Good Friday Meditation 1

march 21, 2008


The Enigma of a Despised and Rejected God


In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth, and he literally spoke the world into being.

In the beginning God breathed into the dust and created humanity in his image.

He looked at creation, and he saw that is was good - very good - and he told humanity to be fruitful and to multiply and have dominion over all of the earth.

How incredible! What more could God do?

Obviously it wasn’t enough.

For, the God who created all things was rejected from the very beginning.

Humanity ate the forbidden fruit and in essence told God that they didn’t want or need him any more…they could be their own gods, thank you very much.

How enigmatic that God would allow himself to be treated that way.

So, you would think that he would straighten things out, set things straight, so that it wouldn’t happen again.

Sadly, the rejection of God in the Garden which he created by the people he created was only the beginning.

Read scripture: it happens again and again and again.

The prophet Isaiah had an incredible vision in which he saw the Lord high and lifted up, with his robe filling the temple, seraphs flying about him singing “Holy, Holy, Holy, is the Lord of hosts, the whole earth is full of his glory.”

Now, dear hearts, that is what we would expect of God.

That is his rightful place and that is how it should be.

But, is that how it is?

But, listen to what Isaiah also has to tell us about God:

“He was despised and rejected by others; a man of suffering and acquainted with grief, and as one from who other hide their faces he was despised, and we held him of no account.”

Despised, rejected? This is God we are talking about.

But listen to what else Isaiah has to say:

“He was wounded for our transgressions, crushed for our iniquities, upon him was the punishment that made us whole, and by his bruises we are healed.

All we like sheep have gone astray; we have all turned to our own way and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all.

What an enigma. God, rejected despised, crushed, bruised.

Not only that, but why in the world would God take upon himself our sins, our iniquities, our failures.

Good sense would have let us stew in our own juice.

But, then again who is God?

God is love.

God so loved the world that he gave his only son so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but have eternal life.

Perhaps it is not so enigmatic at all, for love is unconditional and true love always opens itself up to be despised and rejected.

Isn’t that the human story - who among us has not had our love rejected or despised by someone else.

God, then, took the entirety of humanity upon himself because that was the only way he could save us, and he wanted to save us because he loves us.

Jesus said, “And I, when I am lifted up from the earth, I will draw all people to myself.”

God, in Christ, was lifted up on a cross, on a hill, on this Friday afternoon, and as the cross was being lifted and put into place, all humanity was drawn into the heart of God.

In the letter to the Philippians, St. Paul tells us:

“Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not regard equality with God as something to be exploited, but emptied himself taking the form of a slave, and being found in human form, he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death - even death on a cross.

Therefore God also highly exalted him and gave him the name that is above every name, so that every knee should bend, in heaven and on earth, and under the earth, and every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.”

The enigma of a rejected and despised God has provided for you and for me forgiveness, salvation, and life everlasting.

God has now done all that needs to be done.

And, because he was despised and rejected, we are now his beloved children, and as St. Paul tells us: “For I am convinced that neither death nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.

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