Ignoring her more dubious pronouncements, for which she can offer no credible scientific or prima facie evidence that would stand the judgement of a court, let’s pick on her desire to be God. If she can pretend to be God, then why not us this morning?

So I want you to imagine that you are God. And your problem is as follows: what would you do to reach out to the human beings you have made, but who have deliberately decided not to know you. In fact, more than that, because we are dealing with people who have said, “My head tells me there is no God, but my heart wants to believe in it”, how would you get through to men and women in revolt against you who swear black and blue that you do not exist?

Let’s be different this morning: why not share a few ideas with your neighbour?

Well, I wonder what ideas you came up with it. They might have included a few of these. You might begin by ensuring that you had created a beautiful world, so marvellous that it shouted out your love and skill, your power and beauty as its creator.

Then you might have decided to let these people have the ability to respond to you in love, by giving them the dangerous gift of free will, by which they could respond to you or reject you. But their response would be genuine not as some automaton, like some robot.

Then you might have longed for them to be somewhat like you, a little bit of you and your values coming through them. So you placed some values in the hearts of your people, values that speak of you. Values like truth, goodness, beauty, harmony, creativity, speech, love. Of course, you couldn’t force them on them, because you gave them free will, and they might choose the opposite of these values. But whenever they were exercised, these values or qualities would point to you their creator, like footprints left in the sand of their lives.

You might like to help them make right choices with their free will, encouraging them through some sort of conscience, alerting them to right and wrong. It would approve their right choices and or warn them of their wrong choices, endlessly advising them even if they tried to stifle it.

You might decide to go further still in encouragement, by creating some God-shaped hole in their hearts, some God-shaped longing that only a right relationship with you would satisfy, however much rubbish they might throw into it. What was that phrase earlier: “My head tells me there is no God, but my heart wants to believe in it”.

You might go further than all this. You might decide to intervene in history, in the very course of their lives. Amongst all the arrogance, corruption and falleness, you might decide on a strategy of concentrating on one man, to whom you reveal yourself. From that man, you concentrate on his family, which grows into a tribe, and then a nation, which would trust you and obey you.

Over time, as you worked with that people and nation, you could train them to receive and follow your directions for their highest. They might well make mistakes and you would have to deal with that, teaching them lessons through war, captivity or whatever. But the stakes are high, you love your creation, you care about your creation, you want the best for your creation, so you persevere with them, all along hoping, urging, yearning that they would see you, live as you intend and be a way to reach out to others that were lost to you.

In that constant game of reminding, you would be raising up particular individuals, whose hearts were touched by your especial love and through them you would seek to lead these people, rebuke these people and reassure these people, and this time and time again.

And finally, you have had enough. So you send one final prophet into their midst. You take that person away for time with yourself and you reveal to him your divine will – written in heaven and now communicated directly to one individual who will be the last prophet, who will insist that the words he received by revelation are the only true words and who will demand submission to belief in you and to doing as you command.

Actually what you have provided there is a parody of Mohammad and the religion of Islam. Let me share with you an illustration that will highlight what is happening with so much thinking in our world.

A man fell into quicksand and started to sink. While he was sinking, the Chinese philosopher Confucius walked by and said, “There is evidence that men should stay out of such places”. But the man was still sinking in quicksand. Then a Hindu walked by and said, “Never mind, you will return to earth in another form”. But the man was still sinking in quicksand. Then Buddha walked by and said, “Let that man be a lesson to the world”. But the man was still sinking in quicksand. Then Mohammad walked by and said, “Alas, it is the will of Allah”. But the man was still sinking in quicksand.

If there is a God, why doesn’t he send someone down? We are in a mess and we can’t get out and pious platitudes, however poorly parodied in the story, don’t help us, so why doesn’t he send someone down and do something to sort this mess out.

Then Jesus walked by the man sinking in the quicksand and reached out his hand and said, “Grab hold of my hand and I will pull you out.”

The problem with every other faith is that God does not come down and do something. He remains aloof, above his creation, working through intermediaries but never involved himself. He does not know what it is like to be human; he does not know our stresses, our strains, our worries, our joys, our hopes, our fears. He does not know because he has not come down – this is by the way the problem that JWs have when you chat with them on the doorstep.

But in Jesus, God has come down to earth. God has come in person. He didn’t come full of shining light, glorious in splendour, resplendent in majesty. He would have to come as a human, arriving softly in disguise, ready to learn the language so perfectly that he would be taken for a native.

If you were God, that would be very costly: to love them so much that you shrunk yourself to their level. It would be similar to one of us voluntarily agreeing to turn into a rat or a slug so that we might communicate with such lowly creatures. That would be an unthinkable sacrifice, but God did do it.

Jesus highlighted this whole story in the parable of the tenants (Luke 20:9-16). In that parable, Jesus leaves us with the most hopeless situation – his hearers realised how hopeless this would be (v.16b) – for God’s son was killed and no redemption had taken place.

The good news is that not only has God come down but he has done something about the most difficult problem: our rebellion against him. He has loved us so much that he took that extra step to rescue us – to reach down and grab our hand to lift us up from the mire and mess we have descended into. This is what Christians believe, right from the origins of the church 2000 years ago, when from a handful of Jewish peasants the good news of Jesus engulfed the Roman Empire and became the largest religion the world has ever seen, still growing with thousands of new believers every day.

The longings of the hearts of these Christians were matched by the confidence of their minds. The God who is love has revealed himself as the God who reconciles. He died for us. He is alive for us. They knew him, we know him and there is nothing so important as to revel in that relationship and pass it on to others.

If there is a God, why doesn’t he send someone down? The evidence is there for any who seek it. Jesus is God and he had the authority of God, and the people he met day after day knew it in their hearts, but refused to acknowledge it with their lips (20:1-8).

As Revd Dr Mark Stibbe put it, “Jesus is the meeting place of eternity and time, the joining of deity and humanity, the junction of heaven and earth.”

In Jesus, we see that God has got directly involved in his creation.

In Jesus, we see that God has come in person to rescue and reconcile his creation to himself.

In Jesus, we see that God has lowered himself to our level and known what it is to be human.

In Jesus, we see that God has not given up on his creation but has given hope for his creation.

In Jesus, each of us has the chance to come back to God, to admit that we have kept him out and to admit that our independence has led to bad things in our behaviour, our habits, our relationships. To come back to God requires very little, just a genuine sorry on our lips and in our hearts.

In Jesus, we have:-
A love that can never be fathomed
A life that can never die
A righteousness that can never be tarnished
A peace that can never be understood
A rest that can never be disturbed
A joy that can never be diminished
A hope that can never be disappointed
A glory that can never be clouded
A light that can never be darkened
A purity that can never be defiled
A beauty that can never be marred
A wisdom that can never be baffled
And a resource that can never be exhausted.

My head tells me there is no God, but my heart wants to believe in it. You will always be torn between heart and head until you surrender yourself to the God who gave you both. First and foremost you will need to tell him that you gladly accept that most gracious offer of his: “Behold. I am standing at the door, knocking; if you hear my voice and open the door, I will come in.” (Rev 3:20).

You have heard his voice in your heart and perhaps your mind as well. Invite him in to share your very being. Ask his Spirit to come in, just as you would ask a friend to enter your home. Jesus makes it clear that he will come in, he will accept your hospitality and he will never leave you. And as for the mess – well, he’s the man with the vacuum cleaner.