As humans we have a huge problem when we talk about God – we have to use language and human language can never adequately describe or define God.  Creation can weakly reflect the Creator but can never really define Him.  However, this doesn’t stop us trying to do it!  On Radio 4 this week the director of the British Museum has been looking at religious objects which help define human history.  He charts changes in how God or the gods have been portrayed.  What happens, time and time again, is in art and language we try to make God in our own image – rather than realise that we are made in God’s. 
These ideas are seen in this week’s song – God is God – by Joan Baez.  The words are at the end of the song sheet. 

[Play Song]

Joan Baez

Joan Baez is famous for her 60s protest song "We shall overcome" which she no longer sings as she isn't sure that we actually will anymore.  

She is a folk singer who was at the forefront of the civil rights campaigns in America in the 1960s and 70s.  She also was a campaigner for lesbian and gay equality.  She has kept singing though her style has changed over the years.  The song we heard today, God is God,  is deeper than many of her songs and has many theological ideas within it.  

She now seems to see a need for Divine guidance: "every day that passes I'm sure about a little bit less....and I believe in God...but God ain't us"  The song starts off by recognising that prophecy - speaking God's truth into a situation - is a rare gift.  Baez is well placed to see this with her singing history singing songs of protest about the injustice of society.  

The second verse with the idea of the burning bush takes us back to Moses and his experience of meeting God who revealed himself as "I Am" which we heard read to us by Catherine.  Baez encounters God in many places "something sacred burning in every bush and tree", and she wants to join in with song the angels sing.  She sees God in creation but seems unsure about laws "never seen a line in the sand", she realises she needs God but recognises that God is never the caricature that we make him.  

The faith expressed in the song is tentative at best - "maybe someone's watching and wondering what I got...and maybe not".  But there are strong links with the reading from Exodus.

I Am Who I Am

In our reading from Exodus we heard of Moses’ mysterious encounter with God at the burning bush.  Moses saw a bush aflame but not consumed by the flames and went to investigate.  As he approached a voice told him to remove his shoes as he was standing on holy ground – a practice our Muslim brothers and sisters remember when entering a mosque – and God gives Moses his mission to “set my people free”.   Understandably Moses wonders what Pharaoh will make of him re-appearing after many years absence from Egypt asking for the slave nation of the Jews to be allowed to leave; he asks in whose name he should ask – after all every god has a name.  But God refuses to give his name – simply saying “I am who I am” which could also be translate as “I will be who I will be”.  God wasn’t going to let Moses, or anyone, else know his name as to know someone’s name is to have a degree of power over them. 

This divine name is built on the Hebrew verb "to be" and is related to the divine name used frequently throughout the Old Testament, "Yahweh," or YHWH (the transliterated Hebrew consonants without the vowels). An earlier generation of scholars turned the Y into a J and with some vowels made the name “Jehovah” – you may have seen the skit in Life of Brian where someone is stoned for saying “Jehovah” which rather makes the point about being careful not to utter the name.  Now it’s generally thought that the name is “Yahweh” but this is never said allowed by Jewish people who often even write God as G-d.  In the Jewish tradition, this special name of God is considered so holy that it is not to be pronounced in prayer or worship (hence, the absence of vowels). The NRSV translation represents this special divine name with the phrase "the LORD." This is the convention used by the most translations of the Bible today. 

Naming God

Yet humans have always tried to name, label, describe and define the divine.  From the earliest times gods have been portrayed in very human terms – it’s not surprising we only have ourselves to go on really!  So all the Greek and Roman gods seemed to be supernatural versions of humans with very human emotions and foibles.  But the God of the Bible is different in that it’s not easy to pin Him down with our human ideas and tendency to anthropomorphise.  In Genesis we are told that God created humanity in His own image but we’ve been trying to create God in our own image ever since.

The Biblical writers did their best to describe God, often – but not always – using male imagery for God.  He is the husband of the people of Israel which is often portrayed as a faithless wife.  One of the prophets, Hosea, married a prostitute who wouldn’t stay faithful to symbolise through his own life the love God has for a faithless people. 

The images of God in the early books of Genesis mix between the Spirit (without body, form or gender) who breathed over the waters to give life to the Universe and the person who walks in the Garden of Eden in the cool of the evening. 

In Exodus God appears as a burning fire – both in the bush and in the pillar of fire which lead the people of Israel out from Egypt by night, and by day as a pillar of cloud. 

In Deuteronomy the writer, observing how a mother eagle helps her young to fly by swooping under and supporting their first faltering attempts at flight, saw this as a powerful image of God who supports Her people in their first attempts at independence.  We will sing this image later on in the service. 

In the Psalms, as in our song Faithful one, God is compared to an inanimate object – a rock which we can cling to in the storms of life. 

In the prophets God is portrayed as the owner of a vineyard – an image that Jesus also used – but the vineyard yields bad grapes. 

In the New Testament Jesus startlingly refers to God as “Abba” which doesn’t mean “father” but “daddy”.  It’s an intimate, playful, childlike word for God which has connotations of love and familiarity which is different from the stern “father”.  He compares God to a father who runs to welcome home the estranged, yet compares himself to a mother hen who gathers up her chicks to nurture and protect them.  He is the good shepherd who looks after the sheep – another startling image as no one wanted to be a shepherd living a semi nomadic life of poverty.

Beyond our Words and Ideas

God is always beyond our ability to describe, define, and pin down.  As Joan Baez reminds us “God is God” and that God is the  “God of my little understanding” who “Don't care what name I call”.  It is always tempting to imagine God in ways which make sense for us but we need to be careful to realise that when we speak of God we always speak in similes – when we say “God is father” we mean “God is like a father who is loving and just”, when we say “God is mother” we mean “God is nurturing and tender like a mother”, when we say “God is my anchor” we mean that “we cling to God through the storms of life like a ship clings to an anchor”. 

All language about God is inadequate.  In a song we’ll sing later on in the service we note that “then one day, I’ll see him as he sees me, the lover and the loved, no more words, the longing will be over, there with my precious Jesus”.  At the moment we’re limited by words, one day we’ll see God as God really is; this is so much more than we can imagine, then we will stop limiting God by our ideas, our culture, and our language.

Prayer

Loving God,
We cling to you in the storms of life as a ship is held secure by it’s anchor,
We rejoice in your tender mothering love which nurtures us and helps us grow,
Like a gentle father you give us security and warmth,
You guide us through life as once you guided your people by cloud and fire,
You stir our souls and help us rejoice,
You sooth our pain and help us when we mourn.
Help us never to limit you in our ideas, our language, our songs or our prayers,
So that when we come to see you, face to face, at the end of our journey,
We may embrace the familiar, recognise the unusual
And continue to join you in your dance of love.
Amen.

Amen.