Hebrew Testament text for Trinity Sunday 30 May 2021

 Isaiah 6:1-8      In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord sitting on a throne, high and lofty; and the hem of his robe filled the temple. Seraphs were in attendance above him; each had six wings: with two they covered their faces, and with two they covered their feet, and with two they flew. And one called to another and said:

“Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts; 

the whole earth is full of his glory.”

The pivots on the thresholds shook at the voices of those who called, and the house filled with smoke. And I said: “Woe is me! I am lost, for I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips; yet my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts!”

Then one of the seraphs flew to me, holding a live coal that had been taken from the altar with a pair of tongs. The seraph touched my mouth with it and said: “Now that this has touched your lips, your guilt has departed and your sin is blotted out.” Then I heard the voice of the Lord saying, “Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?” And I said, “Here am I; send me!”

Reflection        There is something about Trinity Sunday that confounds our intellect. One God, Three Persons, undivided and distinct, trinity and unity. What are we to think?

Where intellect fails experience prevails. As we rise to witness the broad sweep of the history of God’s people, we are dazzled with a multiplicity of visions, visions of Divine and human encounters punctuate our story.  One of those visions appears in the Hebrew Testament account of the prophet First Isaiah’s experience.Trinity 

Isaiah avers, “I saw the Lord sitting on a throne, high and lofty; and the hem of his robe filled the temple. Seraphs were in attendance above him; each had six wings…” Great drama. Then with the earth shaking and the Temple filled with smoke Isaiah hears, “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts; the whole earth is full of his glory.” Quite an experience.

The religious life of the ancient Jewish nation is centered in the Temple in Jerusalem. When the future of his country looks especially bleak, it is the Temple to which Isaiah turns seeking wisdom to guide him.  Isaiah was born during the immoral reign of King Uzziah. Even though Isaiah has a keen knowledge of political affairs and mastery of poetic language, he turns to God in his time of trouble. Putting his faith in God rather than himself, Isaiah has a vision, a vision that assures him that despite his nation’s dismal state, God remains present and active in history.

Face to face with the vision of God’s glory, Isaiah is quite shaken.  His stomach must have leapt to his throat and he protests, “Woe is me! I am lost, for I am a man of unclean lips…” Whereupon a seraph, a Spirit of God,”holds a live coal that had been taken from the altar” to Isaiah’s lips, a ritual act to illustrate the inner cleansing of Isaiah’s protesting heart and mind. 

Isaiah realizes that in spite of being less than holy and living in a nation erupting with corruption, he is redeemed so when he hears God’s invitation, “Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?” he responds, “Here am I; send me!” As it is said, the rest is history. The course of Isaiah’s life is set as he dares to preach and counsel three kings before dying a martyr.

I believe Jesus’ story parallels that of Isaiah. At his baptism the vision of the Spirit of God descending like a dove and settling upon him sets the course of his life and ministry, compels him to preach, teach and heal the lives of many, putting himself crosswise with religious and political officials before dying a martyr.

Isaiah and Jesus put their faith in the experience of Divine Presence that invites their incarnate response, “Here am I.” “Not my will, your will be done.”  Benevolent Father calls to faithful Son through the effectual action of the Spirit.  The fullness of God is made known in the interdependent relationship of the transcendent, incarnate and demonstrative. One God in Trinity. 

With clouds of smoke and quaking ground, not to mention a global pandemic, Transcendent God confirms the interconnected interdependence of all creation.

With care for the least, the lost and the lonely, Immanent God reveals Divine Presence and Action in flesh and bones every day.

With blooming breath the Spirit of God breathes life and liberty through all of humanity. Everyone and everything is included in Trinity.

Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

Creator, Redeemer, Source of All Being.

One, Holy and Living God. 

As it was for Isaiah and Jesus, so too is the state of our nation, shamefully corrupt. The elite are built up and protected while the poor are oppressed and rejected.  If we keep doing the same thing, nothing is going to change. And so it is time for us to pray that God’s seraphs touch our lips with the live coal from the altar, redeeming our lives and  compelling us to claim our place with the Trinity praying, “Here am I. Send me” to care for all your people and creation. 

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Gospel text for Sunday 10 December 2017

Mark 1:1-8        The beginning of the  good news of Jesus the Christ, the Son of God.

