God Will Have a People

Last year Mary Jo’s closed.  For decades this local warehouse of fabrics and sewing accessories was a regional destination for those inclined toward needle and thread crafting.  You could find just about any kind of fabric there, in bolts, or simply remnants.  There is now no “remnant” left.  It has been replaced by a mall of modern shops.

The Bible has many examples of what has been called remnant theology.  A remnant is defined most often as a body of people who are left after a catastrophe, such as the people left in Judah after the destruction of Jerusalem by the Babylonians in 586 BC.  The prophet Isaiah (37:31-32) makes the case:

The surviving remnant of the house of Judah shall again take root downward, and bear fruit upward; for from Jerusalem a remnant shall go out, and from Mount Zion a band of survivors.  The zeal of the Lord of hosts will do this.

Sometimes scripture describes a remnant as those who are left after God has winnowed the people in order to prove a point:  Gideon, whose army is whittled down by God to 300 men, nonetheless vanquishes the Midian army of tens of thousands so they may know that the victory comes from the Lord.

Remnant theology often represents the need for purification of God’s people.  The prophet Malachi speaks of the Lord coming like a refiner’s fire to make the people fit once again.  Sometimes the people need to be purged, to be sifted, to remove the dross for the people to be refined - to be made holy.

I have been drawn to remnant theology lately, particularly as I have become more disillusioned with the church in the United States.  I am disturbed by the virulent witness of conservative evangelicals, disheartened by the steady decline of mainline Protestant churches, appalled by the Catholic church’s abusive history, and distressed by the internal squabbling of my own denomination.  Yet, I see in remnant theology a sign of hope.  God will have a people.  

In every age, since the time of Abraham and Sarah, God has chosen people to introduce redemption and renewal into the world.  And while God’s people often fall into accommodation, rather than offering an alternative, to the world, again and again in history God manages to use a remnant of holy people to refine and restore God’s intentions for all of creation.  No matter how bleak the historical context, God will have a people.    

I am encouraged by the words of Paul in Romans 11:5, “So too at the present time there is a remnant, chosen by grace.”  Will you and I be among that remnant?