Luke: 15: 1-10
God’s infinite love finds us all
God’s infinite care seeks for us.
God’s merciful love, God’s compassionate care
Makes all mankind whole once again.
Mankind was created to be complete and whole without the blemish of sin. In the days of Narnia, in the days of Garden of Eden human race was without the stain of sin. But then those days passed. Mankind moved into a time and space where the finiteness stepped into human experience and man struggled with it. Because the unlimited reality of time and space in which they were created and to be part of, became limited experience that they are not used to.
Adam and Eve, supposedly infinite creatures became finite overnight. Why because they tasted, as the story goes, the fruit of finiteness that decayed and rotted. They took into themselves the nature of finite matters and thus became limited beings with an end spanning to a few years. Unbounded and endless nature of man became bounded, limiting his freedom.
But in this story of losing infiniteness the saddest person was not the human being. It was the creator who made them to be infinite. For the creator made mankind to be His friends, children and companions in the creative work. God enjoyed the company of his friend. For God took an evening walk with Adam everyday. God conversed with him and his friend Eve everyday about the things he was planning for them. Mankind was created to be co-creators with God. God discussed His plans and planets. God shared with man His dreams and visions for the millions of stars and galaxies . God enjoyed the silence they both shared and enjoyed the company of each other. He lost it. God lost his friends.
God was sad because God had great plans for Adam and Eve. He hoped for the days ahead when Adam and Eve, all their children and children’s children will become the joyful sound in the Garden of Eden. The music of heaven would be adorned with the sound of music from the throats of his children. Garden of Eden was his dream and his hope. God wishes to walk with man every evening. God’s love for His creation was and is for more than pleasure. God’s creative mind was excited for the possibilities of co-creation. He lost it. Man became limited in his imagination, limited in his scope, limited in his life. There came boundaries and limits in his mind. Colors became seven and sounds became seven. Limited numbers and spaces became the rule for mankind who were created to live without them. God lost his hopes for his sons and daughters to return on their own.
God was sad because God’s love for mankind slowly pushed his infinite nature to take upon the finiteness of those whom he loved most. God became limited and bound by time and space for once. Because God’s heart was moved with compassion for Adam and Eve, who were created in the image and likeness of God. God’s heart ached. He was sad rather than angry. He was in grief and he mourned for the day he lost them. God promised to become finite to go along with his loved creation – the human race.
Then, God had to work things out. God planned his course of action. God meditated over the pros and cons of what his decision would bring. God prepared the way, thousands of years preparing to plunge into the finiteness of humanity where his loved creatures seem to travel easily. God watched them carefully day and night. He learned their ways. He understood their passions and desires. At times God became upset. For God so loved his creatures, he promised to let go of His infiniteness for a short while. God so loved mankind. God so loved mankind. God was upset because man get out of the pits he jumped into. God watched them helplessly. For it was not His realm. Limitedness was not God’s character. God struggled with man’s failure. But God’s love overcame His struggle.
Then God found a way to struggle with his pain and move closer to God’s people. God found men and women who could at least understand his pain and become his spokes person. God chose them who in their finiteness took time to experience the infinite character of their creator. People like Moses and Aaron walked with God and conversed with God. People like Abraham and Isaac took their time to go for an evening walk and sometimes days and nights with him. God became real again in the lives of people who had lost Him because of the intrinsic difference.
Moses became a friend of God. He spent his evenings with God. Moses loved God, he challenged God and he called God to change the course of His action. Moses reminded God of his own love for humanity. Moses invited God to walk with him like a friend. God enjoyed every bit of the challenge Moses threw at Him. For God was waiting for a chance to come down to the midst of his most loved creation in the whole wide world.
God realized mankind can not put up with delays – Moses was delayed and that is what man always is and God was never late, God was always with them. It is not in the basic nature of man as they were created by the omnipresent God.
God realized mankind can not put up with monotony of the world although in God always life was vibrant, new and creative as they are used to.
God realized mankind can not live without seeing His face as was in the days of Garden of Eden.
God could not keep away any more. Even though it was man’s sin that separated him from God, it became God’s need to love mankind as God saw how lost mankind was without God. God need friends to walk with. God need friends to talk to. God need friends to plan things. And again God saw how hard it is for humanity to adjust to the limited nature of this world as they are created to be without limits of the time and space. How terribly they miss seeing the face of God everyday in their lives. Thus it became God’s need to find us, who are lost. For God so loved the world, that God decided to take upon human nature that He can journey them to endlessness.
Walk with your children today, walk with them to heaven if you find them lost in the finiteness, limitedness of this world. For that is not their nature. Walk with them and walk towards God who is never late, never away and always creative. Let us get back to the Garden of Eden and take a walk with God.
Listen to the podcast of this sermon. Click here
———————————————————
C & R by Fr. Jos Tharakan
