Isaiah 35:1-10
Advent 3 - Year A
So often do we connect violence with salvation. Here, again, it seemed important to do so. “Here is your God. He will come with vengeance, with terrible recompense. He will come and save you.”
Given your current sensibilities, would you desire your salvation to come at the expense of recompense? What pound of flesh might satisfy a pound taken from you? Would you need two pounds or more to make up for the one you lost? Is vengeance upon another a necessary part of a compensation package for injuries done you?
Since this is an advent season of anticipation and new beginnings, it would be interesting to note how many times in these remaining two weeks we find ourselves listening to violence in the media, on the lips of political candidates, among our friend’s reports of life, and in our own family experience. Simply being aware of this number will begin a sensitization process needed to begin anticipating an everlasting joy that is not dependent upon divine violence justifying human violence.
If you are already aware of the way in which violence has been built into our joy, you may desire to begin removing it and finding that joy is able to be sustained on its own. There is no magic in this process. It is the same as changing any habit—persistence, persistence, persistence until it becomes second nature.
The best persistence carries with it an extension. Every time we are able to be aware of and back away from a violent response, we would be aided by inviting someone else to marvel at the miracle of our not responding in kind and being proactive in assisting them to glimpse a new avenue of their own salvation. This will mean staying in contact with ravenous beasts who are not aware of the choices in front of them and empathetically revealing them with an invitation to join you in choosing to see glory beyond survival.
An advent challenge is to remember that persistence fatigue is all too easy to arrive at. Keep your practicing communal that you might receive the support you need to keep expanding arenas for your persistent choice against violence in its various expressions, small and large.
As found in Wrestling Year A: Connecting Sunday Readings with Lived Experience
I've been thinking about the Holy Way in verse 8 in relation to the journey of Christian on the King's highway in Pilgrim's Progress. Isaiah portrays it is an exclusive road that has been perfected as a road, accepting only the special folk who are God's people. John Bunyan portrays it as a path that many jump on midway for a brief while or who enter to seduce folks off.
There are a great many resemblances between the story lines of the two authors and some differences. Rather than parsing all that out and thinking a choice can be made between the two that makes sense, as differentiated from a choice based on some inclination or other, it may be more fruitful to ask how you see "Holy Way" these days. Does it have broad guardrails? narrow? Are there high embankments or wide vistas? Are there toll booths and troll bridges?
Will you talk about the diversity of the folks on the way or their homogeneity? Is it a road of quest or of homecoming? What are the speed bumps made of?
I suspect that the way in which the Way is spoken of influences the way in which we travel. Are we on a 3-day tour? Is it a walking tour? Is the guide engaging us in the scene or repeating memorized facts and figures? Are we alone?
For me, who has been a part of the majority with quiet privilege, I find myself drawn toward the excitement of questing forth as described by Bunyan. My experiences with various minorities (and the outcast parts of myself) is that Isaiah's is a very powerful image.
[Side question: How did the outcast, imprisoned Bunyan come up with the quest process instead of the idealized?] The U.S., arguably the nation with privilege, puts forward the idealized formula and claiming it for itself (as opposed to the exiles coming home). All of which makes life very interesting when not frustrating. Just when we think we've got it figured, some invisible "least" pops up to lead us in a different direction.
http://www.kairoscomotion.org/lectionary/2004/december2004.html
Oh so often do we connect violence with salvation. Here, again, it seemed important to do so. "Here is your God. He will come with vengeance, with terrible recompense. He will come and save you."
Given your current sensibilities, would you desire your salvation to come at the expense of recompense? What pound of flesh might satisfy a pound taken from you? Would you need two pounds or more to make up for the one you lost? Is vengeance upon another part of a compensation package for injuries done you?
Since this is an advent season of anticipation and new beginnings, it would be interesting to note how many times in these remaining two weeks we find ourselves listening to violence in the media, on the lips of political candidates, among our friend's reports of life, and in our own family experience. Simply being aware of this number will begin the sensitization process needed to begin anticipating an everlasting joy that is not dependent upon divine violence justifying human violence.
If you are already aware of the way in which violence has been built into our joy, you may desire to begin removing it and finding that joy is able to be sustained on its own. There is no magic in this process. It is the same as changing any habit – persistence, persistence, persistence until it becomes second nature.
The best persistence carries with it a substitution. Every time we are able to be aware of and back away from a violent response, we would be aided by inviting someone else to marvel at the miracle of our not responding in kind and being proactive in assisting them to glimpse a new avenue of their own salvation. This will mean staying in contact with ravenous beasts who are not aware of the choices in front of them and empathetically revealing them with an invitation to join you in choosing to see glory beyond survival.
An advent challenge is to remember that persistence fatigue is all too easy to arrive at. Keep your practicing communal that you might receive the support you need to keep expanding arenas for your persistent choice against violence in its various expressions, small and large.
http://kcmlection.blogspot.com/2007_12_01_archive.html
Fear closes eyes as well as hearts.
When fearful we need to encourage one another to open our eyes even when know we will find our fears confirmed - there is a lot of really nasty stuff out there.
We will also find that the nasty stuff is not a last word. It is still possible to choose. We can choose to open our eyes and that's worth rejoicing over, even if what we see is still bad news.
Intentionally opening our eyes, we may also glimpse transformation going on all around us. Perhaps not large steps, but transformation, nonetheless. Not only can fearful people open their eyes, but folks who have felt helpless find they can stand straight and strong and tall and by such say a clear and firm, "No", to evil. Those who are able to speak their "No" will also find the words and music to sing a larger "Yes" to good.
Believe it or not, fear is catching. When we are fearful the world around us is fearful - streams dry up, storms increase, and the surface shakes. Fortunately, opening eyes is also catching.
Mostly, though, with eyes open we can see a next step where before we were stumbling in the dark. This next step is a Holy Step. Even if we can't see further than one step, it is enough.
Advent is a time of practicing opening our fearful eyes and taking a next Holy Step.
http://kcmlection.blogspot.com/2010/12/isaiah-351-10.html
If you were to read chapter 34 in conjunction with 35 we are apparently dealing with a zero-sum G*D. It is either desolation or flourishing. There is no middle ground.
As with every apocalypse, lines are distinctly drawn. You are either for or against G*D and, likewise, G*D is either for or against you.
For difficult times there is a feeling of righteousness that is generated by this sort of picture. Unfortunately it is not a sustainable emotion or event. The energy it takes to be continually aware of how close you are to moving from rain to drought wears a body out. We can attend to holiness for only so long.
It won’t be long before we are setting up rules and institutions and rituals and intermediaries to give us a break where we can sleep and dream, not just be on 24/7.
This raises an Advent question of whether we are the ones we’ve been waiting for? (Thank You, Sweet Honey in the Rock for a good song even when done by others.) Can those who are solely dependent upon G*D be worth waiting for. Isn’t there a need for a covenant to have more mutuality than this?
A road only for the holy, is spiritual trickle-down theory as faulty as its economic counterpart. May you be blessed with a blessed rest during Advent. May your wait be restful as well as expectant. If you strain to see too far down the road it won’t be long before you fall prey to a mirage.