"Cheeseburgers in the Shade with God"--October 15, 2019

"Cheeseburgers in the Shade with God"--October 15, 2019

The LORD appeared to Abraham by the oaks of Mamre, as he sat at the entrance to his tent in the heat of the day.  He looked up and saw three men standing near him. When he saw them, he ran from the tent entrance to meet them, and bowed down to the ground. He said, 'My lord, if I find favor with you, do not pass by your servant. Let a little water be brought, and wash your feet, and rest yourselves, and after that you may pass on--since you have come to your servant.' So they said, 'Do as you have said.' And Abraham hastened into the tent to Sarah, and said, 'Make ready quickly three measures of choice flour, knead it, and make cakes.' Abraham ran to the her, and took a calf, tender and good, and gave it to the servant, who hastened to prepare it. Then he took the curds and milk and the calf that he had prepared, and set it before them; and he stood by them under the tree while they ate." [Genesis 18:1-8]

I would say that the irony of this scene kills me... but in matter of fact, it does just the opposite: it brings me to life.

But in any case, it is absolutely essential, if we want to "get" what is going on in this story, to be clear here at the outset that Abraham doesn't know he his talking to the living God.  Not once.  Not ever during the conversation.  Maybe months later in hindsight when his nonagenarian wife has given birth to a son named Laughter (Isaac), old Abe realized who it was that had visited his tent on that hot afternoon out by the oak trees, but not during any of this encounter as it played out.  Abraham doesn't know he is being visited by none other than the Ground of Being and the Source of All Life (and, as Christian thinkers have noted over the years, God has come to visit in three persons who seem to speak as one, in what we cannot help but see as a wink toward the Trinity... but that is a conversation for another day).  

I feel a bit like the opening of Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol here, in which Dickens repeats and insists that ol' Jacob Marley was "dead as a doornail," and wants us to be clear about that, in order to make us understand what a big deal it is that his ghost should appear to visit Ebenezer Scrooge on Christmas Eve.  Well, the same sort of emphasis is warranted here: Abraham is completely oblivious--blessedly clueless--to the fact that he is entertaining more than angels outside of his tent.  He is playing host to none other than the God of the universe, whose world Abraham is living on as a wandering guest himself.  Like I say, the irony of the scene, where God is the guest and the wandering nomad is the host, is irresistible to me.  So before we move on, let's get it settled: regardless of Abraham's lack of awareness, the story stands as a visit from the Almighty God... for an impromptu picnic lunch of cheeseburgers in the shade.

Now, here's the thing that gets me.  Since Abraham doesn't have even the slightest clue that this is God visiting him, that means (and I don't know any other way of interpreting this without reaching this conclusion) that this is just the way Abraham receives strangers.

Let me say that again so the point is not breezed over: the default way that Abraham, or any other self-respecting ancient near Easterner for that matter, would treat strangers who crossed his path was to invite them to stop and eat with him.  They were honored guests, not because you expected to be paid back (after all, these were all nomadic people, and you might never cross paths with these same people again), but simply because they all knew what it was like to be wanderers, travelers, and sojourners without a permanent place and dependent on the welcome of others.  Hospitality was not an option--it was their way of life.  That by itself puts us to shame--we live in an age and a time of default fear and suspicion of the stranger who crosses our path, and we are taught that it is only common sense to shut your doors to the faces who come up over the horizon to meet you, because we have to focus on the interests of me-and-my-group-first.  Well, common sense be damned--Abraham just up and welcomes these strangers and goes out of his way to receive them, even without realizing who they are for even a split second.  We would do well, perhaps, to consider that for all of his faults and failings (which were plentiful), Abraham is never criticized in the Bible for this show of unguarded hospitality--in fact, this is one of his most brightly-shining moments.  For Abraham, this is not a moment of heroism or an expectation of a divine appearance: for him this is an ordinary lunch with company.

But it's also that total ordinariness of this moment that is instructive for us as well.  Abraham doesn't expect that he is entertaining the Lord of all creation--he is just being a decent person to strangers looking for a bit of respite from the heat.  Abraham isn't angling for anything, or asking "What will I get out of this?" when he puts on this meal for the three migrants.  He is just offering the ordinary hospitality you would extend to anyone who stopped at your doorway.  But that routine welcome becomes the entry point for the divine, even without old Abe's knowing.  And that, dear ones, is precisely the point.

Among the many surprises of the Scriptures is God's recurring choice to make surprise appearances when no one is expecting it... and by the same token, God reserves the right to decline to appear at the expected "religious" places where we try and conjure divinity.  The prophets, for example, regularly remind us that the living God reserves the right not to listen to our songs and hymns if we think we are buying God off with them.  God reserves the right not to show up at the state-sanctioned officially-approved shrines of worship that the king sets up, or to listen to the petitions at ancient Israel's national days of prayer if they are using it as a pretense to cheat each other, oppress each other, or ignore the needy among them.  But a God who is so free to decline the invitation to the King's-official-Religious-Ceremonies in ancient Israel or Judah is also free to show up undercover under the oaks of Mamre for an old married couple, too.  The God we meet in the Bible keeps showing up in ordinary moments that don't look religious at all--not just in the bread of Holy Communion or the space beneath steeples, but in the conversation with a stranger sitting near you in the coffee shop or diner, and in the emergency department waiting room, too.

If you want to have an encounter with the living God, the Bible's advice is NOT to lock yourself in church, as though that's the only place you'll find God.  And honestly, the best way to be open to a visit from God is not to try and "make" it happen by doing things that look religious.  Rather, Abraham's story suggest that we'll be most open to receiving divine visitors when we are able to welcome the people--familiar or strangers, best friends or unknown--whom God sends across our path.  When our eyes and hearts are open to considering that the unexpected visitor is a messenger from God, maybe we'll live our lives with enough empty space and flexibility that we can receive them and find God showing up in the encounter, too.  And when we are willing to live free from the fear that automatically assumes the stranger is suspicious, we will be ready to be blessed in the encounter with the sojourners who come our way.

It is a beautiful irony indeed that Abraham doesn't know he's eating burgers with Almighty God, but maybe his story can open our eyes to be ready to be surprised by God's entry into our ordinary moments as well--provided we have our eyes and hearts open to welcome those God sends along.

Lord God, let us be ready to receive you in ordinary moments and places, in the guise of the stranger's face.