The previous post of Derek Webb song lyrics and portions of the book of Hosea stand alone as a collage of interconnected stories, stories that tell the truth about the relationship between humanity and God.
We are sinners.
We are the equivalent of the harlot, the prostitute taken from prostitution to be loved truly as a wife. Lest we think even that kind of love-- love that takes a whore and calls her beloved-- does not show grace enough, follow the analogy further. Not only are we harlots taken as brides, we are brides who revert continually to our harlotry. We are wives who stray, who turn to lovers and who credit our lovers for the gifts that came not from them but from our benevolent husband. We are adulterers. We are stained, sinful sex-addicts always looking for fulfillment in all the wrong places, valuing our trinkets and baubles and the thrill of adultery above the husband whose love for us surpasses understanding. In our vain search for pleasure, fulfillment, our next meal and our next adornment, we find ourselves no longer under protection of the husband from which we have strayed; we find ourselves reduced to slavery. The grace of our husband, though, is so great that he, benevolent as he was to marry us in the first place, extends his love further to buy us back from slavery and to accept us again as wife.
The love of God, analogized in the love of Hosea, is love that weds the prostitute as wife and then redeems her from slavery to be his wife again.
Grace. We say the word easily. We know the words to "Amazing Grace," and we sing the word "grace" in praise chorus after praise chorus. We include Grace in the names of our churches, and we say "grace" before meals. Grace is part of all our formulas for understanding our relationship with God. We are saved by grace. I repeat that statement easily and without need for thought. I am certain that I can flip through my Bible and easily turn to highlighted passages explaining and extolling the greatness of that grace. Raised in the Lutheran tradition, the word grace thrills my heart, for, as a Lutheran I learn and proudly give credit to Martin Luther for articulating the motto "by Faith alone, by Grace alone, by Scripture alone." Only by grace through faith are we saved-- not by works and certainly not by pilgrimages, relics, or indulgences. This is the creed I have always known to believe. Grace. Yeah, Grace. Grace is good. I got it.
The Hosea allegory forces me to consider what grace really is, what grace really means. Grace is a pretty word that looks pretty on a sign with a pretty little dove painted beside it, but these things don't help me understand what grace truly means, how grace lives and behaves and acts.
Grace is what a man shows when he marries a prostitute with no resentment of her past, with no jealousy of her other lovers, with no ultimatums and with no ulterior motives. Grace is what a man shows when he not only forgives his wayward wife for her adultery and who not only redeems her with love but also redeems her by buying her from slavery to be restored as a wife. Imagine that kind of love, that kind of relationship. Imagine coming to terms with a past of prostitution and relapses into adultery. Imagine the feeling of redemption in accepting the love of a husband who accepts the past and the relapses without judgment. There is no guilt, there is no need to apologize, and there is nothing to repay. That is the love of Christ. He loves like the husband Hosea was to Gomer. He loves. He forgives. The guilt is gone. That is grace.
The word grace needs a richer definition. The word grace must be evaluated and weighed, felt and understood. I need to taste it on my tongue, turn it in my head, question it in my heart, feel it like the harlot of a human that I am.
Face to face with this kind of grace, how can I not love the God of this kind of grace? How can I not want to share that kind of grace with the world, not just by telling stories and spouting theology about grace but by showing that grace in action?
Grace. We say the word easily. We know the words to "Amazing Grace," and we sing the word "grace" in praise chorus after praise chorus. We include Grace in the names of our churches, and we say "grace" before meals. Grace is part of all our formulas for understanding our relationship with God. We are saved by grace. I repeat that statement easily and without need for thought. I am certain that I can flip through my Bible and easily turn to highlighted passages explaining and extolling the greatness of that grace. Raised in the Lutheran tradition, the word grace thrills my heart, for, as a Lutheran I learn and proudly give credit to Martin Luther for articulating the motto "by Faith alone, by Grace alone, by Scripture alone." Only by grace through faith are we saved-- not by works and certainly not by pilgrimages, relics, or indulgences. This is the creed I have always known to believe. Grace. Yeah, Grace. Grace is good. I got it.
The Hosea allegory forces me to consider what grace really is, what grace really means. Grace is a pretty word that looks pretty on a sign with a pretty little dove painted beside it, but these things don't help me understand what grace truly means, how grace lives and behaves and acts.
Grace is what a man shows when he marries a prostitute with no resentment of her past, with no jealousy of her other lovers, with no ultimatums and with no ulterior motives. Grace is what a man shows when he not only forgives his wayward wife for her adultery and who not only redeems her with love but also redeems her by buying her from slavery to be restored as a wife. Imagine that kind of love, that kind of relationship. Imagine coming to terms with a past of prostitution and relapses into adultery. Imagine the feeling of redemption in accepting the love of a husband who accepts the past and the relapses without judgment. There is no guilt, there is no need to apologize, and there is nothing to repay. That is the love of Christ. He loves like the husband Hosea was to Gomer. He loves. He forgives. The guilt is gone. That is grace.
The word grace needs a richer definition. The word grace must be evaluated and weighed, felt and understood. I need to taste it on my tongue, turn it in my head, question it in my heart, feel it like the harlot of a human that I am.
Face to face with this kind of grace, how can I not love the God of this kind of grace? How can I not want to share that kind of grace with the world, not just by telling stories and spouting theology about grace but by showing that grace in action?
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