The Infinite Improbability Drive

Readings: Psalm 107:1-9,43, Colossians 3:1-11, Luke 12:13-21, Hosea 11:1-11
 Preached at First Presbyterian Church Baldwin, NY, August 4th 2013

A printable PDF file can be found here

Some years ago the late author Douglas Adams wrote a Science Fiction/Comedy book entitled “The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy”. The book became a radio show, in Great Britain a T.V. show, and eventually a Hollywood Movie. Much featured in all interpretations is a renegade two-headed character called Zaphod Beeblebrox who  hijacks a spaceship called ‘The Heart of Gold’ that is powered by something called “The Infinite Improbability Drive”.

“The Infinite Improbability Drive” enables the spaceship to pass through numerous points in space at the same time, whilst it’s computer intones “We are now cruising at a level of two to the power of two hundred to one against and falling” against a background of screen images such as monkeys working at typewriters and coming up with scripts for ‘Hamlet’. If all that sounds just a little to improbable for a Sunday Morning service, well watch the movie, or buy the book, and maybe it will make more sense.

But… have you ever considered this? Improbability drives Christianity. The Christian message when viewed in the cold light of reason and logic makes so little sense.  Just how probable is it that an Almighty God would somehow become a baby in a stable at some lonely Eastern outpost, and in Jesus Christ act to obtain the salvation of the world? 

How improbable is it that a man should rise from death and found an organization that during it’s first 300 years of existence is mercilessly persecuted, yet nearly 2000 years later has become the worlds most adhered to religion? How improbable is it that our lives should become caught up in that experience, or even that a kid who grew up in the suburbs of Liverpool should end up as a preacher on Long Island, after spending a number of years in West Virginia...and that you should be right now a part of the congregation listening to him?

Maybe there should be a computer in here intoning “We are now traveling at a level of three to the power of seven hundred to three against and falling” whilst displaying on a screen events of Christian history that have, against all the calculations of probability changed the world and continue to change the way we live in the world.

But... to our Bible Reading. In Chapter 11 of the prophet Hosea, the first 11 verses fall into three distinct sections. In each of them God is pictured as a caring parent and Israel as a rebellious child. Verses 1 – 4 speak of how God had called Israel out of Egypt, picked them up when they fell, bent down to them and fed them, yet, despite such loving acts, they sought time and time again to go there own way.

Verses 5 –7 speak of the judgment that should fall upon them for rejecting the parental care of God. If there was any justice in the world, then they deserved to go back to Egypt. As they continued to rebel against God and go after other gods they were placing themselves in a position of alienation from God and deserving of God’s anger.

Section three begins at Verse 8, which is the key verse. The parent sees the child who rebels and is angered. But even as the anger wells up, the love of the parent causes a change. God looks at Israel and declares, “My heart recoils within me, my compassion grows warm and tender, I will not execute my fierce anger, for I am God and not man, the Holy One in your midst and I will not come to destroy.”

That third section closes with a picture of the disobedient child returning home, not in confidence, but trembling and fearful, unsure of their parents love, knowing that their separation had been a result of their disobedience, but nevertheless seeking to be back within the family circle of God’s blessings.

There are similarities in this picture painted by Hosea to the parable Jesus told of the prodigal son, in which the erring younger child returns, rather fearfully, to the undeserved embrace of a Father whose love is greater than his anger. In both cases the improbability factor is high. The logical outcome of a life of willful disobedience is that of separation. But the Fathers heart is greater! The Fathers heart turns what is improbable to possible!

Something we never learn about the story of the prodigal son is how things turned out in the end. There is that elder brother who has a hard time accepting the Fathers love. And who is to say that the younger son did not once again turn away? There is no guarantee to the story. Maybe the elder saw the wisdom in the Fathers words and came into the party only to have the younger son whisper in his ear, ‘Who’s the fool now big brother? Didn’t I tell you I could always get my own way?”

Certainly in the case of Hosea’s prophecy we know that Israel did go far from home and return again, but that was not the end of the story. Further passages of unfaithfulness and turning away were to come. Has not that been the story of the Church throughout her history? As the centuries have rolled by time and time again the Church has got it wrong and needed reformation and renewal, only to go and make the same mistakes all over again. And you and I know, time and time again, it has also been the story of our own lives.

The power of the gospel message lies not in the probability that it will solve every problem and answer every question known to our world; but the power of the gospel lies in the fact that when we receive it’s message it creates possibilities for our lives that were not there before.  Where there has been judgment, the love of God creates the possibility for forgiveness. Where there is hurt, the love of God creates the possibility of healing. Where there is conflict and striving the love of God opens the door to the possibility of peace and wholeness.

There is no guarantee with any of this. It’s a question of trusting in Gods promises. It’s a matter of faith. Break it down with the cold light of logic and reason and in all probability the likelihood of such a message receiving a positive response are maybe “three to the power of seven hundred to three against and falling”.

All the mechanisms for failure are in place. We are self-centered people. We like the things of this world. We are sinners who fall short of the Glory of God.  We are fully occupied most days of our lives doing what we can to get by. We are daily bombarded with thousands of messages that tell us that we need this or need that or need to look like this or look like the other, or accept this or accept the other in order to live full and satisfying lives.

If life runs on probability then the chances are we are going to want nothing to do with a gospel that calls us to live in a way that can be the opposite of what all the other voices are telling us. Our innate tendency is to pull further and further away from this demanding God who seeks obedience and sacrifice. But then the improbability drive kicks in.  The voice of God speaks through the prophet Hosea. “I will not execute my fierce anger, for I am God and not man, the Holy One in your midst and I will not come to destroy.”

God’s love, demonstrated to us on the Cross of Calvary and shining to us from the empty tomb, available to us through the Holy Spirit, creates possibility. God speaks not as the One who is far off and absent but as the Holy One who is working in our midst. God reveals the intentions of the Divine heart, that God’s work is not to devastate and destroy, but to bring home and restore and open the doorway to a life in which God’s love can be both received and shared.

Our calling is to be people, who having been embraced by the love of God, now seek to make the most of the possibilities a new life in Jesus Christ lays open to us. It’s a new day. Every day with Jesus Christ is a new start, a new opportunity, a new beginning.

Improbable as that may seem, the reality of God’s love turns the improbable to the possible. Let us then be advocates for possibility. Be a disciple, not because being a follower of Jesus Christ is some kind of equation.. that if we do this and add this then the result will surely be this… but be a disciple precisely because when your life is in God’s hands the rules of probability no longer apply, and the door is open on possibility.

Take the risk of faith. Love, not because it will surely change the world, but because it just might change the world. Don’t be consumed by the evidences of failure, rather by the possibility that this time it may actually come out right! Get your improbability drive in motion and trust in God to work in unlikely ways in and through and around your life.

For God is in our midst... improbable as that may seem! The possibilities that are open to us, by the presence of God in our midst, are completely mind boggling.

AMEN.

Adrian Pratt