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Image: The Adoration of the Shepherds by Rembrandt

This past Monday morning at our 9 am Bible Study at Lake Mountain Coffee, we were discussing Chapter One of James Howell’s The Heart of the Psalms, and Howell referenced Barbara Brown Taylor’s sermon God’s Daring Plan.  I have not stopped thinking about it since. Barbara Brown Taylor has this incredible ability to take a story we think we know and suddenly help us hear it differently. In the sermon, she imagines the angels trying to talk God out of becoming human. They know humanity too well. They know how cruel people can be. They know about violence, rejection, heartbreak, and suffering. They cannot imagine why God would willingly step into such a fragile and painful world. And honestly, sometimes neither can I.

Because if we were designing a plan to save the world, most of us would probably choose power. We would choose certainty. We would choose something dramatic and undeniable. But God chooses vulnerability. God comes not as a warrior or a ruler surrounded by protection, but as a baby completely dependent upon other people for survival. The God who created the universe entrusted Godself to tired parents, uncertain circumstances, and an ordinary family trying to make it through the night. That image has stayed with me all week.

What strikes me so deeply about Barbara Brown Taylor’s sermon is the reminder that love is always risky. You cannot truly love from a distance. Love requires closeness, vulnerability, and openness. In Jesus, God risks all of that. God risks rejection. God risks heartbreak. God risks suffering. And maybe the most beautiful part of all is that God decides humanity is worth the risk anyway. That says something profound about how God sees us, even when we struggle to see value in ourselves.

I think so many people walk around believing God is disappointed in them or waiting for them to somehow get their lives together before God will come near. But the Christmas story says the exact opposite. God comes close before humanity deserves it. God comes close knowing fully who we are. Not the polished version we show the world. The real version. The tired version. The grieving version. The anxious version. The doubting version. The overwhelmed version. God enters into all of it willingly.

Maybe that is why this connected so beautifully with the Psalms. The Psalms are full of honest human emotion. Anger, joy, fear, hope, confusion, praise, grief — it is all there. The Psalmists do not pretend before God. They bring their whole selves. And maybe they can do that because God has already chosen to enter fully into the human experience. God is not afraid of our emotions, our questions, or even our brokenness. After all, God chose to live among us.

As we sat around the table at Lake Mountain Coffee Monday morning, talking about faith, Scripture, life, and the Psalms, I was reminded again how holy ordinary conversations can be. Maybe God’s daring plan was never about overpowering the world. Maybe it was always about loving the world enough to come close to it. And maybe that is still how God works now — through vulnerability, through presence, through compassion, through honest conversation, and through people willing to love one another even when it is risky.  See you Sunday!

Peace, Pastor Tracy

Link to the Adapation of Barbara Brown Taylor's Sermon on Clare Hayns blog: https://clarehayns.co.uk/2018/12/25/gods-daring-plan/