A number of years ago I heard someone begin a sermon with this story. He said he was doing some Christmas shopping, and he noticed a little boy who was not wonderfully behaved. His mother was getting angry with him. Finally the mother said to the little boy, "if you don't behave yourself, mommy will stop loving you."

Isn't that a terrible thing to say to a child? I know there are times we get frustrated and tired and angry with our children, but who among us would be willing to make that kind of statement? Maybe we would think that kind of thought (maybe) but most of us would not verbalize that thought.

Why is it, then, that we often think, believe, and live, that God will stop loving us if we misbehave, if we do things that ought not do, and not do things we ought to do? I am amazed at some of the things I have been reading from Christian authors who seem to indicate that America is God's country (to the exclusion of all others; I wonder why God doesn't seem to like other countries, and why it is that England was so terrible to God that God considered King George to be like Pharaoh), but if we don't shape ourselves up morally and ethically, God will have nothing to do with us, or will abandon us.

Is that the promise of God? What do we do with the promise in Isaiah, that "even if your mother were to forget you, I will not forget you or forsake you. See, I have inscribed you on the palms of my hands." Did Jesus go to a cross in order that we might become morally pure people? I thought it was because we were sinners, that we were not morally pure. Does Jesus say to us, "the cross is about grace, but if your behavior doesn't measure up, then that grace is taken away from you?" I don't think so.

Yet that appears to be a subtle message in some of what I have been reading, and I find that to be disappointing and disturbing. God's grace is given to us despite our failings and shortcomings. God's grace is given precisely to those who do not deserve it, who do not measure up to all the moral standards. And I believe that nothing - nothing - can ever separate us from that love of God in Jesus Christ.

It has been said that the best argument for Christian faith is Christians, and that the worst argument for Christian faith is Christians. Sometimes we are very narrow in our thinking, and narrow in the way we share God's gift of grace. I think that grace opens us up to life, and through that grace we are called to live as followers of Jesus, which includes such things as compassion and love for all, including those who do not think the same way we do, or who do not look the way we do, or who do not worship the way we do.

Let us not forget compassion and justice and mercy and grace as we move forward as a church, as a nation, as a people.