God's exclusive right to name calling.

Clare has been reading through Isaiah recently and posted a few insights on her blog. This term we have also been dipping into Isaiah in our cell as a kind of parrallel to the preaching series on Amos at church. Last week we looked at the story of Hezekiah.

Sennacherib of Assyria captures a number of cities of Judah and then advances on Jerusalem - sending messangers ahead of himself to put fear into the Hebrews. He claims to be on a mission from Israel's God and declares to Hezekiah that he doesn't have a leg to stand on. Hezekiah and his people turn to God with torn garments and sackcloth and ask him what is going on here. God replies to the Assyrians:

The young woman, Daughter Zion, despises you and scorns you: Daughter Jerusalem shakes her head behind your back. Who is it you have mocked and blasphemed? Who have you raised your voice against and lifted your eyes in pride? Against the Holy One of Israel! You have mocked the LORD through your servants. You have said: With my many chariots I have gone up to the heights of the mountains, to the far recesses of Lebanon. I cut down its tallest cedars, its choice cypress trees. I came to its remotest heights, its densest forest. I dug wells and drank water. I dried up all the streams of Egypt with the soles of my feet. Have you not heard? I designed it long ago; I planned it in days gone by. I have now brought it to pass, and you have crushed fortified cities into piles of rubble. Their inhabitants have become powerless, dismayed, and ashamed. They are plants of the field, tender grass, grass on the rooftops, blasted by the east wind. But I know your sitting down, your going out and your coming in, and your raging against Me. Because your raging against Me and your arrogance has reached My ears, I will put My hook in your nose and My bit in your mouth; I will make you go back the way you came. (Isa 37:22-29 HCSB)

One of the things that struck us was the fact that God who had earlier called Jerusalem "adulteress" (Isa 1:21) and "haughty" (Isa 3:16), now refers to her as "Daughter," his daughter.

It is as if the moment someone else comes along to join in insulting Jerusalem, God's zeal blows up and he declares her to be his Daughter and anyone who claims otherwise is an arrogant cow. It is a bit like a work colleague I had who consistently ridiculed his own small stature, but the minute anyone else made a quip about his height, he would rage and smoulder. God has the sole and exclusive right as our father to judge us for our sins but you see here the reaction when an adversary comes to gloat and join in with some insults - pretty quickly God rises up in our defence; "how dare you". I find that comforting. God accuses us from a completely different standpoint to anyone else, when he calls us something nasty he has the right to as our intimate father and benevolent ruler.

Perhaps this expands to an understanding of how we might be able to judge one another within the body of Christ. It's all a case of where you are standing. We are not to judge from the standpoint of "God is right about you, you are a sinner"; but, "we are family and this means we share some home truths." Within the church, judging one another has to happen from a basic assumption that we all belong to eachother and always will, we don't stand outside the walls and call names no matter how justified and true they may be.