Sermon: “No Rest, Until Salvation”

Text: Isaiah 62:1-5

2^nd Sunday in Ordinary Time (C)

January 17, 2010

Scripture introduction:

• Prophecy in the form of poetry; setting not immediately clear from the text.
• People disappointed after their liberation from exile and return to devastated land—almost like an earthquake.

Sermon:

• Illustration[1] of a young female pastor visiting a man living in the nursing home.  He did not answer her and was unwilling even to look her in the eye when she visited.  She took out her Bible and read a lament from the Psalms.  (A lament—e.g., some Psalms and Lamentations is basically a prayer of complaint raised by a human against God.  The Bible is full of them.)  Only then did the man lift his eyes and say, “Finally, someone knows what I am feeling.”  The Bible is true and good not only in the ways it teaches us to behave.  It also is true because it tells how it really feels to be a human being—what it means to be human.
• Text for today begins with what is almost a lament: “For Zion’s sake I will not keep silent, and for Jerusalem’s sake I will not rest, until her vindication shines out like the dawn, and her salvation like a burning torch.” 
• The prophet is saying that he will not quit holding God accountable to God’s promises until God actually fulfills them. 
• Back to the history—what God had promised through earlier prophecies in Isaiah, VS. what actually had happened so far. 
• No beauty
• No fertility
• Still the laughingstock of the other nations, the butt of all their jokes: “Their great God cannot save them.”
• But now the poetry moves into an actual prophecy.  We move from the prophet’s voice to the prophet speaking God’s own words.  The promise is renewed.
• The nations will see your vindication; the kings that laughed at you will see your glory.
• In fact, God will give you a new name.
• Zion no longer forsaken (earlier prophecy had understood God to have divorced daughter Zion, leaving her unattached and unprotected.)
• Land no longer desolate (unproductive)
• God will take Zion back, as in marriage.  Zion will once again be called God’s “delight” (Hephzibah), and the land of Zion will be called “married” (Beulah), that is, “fruitful,” “productive,” “fertile.”[2]
• Aside: think of all the churches, mainly in rural communities, named Hephzibah and Beulah; this is where the names come from.
• In a sense, God has answered the challenge of the prophet, and in the process the prophet has been transformed: For the sake of Zion and for Jerusalem, God will not rest—God’s work will not be completed—until Zion’s vindication shines like the dawn and Jerusalem’s salvation blazes forth like a burning torch.  GOD WILL NOT REST, UNTIL SALVATION.
• When I was 13 years old, my family went on a 21-day cruise in the Caribbean.  With the possible exception of Caracas, Venezuela, the poorest and most depressed city we visited was Port-au-Prince, Haiti.  We were there during the extremely repressive regime of President Francois (“Papa Doc”) Duvalier, and we happened to be their for his birthday parade.  The streets were lined with spectators, but they were also lined with troops to make sure that no one got out of line or failed to cheer loudly enough.  My father raised his movie camera to capture the motorcade as it passed by.  A soldier pushed Dad’s camera down and made it clear that there were to be “no pictures.”
• I’ll never forget the poverty in that city.  Downtown was disgustingly unsanitary.  The buildings were dilapidated.  The economy was so depressed that villagers were selling for $5.00 double-sided carved wooden tabletops that must have taken weeks to produce.
• Haiti is the second oldest republic in this hemisphere, a people of color declaring their independence from France shortly after our own nation successfully separated from Great Britain.  But their history has been tragic almost from the beginning.  The United States bears some responsibility for Haiti’s problems: under President Wilson, we virtually took their country over and ran it for the benefit of New York banks.  Before and since, the Haitians never have been able to get both feet on the ground.
• It’s heartbreaking now to know that, on top of all their other problems—political, economic, and social—the Haitians have been visited by a devastating earthquake.  Yesterday was my day to volunteer as a chaplain at Union Hospital.  Several patients, as much as they themselves were suffering, asked me to pray for the residents of Haiti.  One woman was weeping uncontrollably in sympathy for the children of Port-au-Prince.
• It’s true, of course, that the loss of life and the property damage resulting from the disaster have been much worse because of the historic poverty and oppression in that country.  Better and newer buildings probably would have withstood the tremors.  But the Haitians did not cause the earthquake. 

• How are the people of God to respond to the horror and devastation?
• We don’t understand why God created a world where earthquakes would happen.  We may even be angry at God.
• Pat Robertson has an explanation for why the earthquake happened: he believes it is God’s judgment for what he claims was a pact with the devil that some of Haiti’s leaders made in the 1800s when they sought independence from France.[3]  In the strongest possible terms, I deplore such a theology.
• Why disasters like this happen remains a mystery.  The Bible, and our text for today, tell us that we would not be the first to pray the “Why, God?” prayer.  Why must these things happen, Lord?  Why must there be so much suffering in the world?  Why don’t you do something about it?  You promise that you love us and that you will take care of us.  How’s about a little help down here?
• Is that an unfaithful prayer?  I don’t think so.  It’s a lament.  For the unstated assumption of these prayers is that God does love us and does want the best for us.  I have said before that the essence of faith is believing in God’s goodness in spite of what is happening around us.
• As the Bible shows us time and again, God hears these prayers.  God can handle our anger and frustration.
• Power of prayer to transform our feelings (like the poetry of the prophet, which also reflects a transformation and renewed confidence)
• Sometimes when we tell God our deepest frustrations with the way God is handling things, a strange thing happens.  We begin to see the way that God already is moving in the midst of the tragedy.  Can it be that the Holy Spirit is moving three United States presidents, other politicians, hundreds of thousands of church members, news media, and other charities to respond to the needs of the Haitian people?  Rather than eroding our faith, when we express our frustrations to God, we often find that our own faith is deepened.  We come away even more convinced that, while God’s time-frame is not the same as ours, God nevertheless will not rest until we humans are saved and vindicated.
• Maybe we begin to understand that, while it is not an explanation for the devastation, there is room for life and growth as God calls us to respond in loving ways to the needs of others.  In your bulletin inserts today, you will find described a way to give to relief in Haiti through the Presbyterian Disaster Assistance program.  Karl Irving also has posted on the bulletin board downstairs another way of giving.  You may have your own favorite charity through which you would like to help.
• The prophet in Isaiah would not stop until God’s goodness became a reality on the ground.  Perhaps we, too, are called to that same spirit:  We will not keep silent.  We will not rest until the vindication and salvation of this old world shine forth in the darkness like a burning torch. 
• No rest, until salvation.