Sermon: February 5, 2012
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Have you not known? Have you not heard? The prophet, speaking to the people of Israel, begins with a note of incredulity.
Have you not known? Have you not heard? The Lord is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth.
It is not Chemosh, the God of the Moabites; nor is it Ba-al of the Canaanites. It’s not Asherah of the Assyrians; and it is certainly not Nebo or Aku or one of the Babylonian gods where the people are in exile.
It is Yahweh who does not faint or grow weary. It is the Lord who will give strength to mount up with wings like eagles.
The lure of worshipping other gods was strong in Israel, from the beginning of its history. Imagine ancient Israel in a nation-wide drought, which happened occasionally in that land, and it still does.
Yahweh, the Lord your God, was thought to cause drought from time to time. That’s not too comforting. But there is the local God, Ba-al, of the local people, the Canaanites.
Ba-al is a fertility god, a god who causes rain to fall and crops to grow. Ba-al is a god whose worship entails going in to the sacred prostitutes in the local temple, and there … consummating ones act of worship.
Remember, these are people whose understanding of science and nature is much different from ours. So tell me – in that situation, which god would you expect them to worship?!
These words we heard, from Isaiah, were spoken to people in exile in Babylon. The God of Israel, Yahweh, was known from Mt. Sinai in the desert, a long way from Babylon. Yahweh’s worship was centered in the Jerusalem temple. But the Temple had been destroyed; and the people were in exile, unable to return to their land.
But there were the local gods – Nebo, Aku – who counseled accepting your fate, giving in to reality, settling into the rhythms and cycles of history, and moving on. Which god would you expect the people to worship?
The issue Isaiah presents us with is stark and real today.
Whatever the technical definition, we all know we are in the midst of a sustained and painful recession; and economists, commentators and politicians are telling us that the only answer is to put in place policies that will help and inspire us to spend our way out of it.
It’s only a few kill-joy Christians who keep reminding us –
It’s better to give than to receive…. Do not be concerned about worldly things, but seek first God’s Realm and God’s righteousness…. Human beings do not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.
The issue Isaiah presents us with, is stark and real today.
And the answers are far from easy.
We don’t have complete certainty about any of the ultimate things in our lives.
The final reality and the definitive truth are never obvious.
No one has all the absolute answers in their hip pocket.
That’s why the religion we are a part of is called the Christian faith, and not the Christian fact. It is a giving of ourselves to what we believe and trust, and to the One whom we are willing to follow.
We know the uncertainty that happens when our faith seems to be pulling in one direction,… and friends or family or reality seem to be pulling in a different direction,… and the immediate outcome is just not obvious – the consequences of our choices are partially unknown.
In the midst of that situation, we remember Isaiah’s words:
God gives power to the faint & strengthens the powerless. Even youths will faint and be weary, and the young will fall exhausted; but those who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength – they shall mount up with wings like eagles, they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint.
In the mid and late 1980’s, Communism was solidly established as the political and economic system of a fair amount of our world. While never having been one of those red-baiters who looked for Communists under our beds, it was always clear to me that there was significant political oppression and human terror in that system.
The story of its fall, in 1989, in most of the places where it once held power, can be told in many ways, from many view-points. Purely secular and naturalistic explanations are possible and rational.
But a close reading of those events through the eyes of faith shows, to me, the hand of God at work.
The joy of the people at the fall of the Berlin Wall is not unlike the joy we read about in certain places in scripture.
Have you not known? Have you not heard? Even if we are in exile and cannot see a reason for hope, the Lord is God.
A story from our own past. Through the 1970’s and 80’s, it was clear that the church as a whole did not know what to do about gay and lesbian folks. Though many were still in the closet, more were coming out and asking to be seen as full human beings, beloved children of God.
It was not clear that churches could even talk about this, much less be face-to-face with lesbian and gay people over time, and confess the historical sins of homophobia and even hatred.
Yet our church did in 1992, declaring itself Open and Affirming of all people, including and especially gay and lesbian people. With God’s empowerment, this church mounted up with wings like eagles. It ran without getting weary. It walked without fainting.
Another example – important to me these days because of my life-long struggle against obesity and overeating – comes from the novel To Kill a Mockingbird.
One evening, Atticus Finch tells his children, Jem and Scout, the story of their neighbor, Mrs. Dubose, who has just died. They only knew her as the vicious old woman who assailed them with insults whenever they walked by her front porch.
One time, Jem retaliated against her by tearing all the blooms off her azalea bushes; and as punishment, Atticus forced him to go to her house and read to her every evening. It was a harrowing experience for him. What Jem didn’t know is that Mrs. Dubose was a morphine addict, struggling to free herself from her addiction.
You mean that’s what her fits were? Jem asked his father.
Yes, that’s what they were, Atticus said. Most of the time you were reading to her, I doubt if she heard a word you said.
Did she die free?
Free as the mountain air, Atticus replied. I wanted you to see what real courage is, instead of getting the idea that courage is a man with a gun in his hand.
Courage is when you know you’re licked before you begin; but you begin anyway, and you see it through no matter what. You rarely win, but sometimes you do. Mrs. Dubose won, all 98 pounds of her. According to her views, she died beholden to nothing and nobody. She was the bravest person I ever knew.
They shall mount up with wings like eagles. They shall run and not be afraid.
One final story, about us – not from our past, but from the recent present.
Since, earlier in the sermon, I mentioned the consumer mentality and the difficulty everyone has in standing against it, it seems only fair to remind us of the joy of our recently-completed Capital Campaign.
As we went into the campaign several months and a year ago, there was much wringing of hands over the cost of the new heating system by itself, let alone wanting to do other things some people were talking about.
What if we didn’t raise enough even for a new boiler? How much would we have to borrow, and for how long? What would that do to our already difficult budget?
Had we made plans for failure – was a question I heard often.
Those green & white numbers on the back wall testify to the generosity of our members, our faith in God, and our trust in each other.
They shall mount up with wings like eagles. They shall run and not be weary. They shall walk and not faint.
For God’s gifts of grace and courage, we give God thanks and praise. Amen.