As it is written in the prophet Isaiah,

“See, I am sending my messenger ahead of you,

who will prepare your way;

the voice of one crying out in the wilderness:

‘Prepare the way of the Lord,

make his paths straight,’”

John the baptizer appeared in the wilderness, proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. And people from the whole Judean countryside and all the people of Jerusalem were going out to him, and were baptized by him in the river Jordan, confessing their sins. Now John was clothed with camel’s hair, with a leather belt around his waist, and he ate locusts and wild honey. He proclaimed, “The one who is more powerful than I is coming after me; I am not worthy to stoop down and untie the thong of his sandals. I have baptized you with water; but he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit.”

Reflection        Isaiah is not sending us out with axes and saws, root loopers and clippers, hazel hoes and rock bars to blaze a trail through the wilderness, to “Prepare the way of the Lord.” Isaiah is inviting us to see and be a new way in the wilderness. For the most part our human way, our path through the wilderness of life, is fraught with obstacles. Whether they are fallen timber or emotional memories, mountains or inherited facts of our mental, physical or emotional condition, at every turn and junction we have a choice. Are we going to direct our time and attention to our struggle with the obstacle and consequently get lost in a sea of distractions?  or, are we going to turn ourselves around and pay attention to life as it envelops us, smell the roses even when faced with seemingly insurmountable obstacles? 

What if instead of seeing fallen trees or sordid family history or a series of bad breaks as getting in our way or keeping us from arriving at our joy, what if we saw our obstacles as that which prevents us from welcoming the Spirit of God that is already with us? When we return our attention to God, which is what John the Baptizer means when he “proclaims a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sin,” we are essentially making straight the path or the way between us and God. 

When John the Baptizer says, “Repent,” he is not saying beat yourself up for your shameful deeds. John calls for a change of mind… “the change of mind of those who have begun to abhor their errors and misdeeds, and have determined to enter upon a better course of life, so that it embraces… a recognition of sin, sorrow for it and hearty amendment…” (Strong’s G3341) When we repent we admit we are focused on or entrapped by our obstacles and then choose to turn instead toward God, not only by changing our mind but also by changing our behavior. 

And when John speaks of sin he is talking about the ways we allow ourselves to live without a share in God, missing the mark, being mistaken. (Strong’s G266) This is cheating ourselves out of the experience of God with us. The remedy for sin is not shame or self loathing. It is changing our minds and deciding to live with our share of God. This is the good news that we hear when Second Isaiah speaks on behalf of God to our Israelite ancestors who have been suffering in the wilderness and believe God has abandoned them. “Comfort, O comfort my people.” Our comfort comes when we change our minds, when we lean against our obstacles and decide that life is better when we pay attention to what is good and true and always with us. Life is better when we turn toward God. 

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Gospel text for First Advent, Sunday 27 November 2016

Matthew 24:36-44        Jesus said to the disciples, “But about that day and hour no one knows, neither the angels of heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father. For as the days of Noah were, so will be the coming of the Son of Man. For as in those days before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day Noah entered the ark, and they knew nothing until the flood came and swept them all away, so too will be the coming of the Son of Man. Then two will be in the field; one will be taken and one will be left. Two women will be grinding meal together; one will be taken and one will be left. Keep awake therefore, for you do not know on what day your Lord is coming. But understand this: if the owner of the house had known in what part of the night the thief was coming, he would have stayed awake and would not have let his house be broken into. Therefore you also must be ready, for the Son of Man is coming at an unexpected hour.”

Reflection     What were the people who chose this reading for the First Sunday of Advent thinking? Why begin the New Church Year  in the twenty-fourth chapter of Matthew’s gospel with Jesus warning the disciples and us to keep awake and be ready for apocalyptic change, change that will be no less traumatic than the great flood in Noah’s time?  Why not let us bask in naïve innocence anticipating the powdery smell of a newborn infant’s birth? Why not walk us through the litany of Jesus’ genealogy, who begat whom, “Abraham was the father of Jacob, and Jacob the father of Issac… all fourteen generations until we arrive at another “Jacob the father of Joseph the husband of Mary, of whom Jesus was born.” (Matt1.1,16) 

I believe the vexing choice for this text was to insure we not get swept up in nostalgia,  not for a minute imagine we are preparing for the birth of an ordinary child. The unnerving message is, we are preparing to receive a child who will turn our world upside down. This child, this Son of Humanity, is going to shake us up and wake us up and show us the way to “beat our swords into plough shares and our spears into pruning hooks.”

