Invited into Tenderness--January 3, 2023

Invited into Tenderness--January 3, 2023

"And because you are children, God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying, 'Abba! Father!' So you are no longer a slave but a child, and if a child then also an heir, through God." [Galatians 4:6-7]

The mail that comes addressed "Resident" barely makes into the house before it goes in the trash. The letters that come with your proper title and last name are more likely to be opened and get at least a perfunctory skim.  The handwritten notes that open with, "Dear..." and your first name are almost certain to be read.  And the times you get something written by a child, addressing you by your relationship [which they sometimes treat as your name], are not only read, but treasured and kept safe.  You know, "Dear Mommy," or "To Auntie Susan," or "Dear Grandpa and Grandma," those are the kind of notes that are worth their weight in gold, even if their penmanship is harder to read than the form letter, and even if there are more misspellings than the bulk mail ads.

I came across one such note from my daughter yesterday, doing the annual, "New Year's Tidying Of The Desk and Office Space."  And it almost made my knees buckle just seeing the handwritten envelope, simply addressed, "Daddy," in blue pen.

The difference between this and the water bill is obvious, even though the water bill comes with a lot more verbiage in the fine print of its monthly statement of how much we've used and how much we owe.  Even a simple one-sentence note from a daughter, addressed "Daddy," bears an immense amount of meaning and love in between the words, because it bespeaks a relationship that I just don't have with my utility providers.  It conveys love.  It communicates tenderness.  It carries kindness between giver and receiver, writer and reader, and back again.  And, as my mother used to remind me any time I approached her with the question of why it is impolite for children to call their parents by their first names, to get to call someone "Daddy," or "Mommy," or "Grandma," or "Gigi," or "Papa," or "Grandpa," or "Uncle Stu," or "Aunt Jean," or whatever, is a special privilege, because it implies a relationship not everyone gets.

And this is the amazing thing that the Scriptures tell us we are given with God.  No less than the living God and the Creator of the universe invites us to call on the divine with "Mommy" and "Daddy" language, rather than impersonal titles like, "O All-Knowing and All-Powerful One."  The word Paul uses here, "Abba," is not only a carryover from the same Aramaic language that Jesus himself spoke, but has the familiar feeling of "Daddy," or "Papa."  In other words, because of Jesus' coming into the world and our adoption into the family of God, we are drawn into a relationship of tenderness.  We are pulled into the kindness of God's love.  We don't have to be Dorothy standing before the ominous floating head of the Wizard, addressing God like "The Great and Powerful Oz," but we are invited to call on God with the same blue-pen hand-lettered intimacy that children are invited to with their parents.  We don't have to constantly worry about proper protocols, titles of nobility, or formal language.  We are invited to trust the kindness of a God who has pulled us into a particular kind of relationship--of parents to beloved children, rather than as employees of a boss, conquered subjects of a emperor, or anonymous "residents" at an address.  And in a culture that so easily reduces each of us to a Social Security Number, credit card number, or bank PIN, it is amazingly good news to know that God sees us as beloved children rather than faceless customers.

Today, it is worth cultivating that kind of deep, trusting, and close relationship--both with God and with others.  That means our prayer lives don't have to sound like cover letters for a job application or a petition to your governor--they can be honest and real, grounded in trust like a child's handwritten note to "Daddy."  And it means, too, that we would do well to look at other relationships in our lives and see how we can treat others with personal kindness and tenderness rather than as anonymous strangers.  It will mean we take the time to talk with people rather than rushing past them, to hold doors and offer help, and to reach out to people even if we won't "get" anything out of the exchange.  It will mean we resist the temptation in a social media and screen-obsessed environment to treat other people with the grace and dignity of family members, rather than with the cruelty and rudeness that are so easy when you can't see someone's face.  In other words, we are called to treat others with the same kind of personal kindness that God has shown to us, and which we can experience every time we call on God without worrying about formalities or titles.

That truly is a gift.  Perhaps today it is time to remember just what a gift it is... and to let that affect all of our relationships today.

Abba--you who have loved us with the tenderness and strength of our parents--enable us to lean on the assurance of your gentle love, and to live out of that love toward everyone else around us today, too.