February 9, 2014
Fr. Philip Eberhart
There is a lot of "to do" in our scriptures this morning and its easy for us here in America to get off onto our 'to do' list and to forget the central core - the kernel of truth that is at the center of all we believe and do in the Church.
Have you ever felt a little overwhelmed by the "to do" lists?
I think that most of us have felt overwhelmed by the "to do's" as well as the "to don'ts" in the Bible. We have a tendency to live our lives by lists and formulas, or to want to at least. We don't often want to do the hard stuff - the stuff that inconveniences us. Isaiah lists a great long list of inconvenient actions. The nation of Israel was told over and over and over again, in the law and the prophets, that these actions will lead you to salvation. In fact, God here in Isa 58 turns their "spirituality" on its head, and says to them that what they are doing currently isn't working for Him!
This 58th chapter of Isaiah lays a groundwork for the understanding of a just society, according to God! The nation of Israel was busy doing its spiritual exercises but not getting the "desired" result. Have you ever been there? We get frustrated with God when things don't go our way, according to our plan - when the waters are rough, we complain to God, and think that He no longer loves us. Nothing could be further from the truth!
"Why do we fast and you do not see? Why do we humble ourselves and you do not even notice?"
Their fasting was being done to manipulate God! To "get God on their side." What we discover after a time of living our spiritual lives this way, is that God doesn't take sides - He is already on our side, but we need to join His side!! The problem is not Him it is US! As POGO said, "We have seen the enemy, and he is US!"
Isaiah points this out in stark terms for the society of Israel in this "psalm" - let me read the main points from the Message:
When you fast, "your bottom line is still your bottom line."
When you fast, " you drive your employees,
you bicker and fight,
you swing a mean fist!"
When you fast, "you're showing off your humility."
"you put on a long face and parade around solemnly in black."
You call that fasting?
Here is God's to do list!
> break the chains of injustice...
> get rid of exploitation in the workplace...
> free the oppressed...
> cancel debts!
> share your food with the hungry
> invite the homeless poor into your home
> put clothes on the shivering ill-clad
> make yourself available to your own family!!
He goes on...
> get rid of unfair practices
> quit blaming victims
> quit gossiping about other people's sins
> be generous with the hungry
> give yourselves to the down and out.
THEN!
The lights come on! You start glowing in the dark! Righteousness will pave the way. God will secure your passage!
Isn't this what we're looking for? All the promises of God in and for our lives? A smooth path... A clear way.
The problem is that we can't DO the TO Do list! Because when we make the to do list the priority we lose sight of the why?
And we lose our grip on the how!
The How is in the power of the Cross!
In our reading from the early chapters of the Corinthian letter from Paul, he makes this point:
"When I came to you, brothers and sisters, I did not come proclaiming the mystery of God to you in lofty words or wisdom. For I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ, and him crucified. And I came to you in weakness and in fear and in much trembling. My speech and my proclamation were not with plausible words of wisdom, but with a demonstration of the Spirit and of power, so that your faith might rest not on human wisdom but on the power of God."
The focus of our spirituality needs not be on us and our ideas of how to get to God - the rest of mankind has done that work pretty effectively - all the other religions of the world have that in the bag, from several different directions! The work that we need to do at our root is to believe in Christ Jesus and what He has done on the cross for our salvation. Out of that root, in the cross of Christ, comes the flow of the kind of life that the scriptures speak about - be we cannot get there by trying harder, friends.
The religions of trying harder, and following all the rules, and doing it all right, so God will be obligated to bless you - even of having faith, so God will be obligated -- all of these are man's ways to God. The Cross is God's way to Man!
And it is God's Way FOR man!
Jesus said in our gospel reading this morning, that He didn't come to abolish the law, but that through Him the law might be fulfilled ... it might be filled-full. He came to breath life into the law, and to make a way for us to accomplish it - from the inside. To do what Ezekiel forsaw: Writing the law on their hearts, on human hearts instead of tablets of stone.
The practices of Isa 58 are still valid for us who are NT Christians today, just as they were when Isaiah spoke them to the people of Israel. The difference is that we have the power to do them - power that comes through the Cross of Jesus Christ and the indwelling power of the Holy Spirit.
We start our journey of obedience there! Not the other way around.
It is at the foot of the cross and in the shed blood and broken body of Jesus that we find the power to live the kind of life that God commends - we cannot by trying harder live a life that "wins God's favor!"... that put God in our debt.
We live the kind of life that God commends, the Isa 58 kind of life, as what Jesus called, "salt and light" in the world. But we do it not in our own power, but His power, the power of the Cross and the Resurrection of Jesus.
We start our journey of willingness, and availability, and obedience from the cross of Jesus - from the table of His Mercy, His body and His blood, given to me as food. Given to me and to you as grace in which we stand and in which we "live and move and have our being."
Friends, this is the secret to life on the Mission of Jesus. It's not about us getting God to do our bidding, because He is obligated to us by our good works. It is us doing the work of God, out of loving obedience, empowered by the cross of Jesus and the presence of His Holy Spirit in our lives, living His crucified life out in and through us, day by day. We live the life of Jesus in grateful praise and obedience to His directions, day by day, and moment by moment. In this way we will be salt and light in and for the world.
Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and give thanks to your Father in heaven.
In Jesus name and for the sake of his Kingdom,
Amen.
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