There is no question. Twenty-seven hundred years after the prophet Isaiah proclaimed peace among all people,  two thousand years after Jesus walked the earth, we, the people of God, are still in dire need of teaching and guidance to become the peacemakers God is calling us to be. We must learn how to transform our weapons of destruction into tools turned for the good of all people; think  about transforming M16s into water purifiers, denaturing nerve gas into pollution control systems, converting biological agents into agricultural tools. And of course, translating our words of judgment, condemnation and hatred into words of welcome, recommendation and love. Jesus is unequivocal. In God’s economy words or weapons intended for violence will be reconfigured as the means to care for all people and institute peace on earth and it will turn our world upside down. 

How can we be proponents peace on earth when we ache over our families fractured by divisive politics? How can we extend good will to all people on earth while we squirm among friends and neighbors wondering if we dare say what we think, feel or how we voted?  Where is the vision of hope for all when so many people are suffering and worried about feeding their children, keeping their families together, holding onto their jobs or health insurance?

I believe these and many similar questions illumine our need to hear the apocalyptic story of Jesus’ intrusion into history today. Our days are rife with excess, indulgence, arrogance, irresponsibility, jealousy and greed -  nonetheless, we are preparing to welcome the birth of the Christ child. We are preparing to be made new again and remember that regardless of our situation, always we begin again shining the new light of Christ in the world. 

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Gospel text for Sunday, 9 December 2012

Luke 3:1-6         In the fifteenth year of the reign of Emperor Tiberius, when Pontius Pilate was governor of Judea, and Herod was ruler of Galilee, and his brother Philip ruler of the region of Ituraea and Trachonitis, and Lysanias ruler of Abilene, during the high priesthood of Annas and Caiaphas, the word of God came to John son of Zechariah in the wilderness. He went into all the region around the Jordan, proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins, as it is written in the book of the words of the prophet Isaiah,

"The voice of one crying out in the wilderness:

'Prepare the way of the Lord,

make his paths straight.

Every valley shall be filled,

and every mountain and hill shall be made low,

and the crooked shall be made straight,

and the rough ways made smooth;

and all flesh shall see the salvation of God.'"

Reflection          “....all flesh shall see the salvation of God.” Wow! Isaiah’s unequivocal, all inclusive assurance precedes by about two thousand years another prophet’s words, “And all shall be well, all shall be well, all manner of things shall be well.” Born in England in the middle of the fourteenth century the mystic Dame Julian of Norwich was the first woman to write a book in the English language.   Like Isaiah, Julian turns away from obsession with sickness, corruption and sinfulness and experiences gratitude and joy in God’s unlimited forgiveness and assurance that “...all shall be well.”

What if we really believed the words of Julian and Isaiah? What if we looked at the world and the people of the twenty first century through the eyes of these ancient and medieval prophets who also lived in violent,  corrupt, disease plagued and morally bankrupt times yet did not let their hearts be hardened? Regardless of their circumstance, inside and out, Julian and Isaiah never stopped recognizing God’s compassionate Presence. Might we too encounter God’s limitless compassion and love in the ceaseless suffering of humanity?

When I ask myself, “what keeps me from “seeing” the way Julian and Isaiah see?” the painful truth is this. Judgement. I look at the world around me and I see what is wrong rather than what is well. My heart is hardened and the judgement of my mind says, “We’re going to hell in a handbasket.” And that makes me anxious and so I contract, begin to build walls to keep the world out except my walls bump into your walls and then we have to battle over property rights and human rights, which executes our humanity because we see each other as threats rather than the vulnerable creatures created in the image and likeness of God that we are. On guard rather than in God. 

Oh to see with the eyes of the prophet who looks into the face of corruption and calamity and experiences God’s limitless compassion. In the wilderness of our lives the prophet assures us that everything that is crooked will be made straight, whatever is rough will be made smooth, “all flesh shall see the salvation of God.” This is how I choose to be, in God rather than on guard. "And all shall be well, all shall be well, all manner of things shall be well."