Guest preacher -  Rev. Alex Webster

Sermon Notes Sunday        27th August 2006 

Psalm 84        1 Kings 8:22-30 

                                                                         Israel’s Kingitanga 

                                               (Alternative title: Has the work of creation changed God?) 

Over the past fortnight, much of the attention of NZ has been on the death of the Maori Queen Dame Te Ata and the coronation of the new Maori king, King Tuheitia. Our reading this morning talks about King Solomon who was third in the line of Kings of Israel. I don’t intend to speak about the scripture reading we have heard this morning although of course it is a beautiful passage. I would like to think about the “king movement” of Israel. As far as I am concerned, the story of the rise of the kings of Israel is a fascinating one. It raises many questions and I would like to suggest, can be a window into a new way of thinking about God. Before we return to the kings of Israel, a little background. 

Our view of reality has a significant influence on the way in which we think and talk about our concept of God. Our view of God is linked to our view of reality. I want to talk briefly about two Greek philosophers and their influence on how we might think of God. The first is named Parmenides. 

Parmenides (c 515 – 450 BCE) was an ancient Greek philosopher born in Elea, a Hellenic city on the southern coast of Italy. He is one of the most significant of the pre-Socratic philosophers. As Parmenides reflected on the world around him, he was struck by the reality of constant change. After a long time spent in pondering change, he came to the conclusion that change was merely a shadow. For Parmenides, behind this surface of change, there lay an unchanging reality. For him and his pupils the phenomena of movement and change are simply appearances of a static, eternal reality – he postulated a duality of appearance and reality. The appearance was that of constant change, the reality was unchanging and static. 

Parmenides' considerable influence on the thinking of Plato is undeniable, and in this respect Parmenides has influenced the whole history of Western philosophy, and is often seen as its grandfather. Even Plato himself, in the Sophist, refers to the work of "our Father Parmenides" as something to be taken very seriously and treated with respect.

Heraclitus of Ephesus (c 535 - 475 BCE), known as "The Obscure", was a pre-Socratic Greek philosopher from Ephesus in Asia Minor. The details of Heraclitus' life are almost completely unknown. 

Heraclitus was also fascinated by constant change and yet came to a very different conclusion to that of Parmenides. His idea was expressed in the notion that no man can cross the same river twice: "We both step and do not step in the same rivers. We are and are not." 

The idea of the logos is also credited to him, as he proclaims that everything originates out of the logos. Heraclitus held that an explanation of change was foundational to any theory of nature. This view was strongly opposed by Parmenides, who argued that change is an illusion and that everything is fundamentally static. 

So we have two views of reality – one which says that behind all the change we observe is an unchanging reality and the other view that says that change is ongoing and is reality. 

It is not difficult to see how one of these views has been influential in theology, on how we speak about God. For most of the history of Christian theology, God has been seen as that unchanging reality – God knows the end from the beginning – God is eternal, rock like, solid and dependable. God never changes. God never needs to change God’s mind – God has everything worked out. 

Parmenides view of the unchanging nature of being remained dominant until the 19th century, when the Industrial Revolution and developments in science began a shift away from what is known as the “mechanistic” view of the world. Some of the change in thinking was caused by such thinkers as Einstein and of course the work of Darwin. These kinds of changes in science and philosophy have impacted on society in general and we could say that “modern” life is characterised by a sense of contingency, transience and relativity. We are all aware of the idea of a “big bang” and that the universe itself is in a constant state of change. 

How does all of this relate to the story of the kings of Israel? 

Soon after the Children of Israel first inhabited the “Promised Land”, the task of ruling and governing the country fell to a group of people who became known as the Judges. (Hence we have the book of Judges) The time of the Judges was a tumultuous time in Israel’s history and the success or lack of success of this type of leadership is summed up at the end of the book of Judges when we are told that everyone did what was right in their own eyes. 

Following the Judges, priests began to hold sway and of course two of the last priests are well known. Eli was a powerful priest but his sons were unruly and so God decided not to allow succession to take place and called the young boy Samuel. Samuel too was a powerful leader, we are told that when he came to visit a village or town they would send out messengers to make sure that he came in peace. Sadly, history repeated itself and Samuel had unruly sons. The people became nervous and they decided that they would like a king to rule them and they began to agitate for that to take place. At some point, God decided that this was what would happen, and now we have the story of Saul being chosen as king. God chose Saul and arranged a set of circumstances to that Samuel would know that Saul was God’s choice. Saul was an obvious choice – we are told quite clearly that he stood head and shoulders above anyone else. 

Sadly, Saul turned out to be no good in the end and Samuel is given the task of choosing another king (a risky business when another king is still alive!). This time, the criteria of choice is very different – it is not now on the basis of size or physical presence, in fact outward appearance is to be overlooked. The choice will be on the basis of character – the heart of a person.

If we think about all this we have an interesting possibility. It seems that God is working with God’s people – often stubborn and rebellious people. When having judges to lead the nation does not work out, the plan is changed and priests are given the mandate to rule, when the priests fail in their duty a line of kings are brought into being. The first king, Saul, is chosen on the basis of size and when that proves a bad idea then a new criteria is settled on – inner qualities, qualities of character. So I am asking in all of this, is God learning something here. Is God changing with the changing situation? Can someone be perfect and still learn? Of course they can! Perhaps there was not some perfect, pre-ordained plan but God adapted to the vagaries of human nature. 

Of course this is not the only time in the Biblical record when we see God reflecting on things and making changes. 

There is another interesting verse in Genesis 6. We are given a glimpse of God “reflecting” on all the wickedness of humankind and we are told in verse 6 of Genesis 6, that when God saw all of this that God was sorry that he had made humankind and God was grieved to his heart. 

You may recall too the time when God became exasperated with the conduct of the Children of Israel in the Wilderness. God orders Moses to stand aside to allow God to wipe them out. Moses pleads with God on their behalf: “What will the other nations think of You if You destroy them”. We are simply told that God repented of what was planned. God had a change of mind. 

I have a very good friend who I have known since primary school. If I was to describe him I would say that in the 50 or so years that I have known him, he has never changed. He is positive, caring, hard-working and so on. He has never changed and yet he has changed a lot, in many ways. 

Has the on going work of creation changed the Unchanging Creator in any way?