Isaiah 43:18-25

Epiphany 7 - Year B

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"Forget what's happened; don't keep going over old history. Be alert, be present. I'm about to do something new."

Here is a place to go to get a whole series of reflections upon the unhelpful responses of claiming the current issues between America and Iraq are parallels to 1939 or 1956.

Check it out at The Guardian, Tuesday February 18 2003 - Blast from the past.

Politicians on both sides of the argument over Iraq have been busy rummaging through the history books. The pro-war camp constantly warn against repeating the mistakes of appeasement. The antis claim we are heading for another Suez. But which is the more plausible parallel? Matt Seaton asked a dozen leading historians

One of the comments goes like this: "I'm allergic to lazy historical analogies. History never repeats itself, ever. That's its murderous charm. The poet Joseph Brodsky, in his great essay A Profile of Clio, wrote that when history comes, it always takes you by surprise, and that's what I believe, too."

http://www.kairoscomotion.org/lectionary/2003/february2003.html

 

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Remember good-old Jesus, teaching away in the synagogue. Then comes a load of sin through the roof. This is an opportunity to keep on teaching and rebuke the interruption. It is also a time to remember Isaiah 43:24-25: you have burdened me with your sins but I blot out your transgressions for my own sake, to be consistent with my own teaching, my own image.

What do you do with the loads of sin that come your way to interrupt an otherwise wonderful life? It is so easy to keep holding folks sins against them and so hard to move on, to remember not such sin, to help folks stand without the props of certainty and socio-religio-politico-trappings.

Even when sinned against, G*D forgives. What do you do when sinned against?

http://www.kairoscomotion.org/lectionary/2006/february2006.html

 

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Isaiah 43:18-25 and 2 Kings 2:1-14

Don't hold on to former things /for\ a new thing is springing forth. (Isaiah)

Don't stay behind /for\ double blessings lie ahead. (2 Kings)

With these two summaries (continuing the tension between Epiphany 7 and Epiphany Last) we find moments of transfiguration right on this cusp of past and present/future.

These moments are precious. They are call-moments, direction-setting moments that are within and without what has been seen as a religious context.

So, what does it take to be aware of these opportune times? Well, watching or perceiving. This is difficult work to do alone and just as difficult to do in community. The difficulties are different but equally trying. To put oneself to the test or to be put to the test by another takes audacity, perseverance, humility, vision, hope, and forgiveness (just a beginning half-dozen of qualities needed in an in-between place).

Enjoy your cusp moments today. You'll look back on them with even more joy than you had in anticipating them.

http://kcmlection.blogspot.com/2009_02_01_archive.html