Scripture: 2 Samuel 7:1-11 and Luke 1:26-38
You just gotta love Nathan. Quite a gutsy (and other words come to mind) prophet.
He's a court prophet to King David, which means David turns to Nathan for holy wisdom and advice from God, and Nathan in turn knows who signs his paycheque.
David is newly installed as king. Finally settled in his new royal digs, David decides to build God a house as well, as grand as his.
God has been David's and the people's saviour and guide all along -- from the time God led Israel out of their slavery to Egypt, travelled with them through the wilderness, led them into the promised land, and then helped them become a kingdom. Through all this time God has literally travelled with the people. Unlike other gods who dwelt in fixed places and shrines, God's presence has been resident in the ark of the covenant which the people have carried with them wherever they have gone, and has been housed in a tent whenever they stop and settle down.
God has been portable, but now David wants to build a house for God as grand as his own, so he and God can settle in and settle down together. He tells Nathan his plan, and Nathan (good court prophet that he is), says, "Go ahead! God is with you!"
But that night Nathan gets a different word from God, and in the morning has a different message for the king -- one of the most bitingly sarcastic and ironic messages you can imagine a court prophet giving his boss.
Nathan tells David that God's real answer is, "You plan to build me a house? Ha! Let's think back a bit about who has really built what for whom, between the two of us." And then he ends with a wonderfully delicious word-play: "You will not build me a house (of wood, stone and precious metal); it's I who will make you a house (of ancestors who will live out my good will in the world)."
How does it feel to hear that God is not interested in settling in -- with us, or with anyone? That God's only real interest is to keep doing what it takes and keep going where is needed to shape people into communities that will faithfully live out God's will for Earth, and be an example to the rest of the world of how it can be done?
Isn't that what Christmas is about, though? About God coming to us -- not to settle down in any kingdom or building or ritual or tradition or structure or system we might see as "it", but to be living and portable among us in the most radical way imaginable -- as portable as an ark, as moveable as a tent, as unexpected as a baby, as unpredictable and redeeming as a Jesus.
We need and we enjoy our structures -- our houses (holy and otherwise), our rituals, our signs of the season, our routines of worship and faithfulness -- all those good, settled things. But it's good to remember these are more God's gifts to us to help give faithful shape to our life and to help us keep following God, than they are our gift to God to give God a place to settle into, and a way to settle down.
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