of intimate human love relationships to reveal God’s desires for humanity. God’s love is not for the purpose of getting gifts from us, burnt offerings or even works righteousness. Rather God wants us to know God, accepting God’s gifts to us, appreciating all that God wants to do for us, (6:1-3) and to be steadfast in our love for God (6:6).  Secondly, God is a forgiving God and even forgives before we think about repenting and asking for forgiveness.  Lastly, God waits patiently for us to change our mind and our heart. God does not make Israel love him with coercion, but will wait patiently until she returns. God lures Israel with promises of forgiveness and memories of all that God has done for her in the past. God respects the freedom and integrity of Creation. God goes back to God’s place, leaving Israel to make her own decision. ( 5:15 )

Psalm 50

The psalm strengthens our understanding God’s relational nature, and expands our awareness of God’s presence in the earth, animals, and the whole creation. God is pleased by our praise, but truly honored by our desire to follow God’s way—for this alone leads to a loving relationship with God. Like in Hosea, God bears witness against God’s people for their/our inequities and is notably frustrated that we do not call upon God to deliver us from our trouble. (15)

Notice that God uses personal pronouns in God’s conversation with us. God says I will deliver you and you shall honor me. Let us take from this fact lessons about God that are similar to that which we learned from Hosea. Namely, that God is relational, bidding us to be God’s people in earnest with our whole heart. God waits patiently, although God appears to feel more frustration here, for us to call upon God and keep God’s ways.

Romans 4:13-18 and Matthew 9:9-13

This theme of God’s relational character and desire for mutual relationship with us continues into the second testament readings. Paul says that God’ dealings with us is and has always been based upon grace and faith, and not upon our adherence to external law or practicing works righteous. God clearly desires faith and love from us, not sacrifice or righteousness according to external laws. Forgiveness of sinners is a significant second theme that is carried over from the earlier readings. God loves us and forgives us even before we ask for forgiveness. When Jesus is rebuked for sitting with sinners who have not yet asked for forgiveness, his response is that those who have either already asked for forgiveness, and received it (or have not sinned ?), have no need to be called to repent. Jesus’ fellowship with sinners reveals God’s work in bidding us to receive the gift of forgiveness and to give our love in return.

In these and other passages that address the law and faith, it is vital to resist the temptation to polarize the Hebrew scripture readings on the one hand, and the gospel and epistle readings, on the other. Rather we should look for and assume that they are in continuity with each other. Further, we Protestants tend to have embedded assumptions about the nature of faith and the law that pit these two terms against each other. This is a false dichotomy as well and must be carefully avoided. As Christians we must be vigilant in resisting the tradition that denigrates Judaism and our inherited Jewish traditions. 

This false dichotomy between the law and the Hebrew testament on the one hand, and faith and the second testament on the other is not even in the text we are reading for today. Paul clearly says that the promise to Abraham and his descendents came through faith, not works, not strict adherence to the law, not trust in the law or in one’s own righteousness, but through Abraham’s faith in God’s grace. Here we are reminded not only of God’s steadfast faith—God always keeps God’s promises, but also of the unconditional nature of God’s love. God loves Abraham , Israel and us, based upon God’s righteousness not upon our works. God’s promise to Israel is not based upon Israel ’s adherence to the law or anything that Israel did or didn’t do. Likewise, God’s promise to us is freely given via God’s righteousness. God’s love is unconditional and steadfast in the Hebrew scriptures and in the second testament scriptures.

Faith is what characterizes the nature of our relationship with God. Faith is what joins us together. Jesus says in Luke that we are made intimates, not only by blood, but also by faith. Harkening back to the reading from Hosea in which God reveals Godself as a relational God who seeks mutuality in relating with faith, love and knowledge, we see a strong continuity with Paul’s bid to the Christians in Rome to receive God’s promise that rests upon grace and belief then and now and for always. All of these readings share the theme of God’s steadfast love for humans. 

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