The Healing Hope of our Mothering God

“Welcome Home, Iliana,” we have just said in our baptismal vows earlier this morning.

“Welcome Home, people of God,” we say every Sunday here at Madison Square.

And it catches at your heart doesn’t it? Perhaps especially on this Mother’s Day, as we long for the deepest home expressed by the Psalmist today. When our soul is soothed and quieted and we are held in the steadfast arms of the mothering God who will not ever let us go.

But there was another “Welcome Home” that caught at my heart this week. This time on a sign at a restaurant  near the crime scene in Cleveland, Ohio, where three young women finally escaped their captor.

“Welcome Home: Amanda, Gina, and Michelle,” says the sign. And our hearts fill with compassionate hope for their healing. And for the healing of anyone who has suffered such unspeakable evil. Including many of us who have “come home” to Madison Square today.

Our names may not be headline news, but it is the inescapable truth of our existence that every one of us—in some way—bears the mark of the madness that seems to run free in our midst. Every one of us—in some way—“comes home” to this sanctuary today wounded by the ways of the world. In search of the fierce and steadfast love of our “Mama Bear” God, who is desperate to protect and defend every one of her children. Whether we know their names or not.

I am hesitant to speak of such suffering in the midst of our joyful celebration this morning. But it is in fact because of the joyful celebration of the baptismal covenant—and the mothers who bring us to birth within that covenant—that we must remain vigilant in naming and confronting and healing the knowledge of evil that still yet runs rampant in this garden of life we have been given to tend as co-creators with God.

The truth is we who are human know evil far too well . . .

And we must respond!

In the Presbyterian tradition a powerful way to respond to this evil actually does come through our baptismal vows. In our tradition we literally ask the baptismal candidate—or her parents on her behalf—to make a commitment to “renounce evil.”

We couch it in positive language here at Madison Square. We base the question on our mission statement. We invite parents to “teach [their] child to ‘serve actively and creatively as an agent of love, reconciliation, peace, and justice in the community and in the world,’ which is a manner of living that renounces all evil.”

And, when asked if they agree to do this, the parents of Iliana say, emphatically, “Yes!”

And so do we!

But a more traditional service of baptism in the Presbyterian tradition uses language that is much more stark. And language that we might often avoid in our legitimate efforts to bear witness to the unconditional love of God.

“Do you renounce the evil powers of this world,” one way of asking the question goes, “which corrupt and destroy the creatures of God?”

Including—and perhaps especially—our children.

And as jarring as that language might sound to us, the truth is that any parent would also—emphatically—for the love of their child, say, “YES! I DO! I RENOUNCE the evil powers of this world which corrupt and destroy the creatures of God!! I want my child to be well!

The theologian Daniel Migliore would describe our baptismal renunciation of evil as a steadfast commitment to “courageous participation in God’s struggle against suffering” (Faith Seeking Understanding, p114) with our children and for our children and by our children. Until all are made well in the fullness of time. Soothed and quieted and comforted in the arms of their mothering God, as the Psalmist sings in our Old Testament lesson today.

And the author of the book of Revelation, that is our New Testament lesson this morning, would say our renunciation of evil leads directly to God’s ultimate vision of healing hope for the whole of creation.

Like Madison Square’s baptismal vow, the renunciation of evil in Revelation is wrapped up in a positive vision of creative love.  With a river of the water of life flowing from the throne of God. And a spirit of grace that says Come! Frolic in the river! Amid the flourishing of fruit! And the broad branches of life in all its fullness! Growing in a city where pain and suffering and crying are no more!

It is the way our lives were supposed to have been all along. And it is the way our lives can yet be, when we truly renounce evil and cultivate the goodness of the creation God has consistently rushed to redeem.

Yes, admits the author of the book of Revelation, we know far too well what it is to suffer. And we live with ample evidence of the knowledge of evil in the violence that surrounds us. And we even call upon the violence of God to respond to that evil.

The first twenty chapters of the book bear witness to that.

But the final vision of Revelation, and God’s ultimate hope for humanity—in this life and not just the next—is that we might finally learn to live as a whole new creation. Where we refuse to be defined by the evil that we know. What we have done or what has been done to us. But where we define ourselves instead by the “font of identity,” in which we have been baptized. Where our “robes” have been washed clean of the stains of violence and suffering we have either inflicted or endured. And we have the right to reclaim the tree of life that has been ours to partake from the beginning of time until the end.

This is, after all, what resurrection faith is really all about.

Elizabeth Smart and Jaycee Dugard and others who have lived the deep trauma of evil bear witness to this healing hope of our mothering God. When asked how they not only have survived but have honestly come to thrive, they will say they have relied on faith and family and the steadfast hope that healing can come in the fullness of time.

Which sounds an awful lot like the baptismal covenant we continue to celebrate today.

We have said to Iliana, and to Geo and to Kimberly who mother her, that we will join them in instilling faith and church family and steadfast hope in their lives. So that they, too, might know the healing grace of God whenever and wherever they might need it.

And as important as those vows were for Iliana and Geo and Kimberly, the good news really is for every one of us who knows the evil of violence and suffering far too well.

The healing hope of our mothering God is right here for us! Right now for us! Right now with us! Splashing once again in the river of the water of life. Where Iliana and Geo and Kimberly have led us. And where everyone who is thirsty can come. And where anyone who wishes can take the water of life as a free gift of healing grace.

[go to table]

And so the Spirit and the bride say, “Come!”

And let everyone who hears say, “Come!”

And let everyone who is thirsty come!

Let anyone who wishes take the water of life as a GIFT!

I pray it may be so. Amen.