Scandalous Love - Hosea 3:1

Christmas celebrations mean different things to different people. For some of us it a joyous time to gather with family and celebrate together - seeing those who we may not get to be with often. But for others it is a reminder of past hurts - I recently had a friend tell me that Christmas is always a tainted holiday in her house because her husband’s great grandmother left his grandfather that day. And that sadness has penetrated down through generations that never even met each other. Christmas isn’t always joyous. For some it is marked by family wounds, loneliness, and the absence of a loved one. 

Christmas is a time that seems to magnify our emotions. Whenever I think of this season one of the stories that comes to my mind is a Christmas Carol. While the book describes those around the season as being generally of good will, I tended to see the story as one that shows who we are at our deepest level. For those who are kind and generous, the Christmas season brings out that generosity even more. But for those who are wounded and bitter, this season reopens those wounds and causes even more bitterness. 

These general attitudes carry over to how we address God. For those who are wounded, questions often arise about how God could ever love them. Why God would ever desire to be with them, let alone redeem them. During September and October, our parish Bible Study was on God’s grace. One thing that kept coming up time and time again was how people make the comment that they just aren’t good enough to come to Church, or they’ve already screwed up so much that God could never love them. Friends this is our wounded nature speaking. 

And today’s scripture verse speaks directly against such thoughts, and acts as a salve on our wounds. It is our balm in Gillead. The prophet Hosea was instructed by God to take a prostitute who continually cheated on him as his wife. His marriage was to be a living metaphor for the people of Israel for their relationship with God. Even though they wondered away. Even though they turn to other Gods. Even though they placed their hope and desire in things that could not satisfy them, God keeps redeeming them. And God keeps redeeming us. 

Christmas is our time to celebrate the God who is with us - Emmanuel. The God who wants to be with us. In fact, the God who wants to be with us so much that he shed his honor and glory in order to come in the form of a humble, helpless baby to show us the way to God. To redeem us. God’s love for us cannot be defined rationally. God’s desire for us cannot be diminished. And God seeks us out as the beloved of Christ, even when we turn away and our love fails. God relentlessly pursues us, no matter what the cost. 

As much as Christmas is a time that shows who we truly are, it also shows our true priorities. In our world that runs off of shopping for the perfect gift, and filling every moment of every day, Pastor Mike Slaughter equates our Christmas celebration with Hosea’s wife saying, “Happy Birthday, Hosea! To celebrate I’m going to go party with my other friends.” While Christmas is a time that we should be drawing close to God, falling more deeply for the scandalous love of God, we often give in to the pull of the holiday culture around us. Yet God loves us even when we make this holiday that is supposed to be about the love of God, into one focused on greed, selfishness, and debt. 

We fail to understand just how scandeouls God’s love is for us. Or maybe we would rather ignore it. So we get caught up in all of the wrappings and trimmings of the holiday season. Spending more and think about God less. We don’t want to dwell on our need for God, or that things were so bad on Earth that God sent himself, humbly to be born in human form. We don’t want to think about the God who pursues us relentlessly. Instead of focusing on God we look to anything and everything else that is here to distract us during the holiday season. 

But when we set everything else aside and focus on God and God’s saving act and grace, an interesting question, an intense question, ends up coming to the surface - do I trust God to redeem me? Do I trust that God wants to love me, that God won’t give up pursuing me? Or like so many others do I think I’m beyond hope, even if I consider myself to be saved?

Because when that relentless love and hope gets a hold of us, it transforms us. It transforms us into a people who seek to share the scandalous love of God with others. We want to tell people the story of the God who can be the balm for their wounded-ness, who can free them from their past. The God who never gives up on them, no matter how many times they run away and sin like Hosea’s wife. Brothers and sisters, if you have that message ringing through your heart and Spirit this holiday season, you have to share it! God’s scandalous love cannot be contained, it is meant to be proclaimed. 

What would it look like for you to love another scandalously this season? Scandalous love is scary because it isn’t safe. It isn’t just giving someone a tangible gift, its taking a risk to share your faith story. Its not just simply doing something nice, its being able to share the faith behind what you do and say. Christians often do wonderful things in the world as manifestations of their faith, but they are cautious in telling other’s why they do what they do. Its an opportunity missed to share of God’s love.

The Christmas story points out to us that God’s ways are not our ways. Just as the story of Hosea points out the way God addresses issues and teaches lessons, probably aren’t the way we would. But God is in the business of creating miracles and scandalous love. God is in the business of working in unexpected ways in hopes to catch our attention. But the Christmas story and that of the prophet Hosea also ask us if we are willing to be loved by God and show this love to others? If we are willing to notice miracles, even if they aren’t where or when or how we expect them? 

God’s love is scandalous because it isn’t what we expect. It isn’t how we expected God to interject into human history. Yet it is that scandalous love of God that we see in our daily lives, and are called to make more visible to those around us. Friends, go forth from this place filled with that unmistakable love of God, loving even those who you deem to be unlovable, with the love and faith and hope of Christ Jesus that this season is built upon! Bravely and boldly proclaim! Amen!