Building on previous post, more re loving God

Here are a few more thoughts, building on my previous posting about vocations.

One of the reasons that God sent Jesus Christ was to bring God’s love to humans, in person. One of the afflictions of the age during which Jesus was born was that the Israelites had lost much of their love of God. By love of God, I mean the personal relationship of love dialogue, as I described in my previous posting in this blog.

I know that many of you assume that a personal love of God is something that really did not exist in the Old Testament times, but you would be wrong. I can explain this in several ways. One is to point out the obvious love of God that is expressed in books such as the Psalms, the Song of Solomon, Ecclesiastes, Wisdom, and Isaiah and in many other places. You can distinguish the fervor of love from the feelings of fear of God. So many of the faithful did indeed feel a fervor of personal love for God, although it was not the focus of the law and obligations for worship as documented in the scripture. You have to read between the lines a little bit to understand where the authors are swept away in the grandeur of God, and in appeal to him for justice, or fear of his wrath, from the contemplations of the wonders of his work and also their sense of personal love for him.

Second, love tended to be expressed in parent and child terms during those times. There really is no way to describe to modern humans exactly the love between a father and his first born son, for example. So much of the personal love dialogue that I speak of is cloaked in the depth of love that a father and first born son have for each other, rather than ardent friendship, shepherd, and consoler that Jesus brought in person. So you have to remember that love for God was just as personal and ardent during Old Testament times, but tended to be expressed and felt in much more of the treasured father-first born son as it was back then. In fact, readings for the Mass from this week indicate times when God is frustrated with the hypocrisy of their ritual worship of him while at the same time sinning. It is not that the sinning “makes God mad” so he “doesn’t care about the sacrifices,” but rather, when one sins one does not love God. Sin is the expression of not-love of God. So you have to understand that from “God’s point of view,” when one sins one is acting in a way that is not indicating love of God. Trust me, people did not obey God just because he cracked the whip and threatened them with punishment or hell. Many, MANY people in Old Testament times had a fervent personal love relationship with God, but it was perceived as something that did not have to be preserved in scripture as a special point. The many allusions to father-first born son love was really the way the people of that time felt, in its nearest equivalent, their personal love relationship and dialogue with God. It has wrongly been portrayed as a time of when fear wrung obedience out of the people, but as I said, the fervent and personal love of God is evident but in a much more subtle way throughout the Old Testament.

A third point to make is that when Jesus was born there were many “distractions” from a person’s love relationship with God, much as today. The Roman occupation, the secular temptations and the corruption of the money changers and much of the priesthood were all interferences between the faithful and their personal love relationship with God. Some of it was understandable, as they kept “waiting” for God to “do something,” in the miraculous fashion to impact the political or military situation. Impatiently tapping one’s foot at God expecting an army of angry angels to whoop the butts of the Romans is not exactly conducive to the love and adoration of God, and this had a very corrosive effect on the faith of the Israelites and the fervent love of God that their forefathers had. So this is another reason that in the beauty and, to humans, mystery of God’s perfect plan, he sent “his Son.” The people still well understood the father-first born son devotion that was culturally historic, as I describe above, and so remained relevant and a way to make God again “accessible.” Through Jesus God opened that door to re-personalize the mutual love that had been blocked and corroded by the dire condition of the Israelites. This is why you can read in the Gospel that thousands responded over and over to the obvious “magnification” of God’s love onto the people through Jesus. Jesus allowed the people to overcome the corrosive times, the cynicism, and the oppression of pagan conquerors, plus their own priests’ corruption, and once again connect to God using a love metaphor that they understood of father and first born son. Jesus never had to declare God his Father to the flock who listened to him, or that he is the Son, for this love metaphor to work. You see, Jesus was acting as the loved “agent” of God, just as the first born son would for his father in family business or work. Jesus explained God to the people, demonstrated his obvious love and obedience to God in all things, and magnified his love for God so that the people could see through unspoken example. This is why people did not run around trying to worship Jesus himself on the spot. When people left one of Jesus’ “sermons,” they left feeling more fervent love for God.

This is why it is perfectly alright to love Jesus with one’s whole heart and soul, and to focus one’s love on him. However, it is not being one hundred percent true to either Jesus’ intentions or what he actually accomplished when he was here on earth to have the love “stop at Jesus” and not extend through to God. If one truly wants to imitate those who heard Jesus in person and who believed, then you must come away from an encounter with Jesus loving him, yes, but recognizing that your love is really extending through Jesus to loving God, and feeling his love in return, himself. I do worry very much about this pious generation and the parts of Christianity who have forgotten this, or never realized it. Why is it that people, even as Jesus performed incredible miracles, did not throw themselves at his feet in organized worship on the spot? Because, obviously, it was their faith in God and love of God that was refreshed and restored, and that is exactly what Jesus wanted. Jesus came in order to be the Savior and the Messiah, but this does not mean that he was not “bringing God” to the people, but only himself. I often repeat how Pope Benedict XVI wisely phrased it in his book “Jesus of Nazareth,” that he, Jesus, “brought us God.” When the son represents the father, and is his agent, for the Israelites (and many cultures of the land, including what would become the Muslim people), the son speaks for the father, and has the authority “as if the father himself is there.” But that does not mean that the son wants people to only “deal with him” and forget about the father and his authority. Jesus made God, the Father, more accessible, restoring the love dialogue between the people and God, and between the individual and God. And then he died, resurrected and “returned to the Father.” If you want to imitate “how the Church really was” “in Jesus’ time” then one must understand that exposure to Jesus resulted in more fervent and personal love of God himself.

I hope that you find this helpful. It is a source of great concern for me, especially regarding Christians who are outside of the Catholic Church. The Catholic Church in its liturgy retains more of the continuity of devotion to God and this is why I am not quite as worried about those within the Church as I am for those outside of it. Here is a practical example of how to reflect on what I mean. How often does one feel an experience of loving God very deeply in gratitude for sending Jesus, compared to how often one focuses all of one's love on Jesus? I'm not talking quantity here, but giving you an exercise to see if you are truly "loving God through Jesus" or if you have stopped feeling the "follow through" through Jesus all the way to God, and thus do not really contemplate your love for God and fully extend and receive the dialogue in return from God in his fullness.