Roll Down Justice: Conviction
Isaiah 58:6-12
Rev. Lynn Carman Bodden, guest preacher
Emmanuel Baptist Church
March 15, 2020
INTRODUCTION to Isaiah 58.6-12
That the prophet Isaiah engages in a debate about the participation of the faithful in ritual worship versus in faith-filled living proves that this wrestling is nearly as old as the hills. During a high holy season like Lent (which I know you as Baptists are not as given to – I heard all those “alleluias!”), it’s an important conversation to engage, because some of us feel pressed to engage in religious ritual like more regular attendance in church, or particular times and styles of prayer, or specifically designated sacrificial giving, or even fasting. The challenge is that we don’t always know why we are taking on these practices. It’s what good Christians are supposed to do, perhaps. Or it’s what will focus us on the God we know in Christ, we hope. Or maybe it will just provide a framework of discipline we believe will strengthen us to face into the storms of life that surround us.
And it is exactly this kind of reasoning that Isaiah takes on, like a house afire!
Speaking to an audience in the early sixth century BCE, a band of people recently returned from exile in Babylon to a Jerusalem still in rubble, Isaiah wants to challenge religious practices which are transactional: that if we do certain activities – pray, fast, give – then God will notice and offer us something in return – encouragement, protection, salvation. It doesn’t work that way, exclaims the prophet, whether with a loud growl or a disappointed hiss. Fasting and prayer and giving are not about building up brownie points with the Holy One. They are not pursuits we engage to get ourselves noticed, by God or by anyone else. They are not, when it comes down to is, about US. (Thomas W. Currie, FotW, C Ash Wednesday)
The people of the One God are not to live as their Canaanite neighbors who expect that if they fast, their gods to perform certain functions for them. (Andrew Foster Conners, FotW, A Advent 5) Instead, the prophet proclaims, religious practices can lead us from the isolation of personal salvation into relationship with the world around us. Our worship faithfully, creatively, genuinely offered will change us, open us, lead us to recognize where God is at work around us and then inspire and embolden us to join in.
As you listen to our reading from Isaiah this morning, hear how often the prophet challenges us personally: to share our bread, to open our homes, to offer cover and care to those within our reach, to take responsibility, do our part, to free the oppressed and to foster clear and constructive communication. As we live into and move with a bit more of the grace God has shown us, we will notice the Light. The power of the living God in, around and through us, will be unmistakable. Restoration will be tangible and visible.
Hear now to the words of the prophet Isaiah, as powerful and true now as they were generations ago. How do they speak to us in these days of Covid 19 “as shelves empty, markets tank, leaders dither, and old people die in a day.” (Mary Luti, Daily Devotional, 14.March 2020) Listen and be moved.
Readings: Isaiah 58.6-12
If any of us were put on trial today for being followers of Christ, would there be enough evidence in our lives to convict us?
Maybe you have heard this question before. Or perhaps today it’s being asked of you for the first time. Consider well: if you were standing trial this very day, is there enough evidence in your life to convict you of being faithful to what you say you believe?
If you are at all like me, you might take a quick look back at however many years you’ve claimed to be a believer and think: well, I was nice to people – most of the time. I went to church. I gave what I could. I prayed and did bible study. I helped out in a feeding program, brought canned goods when asked, took my old clothes to the clothing closet or the rummage sale, and occasionally gave a few bucks to a person on the street. I stopped using Styrofoam long ago, and started walking or using my bike or public transportation more often. I marched for peace and cast my votes for justice. I participated in difficult conversations about white privilege. I welcomed the full participation and equal rights of GLBTQIA people in the life of my church and society at large. So, yes, I think my neighbors considered me a good Christian. I think I’m guilty as charged.
The follow-up then might be: then why – if you, Lynn, and this church with its good people, and those across the street and down the hill and over the river and across this nation and throughout the world can be convicted of following Jesus, why is there still so much craziness and rancor? Where is the light of God’s love shining? Where is the evidence of restoration? In whom are healing and liberation made manifest? Where are light and liberation, restoration and rebuilding visible, tangible?
