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| Hosea and Gomer from Bible Historiale (French 1372) |
“Come, let us return to the Lord; for it is he who has torn, and he will heal us;
he has struck down, and he will bind us up.” (Hosea
6:1)
The prophet Hosea is a pretty funky dude. It wasn’t enough for him just
to prophecy to the nations of Judah
and Israel. Oh no. This cat had to come up with a dramatic object lesson. So
what did he do? He married “a wife of whoredom” named Gomer[i].
Gomer, by virtue (or lack of virtue) of her chosen profession, wasn’t exactly
as faithful as a golden retriever. Hosea claims God told him to marry this trollop
to symbolize the relationship between God and God’s people. That is, God is
loving, good, and forgiving, even though we all act like a bunch of floozies
chasing after false gods. But as often as Gomer plays the field, her husband—poor
slob that he is—speaks lovingly to her and forgives her.
Like all the prophets, Hosea speaks to the people collectively as a
nation. He’s trying to tell the political leaders of his day they are pursuing
a bunch of false values which God doesn’t like. God isn’t inclined to protect them
from the consequences of their stupid, selfish choices. God will, however,
still love them, forgive them, and restore them once they get their act
together and decide to be faithful. This message from the 8th
Century BCE might just as well be preached to us today.
What does God want? God
wants to restore us to a right
relationship, and God wants everyone to be part of that relationship. The only
way to make America great is for everyone to have a seat at the table so no one
goes hungry, no one is left out, and no one is despised for who they are.
Jesus in our Gospel
lesson for Pentecost 2, Year A (Matthew 9:9-13, 18-26) seems almost as radical
as Hosea. He may not marry a hooker, but he has no problem hanging out with
hookers or others who are on the outside of “decent” society. No one of the
disciples could’ve been as reviled as Matthew—a good Jewish boy who was working
for the occupying enemy, Rome. That’s like a Jewish boy working for the Nazis.
Add to this the fact that, as a tax collector, old Matt was touching Roman
coinage all day, coinage which had a graven image on it. This made him not only
unpopular (Unpopular? No. too tame a word. The dude was a traitor!), but also
ritually unclean. It was like washing his hands in a urinal. Yet Jesus chose him. Note: Matthew didn’t seek out Jesus—Jesus chose him.
Jesus sought out the
sinners. In fact, Jesus ate with
sinners. This was an act which established a close bond. After all, if you like
someone, you ask them to lunch, right? There’s something about sharing a meal
which glues folks together. The Pharisees got their Fruit of the Looms in a
twist because Jesus was eating with folks on the outside of society. “Sinners”
could refer to really notoriously wicked people, but in Jesus’ day it could
also mean people who were looked down on because they were not 100% observant
of the purity laws. “Sinner” was synonymous with being dirty.
“Dirtiness” could also be
extended to sickness, blood, and death. The logic of the day said, “If you’re
sick, it must be because God doesn’t like you. Guess you did something to
deserve a sucky life, and good people don’t want anything to do with you.” But
Jesus goes and does acts of mercy for the sick, allowing a bleeding woman to
touch him (both women and blood were looked on as being impure) and is willing
to lay his hand on a dead girl to bring her back to life and wholeness for the
sake of her dad.
A real perversion of
logic, it seems to me, is the way we “non-sinners” like to think affliction is
the fault of the afflicted. For example: the neighborhood around Faith Lutheran
of Philadelphia has recently seen an increase in homeless people. Just today I
saw a tent on the parkway lawn in front of the local Dollar Tree. We’ve even
had a homeless guy sleeping in the outside stairwell of our church building. I’ll
grant that these folks probably are “unclean”—simply because they haven’t
bathed for a while and don’t have much access to plumbing. But I have to ask if
homeless people are homeless because they’re a bunch of irresponsible, lazy
junkies, or because the cost of housing in Philly far outpaces the wages?
I will admit that there
have been some around here who fit the first description, but I’ve also
encountered one old guy whose meager public assistance checks can’t even afford
him a studio apartment. The folks at Faith invited him to share a soup supper
during Lent and some bagels in our Fellowship Hall on Easter. It might not have
helped him much, but it brought him to the table.
I am also astounded by
the reaction people have to affordable housing. Like the Pharisees of old,
there seems to be a certain aversion to having low-income homes constructed in
proximity to not-so-low-income homes. Guess folks don’t want to share their
neighborhoods with “sinners.”
Lest you see this essay
as your Religious Guy’s treatise on class oppression, I really appreciate the
fact that, in these verses, Jesus is just as willing to help a rich guy as he
is a poor, sick woman or an outcast tax collector. No amount of prestige can help
the leader of the synagogue when his little girl takes sick. There are some
kinds of suffering to which we all
are prone, and compassion is always appropriate.
Jesus lived in a time and
culture that was all about honor or shame, reward or punishment. I’m not sure
the times have changed that much. But Jesus was never about those things. His
ministry, life, and death were about bringing all of us to the family table.
God bless you this week,
my friend. Drop me a line when you can.
[i]
See Hosea 1- 2.
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