Back to the Old Testament again- I hope you don t mind. This is a lectionary

Transcription

1 Isaiah 1:10-17 God s Burden Back to the Old Testament again- I hope you don t mind. This is a lectionary reading- I m not just picking these scriptures out of the sky. They are important passages for us to study, as valid for our world as they were for the ancient Near East; as important for our society and modern communities of faith as for the Southern and Northern Kingdoms of the Bible, Judah and Israel. These prophets Isaiah, and last week, Hosea, and last month, Amos, and others, were men who listened for God s message to the chosen people and proclaimed it. It is important to us because of the powerful social element in their preaching: again and again the prophets demanded caring for one another and justice by those with influence or money- the merchants, the priests, the rulers of the people. We would be on the wrong side of religion if the practice of our faith were merely a matter of praying and worshipping and keeping commandments. Over and over the prophets emphasized the communal aspect of obedience, that is, relationships with othersand in particular, the poor and the needy. It is what the people of long ago were commanded to do, and God s word for us today, as well. Loving and justice and helping are the greater commandments to God s people as a nation and to worshippers as the community of faith.

2 In this first chapter of Isaiah, the prophet straightaway challenges his readers, without introduction or preamble, with the complaint that their religion falls far short of God s demands. He calls them sons who have rebelled against God, and children who deal corruptly; a sinful nation; they have despised the Holy God; they have forsaken the Lord. And so, the land is barren and desolate, and overrun by invaders. What must they do? According to verses 16 and 17, they must make themselves clean, and cease to do evil and learn to do good, do justice, fight oppression, and help the needy, because the prayers they speak and the sacrifices they perform don t make clean hearts, don t make for a right relationship with God. They have, in fact, become a burden to God. Look at the teaching in this passage. All the things that a congregation at worship would consider important, Isaiah says the Lord is sick and tired of: offerings and sacrifices, God has had enough; incense- it is an abomination; religious festivals, God hates; when they come in to worship, they are only making noise; when they gather for worship, their reverence is negated by their iniquity; when they pray, their hands are not empty to receive God s blessings, but are filled already with the blood of the innocent and the helpless. This key verse explains why their worship is futile, or even worse- why their worship dishonors God: their

3 deeds are evil, they do not give help to the needy, and so their very acts of worship are sinful; and it is a heavy weight on the shoulders of God. It is no wonder that Isaiah speaks as though addressing the legendary wicked and condemned cities, Sodom and Gomorrah! We may think these days that God s rejection of that ancient people has nothing to do with us. We may read our passage and see that their worship is nothing like ours. But what if we read it this way, that instead of offerings and sacrifices Isaiah said to us that God is tired of our weekly contribution because it is not given with a generous and humble heart? What if instead of incense, a symbol of God s presence, Isaiah had mentioned lighting a candle, or even sharing communion? Instead of the new moons and festivals of our passage, that God hates our special seasons and gatherings like Advent and Christmas, and Lent and Easter and Pentecost? And when we come together to pray, does God hear us, or does God refuse to listen because our hands are filled with the blood of the starving and abused men and women and children in the sweatshops of Asia or South America who sew our clothes or glue together our athletic shoes; or with the blood of the people of the Congo slaughtered in the fight over control of the minerals that go into our cell-phones and computers; or even the blood of the birds and animals

4 and fish of the Gulf, and the livelihood of the millions who live along the coast; as individuals, as a church, as a nation, are our hands clean of the blood of those who have committed suicide in that region these past few months out of the desperate feelings of loss and fear? If we can blithely go on with our lives, without real concern for these, then I think the prophet would say of us, why do you come tramping into the Lord s sanctuary? It may be true we do not have solutions ourselves, but we have a voice that we can lift to God on their behalf, a voice that must be lifted up to leaders of our country and to all rulers, for the sake of the hungry and the hurting and the poor. So in Isaiah, God demands true devotion, the whole hearts and minds of those who would worship. Anything less and God will turn away. We are not permitted to think that God, through the words of the prophet, was so severe towards the people of that old time, but as for us- well, we do the best we can and God understands, so it s all fine. Don t you think they were able to justify their own actions and thoughts in the same way? I m certain they thought they were obeying all the rules. But there is some instruction from verse 10 which may help us understand better. Isaiah tells his readers to hear the word of the Lord. This

5 phrase is a cue that nothing is more important than the words that follow. Isaiah is claiming the absolute authority of God for his preaching. The word of the Lord is God s judgment against prideful, self-righteous worship; and the command to give humble hearts to God. And then for emphasis he says something else. Give ear to the teaching of God. And the word teaching is the Hebrew word torah, which of course is the word for the Law of Moses. But saying it here directs Isaiah s audience, and us, to the idea that the teaching in our passage is a new and bigger understanding of God s Law. It is no longer acceptable just to follow the commandments, just to keep the forms of worship, but the prophets teach us that God demands our hearts and minds, and not simply getting all the doctrine correct- we can see how displeased God is with the people in our scripture; God is not concerned with mere acts of worship and piety- we can see how angry God is with those who come to worship so seriously and who make many prayers, but yet, who will not be cleansed, who will not learn to do good. This is Torah as well: to learn from this new teaching how to love and show kindness to God s creatures; to show by our mercy that our hearts and lives belong to God.

6 Maybe you were already able to tell that this sermon didn t come easy. This magnificent passage of the Lord God demanding whole-hearted and open-hearted worship and service by the people who claim to love him- should have been simple. But it is difficult to discuss the larger issues, hard for us to get our minds around this idea of church people with bloody hands- the bigger picture of what is sin: not just occasional guilty deeds, but also our silence while others suffer, or our desire for some object that may cause others to suffer in our drive to possess it. Thus are we partners with the violent, greedy world and guilty anytime we try to excuse ourselves, and think we can make it up by praying harder or being a better church-goer. That is not exactly how we can make it right. We become God s woman or man by our service to others. But see, you are some of my favorite people anywhere. And I know your hearts are already big, so what can I say to you from Isaiah that you need to hear? Perhaps I can help you consider that much of what we say and do as the church is a burden we have put upon God; anytime we think to please God in such a superficial manner as simply doing worship the right way for an hour per week; anytime we think we may have God figured out and think we understand all that God wants from us. Here in Isaiah, we can learn the new Torah: making our eyes

7 to see the depth of evil in the world, and realizing that even the best of us cannot avoid it; and striving with grateful hearts to love others as God loves- to love all other people, with the compassion God has shown us in the writings of the prophets, and with the love made known to us in the life and death and resurrection of Jesus Christ our Lord.