Lots of years ago, as I was getting to know the man who would become my husband, I was touched by the life of the Catholic Worker community. Peter was living in Waterbury, CT in a Catholic Worker house of hospitality, run by Tom and Monica Cornell. As you may know, the Catholic Worker was founded in 1933 by Dorothy Day and Peter Maurin, who lived among the least and the lost and the most vulnerable in New York City, feeding the hungry, taking the homeless in, offering clothing and care. The motto of the Catholic Worker, as I came to understand it, was: If you see something that needs doing, do it – whether it pays or not, and no matter the cost to you. Don’t just pray and hope – get your hands dirty. Jump in.
The most costly thing then as now was to see the humanity in someone whose life situation was so different from one’s own, to see that humanity in its illness, its grit and grime, its misfortune and weakness, its unlove-ability and to love it anyway – up close and personal. It was to advocate that others would see that humanity as well. It still does. It means standing with and standing up for immigrants, like Kathy is doing right now, welcoming the mentally ill and advocating for proper services, seeing the poor as human beings in need and living in ways that create sharing by all so there is scarcity for none. It means loving enemies. It isn’t always safe. It can feel tedious and painful rather than rewarding. It certainly raises eyebrows among those in polite society, even in churches. But in otherwise dismal and despairing and broken lives, it really is true that the light shines and a little healing is apparent, because of the conviction of some to be where Christ would be, among the people and in the places on the edges.
Two stories that resound with God’s conviction about true worship, the first related by Andrew Foster Conners in the commentary Feasting on the Word. One year during Holy Week, a few Christians from well-endowed congregations in a major metropolitan area spent a night with homeless friends on the street. They were looking for the suffering Christ in the lives of those who spend their days and nights suffering from hunger, disease, and rejection. It was a chilly night, and rain rolled in close to midnight. Looking for shelter, the handful of travelers felt fortunate to come upon a church holding an all-night prayer vigil. The leader of the group was a pastor of one of the most respected churches in the city. As she stepped through the outer doors of the church, a security guard stopped her. She explained that she and the rest of their group were Christians. They had no place to stay and were wet and miserable, and would like to rest and pray. Enticed by the lighted warmth of the sanctuary, she had forgotten that her wet, matted hair and disheveled clothing left her looking like just another homeless person from the street. The security guard was friendly, but explained in brutal honesty, "I was hired to keep homeless people like you out." (FotW, A Advent 5)
The second story appeared in the most recent issue of The Christian Century. Last year at about this time in Laredo, TX, which is 200+ miles up the southern border to the west from Brownsville where Kathy is now, a local pastor noticed an escalation of Central American asylum-seekers crossing the nearby border. Lorenzo Ortiz began to invite these people, hundreds of them – men, women and children, to stay at Iglesia Bautista Emanuel. According to Amy Frykholm’s article, “there were people sleeping behind the altar and under the pews” – that is they were until the church people began to object at the takeover of their church. So Pastor Ortiz took them to his home, as many as 140 at a time, where they slept in tents and cots in the yard and in the house. And when the flow of migrants stopped rather suddenly, Pastor Ortiz began to drive daily across the border to take food and to the tent cities to help them get supplies, and to offer transportation for their appointments with the US authorities (The Christian Century, March 11, 2020, p. 10-11)
“Is not this the fast that I choose: to loose the bonds of injustice, to undo the thongs of the yoke, to let the oppressed go free, and to break every yoke? Is it not to share your bread with the hungry, and bring the homeless poor into your house; when you see the naked, to cover them, and not to hide yourself from your own kin?” If we want to be convicted, perhaps not at the border, perhaps not on a rainy night among the homeless, but in our neighborhoods, our city in a time of Covid 19, our nation in days of confusion and rancor, where will we hear God calling us to be at work? And how in these days of fasting and prayer will we respond? May the love of God roll down through us.
Amen.