Several months ago, many of you met and heard one of our United Methodist missionaries, the Rev. Sandra Olewine, who is serving in Jerusalem through the General Board of Global Ministries. Sandy regularly uses e-mail to send out serious and thought-provoking commentary on the situation in that most-conflicted part of the world, but recently she sent along one that makes us laugh.

This is a true news item that we Southern Californians will easily relate to. It's about water policy in that desert land of the Middle East, which is always desperate for more water, as are we. It seems that an Israeli official, commenting on current talks concerning water, was quoted as saying, "We will come to a rational solution as soon as we exhaust all other options."

You know, I wonder if God sometimes must feel like he just keeps moving through a long list of options, trying to get through to us obstinate humans, trying many options which, to the untrained eye, must seem completely irrational. Since making us in the first place, God has bent over backwards, we might say, to get us to trust the love that created us, that divine love that heals us over and over again and that sets us free.

In a few minutes, as part of our communion liturgy this morning, we will pray what's called "the prayer of the Great Thanksgiving," a prayer that reminds us of many of the options God has tried to communicate to us in order to stay in relationship with us humans. This prayer is confessional in tone, and surely we recite it regularly to remind ourselves of our own history, a history of which God is no doubt perfectly and painfully aware.

We say, "It is right to give thanks to you, always and everywhere, Almighty God, Creator of Heaven and Earth. 1) You formed us in your image, and 2) breathed into us the breath of life. When we turned away, and our love failed, 3) your love remained steadfast. 4) You delivered us from captivity, 5) made covenant to be our sovereign God, and 6) spoke to us through your prophets." Six options right there.

Do you hear it? God created us in God's own image. Didn't have to do that. Didn't have to do it that way. We could all be frogs. Or banana slugs. And dead ones at that. But NO! It was LOVE that caused God to create us in God's own image, all of us-man, woman, youth, child-in God's own image. And for love, God breathed into us the breath of life.

Then what? How did we respond to that stupendous love? To be sure, sometimes we remembered to say, "Thank you." Sometimes we even loved God back. But, all too often, as our prayer says, we turned away and our love failed. Oh, and it wasn't just that once, was it, way back in the Garden of Eden, with those rascals Adam and Eve and the snake? We still do it all the time, don't we? Our love fails. We turn away. Can you imagine God's frustration with us, exasperation, even disgust, sometimes?

We can turn far away, can't we, and stay away for a long time. Our hearts can become cold and hard. We can live for ourselves alone. Our love can fail. But when that happens, what does God do? Tries another option. Tries yet another way to get at us. To bring us back home. God's love remains steadfast. Remember the story of the Hebrew people, slaves in Egypt? That's our story. God delivers us from captivity, sets us free. Turns the kingdom of Pharoah on its head. God brings us to the Promised Land, flowing with milk and honey. God initiates a covenant with us, to be faithful forever. It works for a while, but not very long, really. Again, our love fails and we turn away.

So, God tries another one of the options. He sends the prophets. Remember them from last week? Amos, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Micah, John the Baptist. "People, come back," they plead. "God wants you back." You see, through it all, God's love remains steadfast.

Wow! "Holy, holy, holy," we sing. And we praise the one who comes in God's name. For lo and behold, before we even recognize it, God is already trying one more option. One more way to get through to us. One more attempt to breathe life into us again. God sends Jesus, fully human, fully divine, love incarnate. God sends Jesus to heal and save and to set us free.

For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believes in him might not perish, but have everlasting life. Martin Luther said that these words are "the gospel in miniature" and describe exactly how God bridges the gap between Spirit and flesh with the gift of Jesus Christ.

For God so loved the world. Our Creating, Redeeming, Sustaining God wants us, and wants us to know, believe and trust that love. One of the great writers of our time, Reynolds Price, writes that these words from John's gospel, which we hear today, say, in the clearest voice of all of Scripture, the words we all crave: "the Maker of all things loves and wants me."

Why does God keep reaching out and pulling us back? Why does God never give up on us? Love. It's the only rational option, for nothing else makes sense. Only love, which, of course, isn't rational at all, could continue to motivate the Holy of Holies to keep loving us.

No wonder it's so hard for us to hear and fully receive. God loves us, each and all, this much. We live in a harsh world where there's plenty of evidence to the contrary. Some of us were raised in loveless families, or dangle now in loveless relationships. Some of us are missing the love of another special person for companionship and partnership.

Some of us shrink under the constant barrage of messages that we are not and will never be . . . rich enough, smart enough, attractive enough, thin enough, competent enough . . . add to the list your own personal demons.

The Word of God proclaims something else. Love. Can you hear the words today? The Maker of all things loves and wants me and you. That's all you really need to know. It's what God wants you to know and believe.

Ponder this for a moment, and let its healing power seep into your heart and bones. As we prepare to receive the sacrament of God's great gift of love, ponder the options of God's love as expressed in the words of a modern hymn-writer, Thomas Troeger:

A spendthrift lover is the Lord, who never counts the cost
Or asks if heaven can afford to woo a world that's lost.
Our lover tosses coins of gold across the midnight skies
And stokes the sun against the cold to warm us when we rise.
Still more is spent in blood and tears to win the human heart,
To overcome the violent fears that drive the world apart.
Behold the bruised and thorn-crowned face of one who bears our scars
And empties out the wealth of grace that's hinted by the stars.
How shall we love this heart-strong God who gives us everything,
Whose ways to us are strange and odd, what can we give or bring?
Acceptance of the matchless gift is gift enough to give.
This very act will shake and shift the way we love and live.

Dear brothers and sisters, prepare now to come to this table and receive the Gifts of God in Christ Jesus. Take them in remembrance that Christ died for us while we were yet sinners, and feed on him in your hearts by faith with thanksgiving. Through this sacrament, "may you be strengthened in your inner being, that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith, as you are being rooted and grounded in love. And may you have the power to comprehend, with all the saints, what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, so that you may be filled with the fullness of God." (EPHESIANS) Amen.