Pew Sheet, Sunday, 14th September, 2025. 13th Sunday after Trinity / Creationtide 2

Exodus 32:7–14 is a remarkable passage that reveals a deeply relational and dynamic view of God as someone who listens, feels, and even changes mind in response to human intercession. This narrative centres on the apostasy of the Israelites who created a golden calf to worship just as soon as Moses goes up onto the mountain to converse with God, and we are told that God’s anger ‘burns hot’ against them as a consequence. God tells Moses of his intention to destroy them all for what they have done, but Moses pleads for God to spare them, and reminds God of his promises to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob (Israel) to make a great nation of their descendants - even using reverse psychology by saying that if God chooses to destroy them so soon after delivering them from the hands of Pharaoh, he would be a laughingstock to the Egyptians. We then learn that God does change his mind and relent, and does not punish them as he originally intended in response to Moses’ intercession.

The passage raises profound theological questions about the ‘immutability’ or ‘unchanging’ nature of God, whom, we are reminded in our reading from the Epistle of Timothy is ‘immortal’ and ‘invisible’. We often sing those wonderful words ‘Thou changest not, thy compassions they fail not’, and it remains a truism that most theologians stress that God does not change – as do many scriptures (Malachi 3:6; James 1:17). Yet our passage today shows that God is far from aloof, rigid, and unwavering, and does sometimes respond positively to our intercession for others, and is even open to dialogue as he was when Abraham pleaded for the people of Sodom and Gomorrah in Genesis 18.

The Hebrew word nicham, often translated as ‘relented’ in this passage is expressed in its most accurate form here, for God literally ‘changes his mind’ in response to Moses’ plea and decides not to destroy the people entirely as planned. Moses’ intercession is central to this narrative and his role as mediator is often said to foreshadows the work of Christ, who also stands between us and a sinless God. In pleading for the people, Moses reminds God that he cannot break his word or be faithless to the covenant made to their forbears, for the word of God is more important even than the people's sin, so it is interesting that it is Moses’ anger which ‘burns hot’ against the people when he gets back to the camp, destroying the stone tablets and ordering the murder of many thousands of its inhabitants by the Levites, two decisions which God did not order, and seems not to have sanctioned; so that all other

comparisons with Christ probably come to an end at this point!

Far from showing inconsistency or weakness however, God’s willingness to change his mind and withhold retribution against all the people shows that aspect of his character which is most enduring, namely a compassion which shows itself willing to be merciful even when angry and sinned against, so that whilst none of the generation involved in the golden calf episode (Moses included!) would enter into the promised land, God ensured that most of their children and grandchildren would.

God’s faithfulness to his word is one aspect of God’s character that never changes, which is why the Psalmist can write that God’s anger lasts but a moment, but his favour lasts for a lifetime (Psalm 30:5). God’s willingness to ultimately forgive the sin of the Israelites contrasts starkly with the stiff-necked approbation of the pharisees in our Gospel narrative who look only at the external, and are quick to condemn those with whom Jesus dines even though they cannot see into their hearts as God does, or have any notion of Jesus’ redemptive purposes in choosing to sit and dine with those sinners.

It is also interesting that neither the sheep nor the coin in the parables Jesus tells in response to their approbation have any agency or role in their being lost. They are animals or things rather than people, and there is no sense that they could have been held responsible for their own loss. The true message of the parables is not that they were lost – in spite of Luke’s attempt to link them to the subject of repentance, but the joy and celebration which ensued when they were found again, which is why the writer of Psalm 30 concludes that, ‘weeping may stay for the night, but rejoicing comes in the morning.’ God, unlike the Pharisees, values covenant relationship over the rigidity of the Law, and of justice and mercy over wrath. Unlike them, God cares much more about covenant love than condemnation which, in a world fractured by so much human failure provides hope for the future, not as a result of our own actions, but a divine mercy which listens, relents, and will restore everything to itself – Godself – in the fullness of time.

Collect

Almighty God, you search us and know us: may we rely on you in strength
and rest on you in weakness, now and in all our days; through Jesus Christ our Lord, Amen.

Exodus 32:7-14

The Lord said to Moses, ‘Go down at once! Your people, whom you brought up out of the land of Egypt, have acted perversely; they have been quick to turn aside from the way that I commanded them; they have cast for themselves an image of a calf, and have worshipped it and sacrificed to it, and said, “These are your gods, O Israel, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt!” ’ The Lord said to Moses, ‘I have seen this people, how stiff-necked they are. Now let me alone, so that my wrath may burn hot against them and I may consume them; and of you I will make a great nation.’
But Moses implored the Lord his God, and said, ‘O Lord, why does your wrath burn hot against your people, whom you brought out of the land of Egypt with great power and with a mighty hand? Why should the Egyptians say, “It was with evil intent that he brought them out to kill them in the mountains, and to consume them from the face of the earth”? Turn from your fierce wrath; change your mind and do not bring disaster on your people.
Remember Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, your servants, how you swore to them by your own self, saying to them, “I will multiply your descendants like the stars of heaven, and all this land that I have promised I will give to your descendants, and they shall inherit it for ever.” And the Lord changed his mind about the disaster that he planned to bring on his people.

1 Timothy 1:12-17

I am grateful to Christ Jesus our Lord, who has strengthened me, because he judged me faithful and appointed me to his service even though I was formerly a blasphemer, a persecutor, and a man of violence. But I received mercy because I had acted ignorantly in unbelief, and the grace of our Lord overflowed for me with the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus. The saying is sure and worthy of full acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners—of whom I am the foremost. But for that very reason I received mercy, so that in me, as the foremost, Jesus Christ might display the utmost patience, making me an example to those who would come to believe in him for eternal life. To the King of the ages, immortal, invisible, the only God, be honour and glory for ever and ever. Amen.

Luke 15:1-10

Now all the tax-collectors and sinners were coming near to listen to him. And the Pharisees and the scribes were grumbling and saying, ‘This man welcomes sinners and eats with them.’
So he told them this parable: ‘Which one of you, having a hundred sheep and losing one of them, does not leave the ninety-nine in the wilderness and go after the one that is lost until he finds it? When he has found it, he lays it on his shoulders and rejoices. And when he comes home, he calls together his friends and neighbours, saying to them, “Rejoice with me, for I have found my sheep that was lost.” Just so, I tell you, there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous people who need no repentance.
‘Or what woman having ten silver coins, if she loses one of them, does not light a lamp, sweep the house, and search carefully until she finds it? When she has found it, she calls together her friends and neighbours, saying, “Rejoice with me, for I have found the coin that I had lost.” Just so, I tell you, there is joy in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents.’

Post Communion Prayer

God our creator, you feed your children with the true manna, the living bread from heaven: let this holy food sustain us through our earthly pilgrimage until we come to that place where hunger and thirst are no more; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

This week’s events

Monday (Cyprian, Bishop. Of Carthage, Martyr, 258)

Bell ringing at 7.30pm in St Laurence. Contact Jan on 07835 461361.

Tuesday (Ninian, Bishop of Galloway, Apostle to the Picts, c432)

Zoom Morning Prayer at 9am. Meeting ID: 539 3978774 Password: TuaR0T or contact Sue on [email protected] (The 0 in R0T is a zero not an ‘O’)

Evening Home Groups, contact Jo on 07803 942 687.

Wednesday (Hildegard, Abbess of Bingen, Visionary, 1179)

Morning C