Today’s household object is the kettle and our Bible passage for today is Isaiah 64:1-5.
I was thirteen years old when I realised that the kettle I had taken for granted all my life was not ubiquitous. We were on a holiday to France, my first time abroad, and staying in self-catering accommodation, I discovered that kettles were not available. There were many things that were unfamiliar to me during that holiday (including dunking croissants in hot chocolate drunk from bowls, not mugs!), but I still find the kettle an indispensable part of cooking.
Kettles are used, of course, to boil water – boiling water which can cook food for us or can make cups of tea! By and large, the kettle is a safe way of doing this (though I have managed to burn myself on occasions when my hand hasn’t been steady enough in the pouring process!) Boiling water produces steam which can be used to sterilise needles or bottles, but of course, steam can hurt us too. There is a danger involved with this process!
Similarly, Isaiah shows us that God is both loving and to be feared, someone before whom we rightly quake. He is not to be trifled with. Love and judgment go hand in hand, which is what we see at the cross. God’s love was the motivating force behind sending Jesus to save the world, but the wrath of God had to be fully satisfied by a perfect, sinless offering for sin. If we don’t quake a little at the enormity of Easter, perhaps we haven’t fully grasped what it’s all about.