The Rev. Virginia W. Nagel
Ephphatha Parish of the Deaf
Episcopal Diocese of Central NY
Today's reading from the prophet Isaiah is the reading Jesus used to begin
his ministry in the synagogue in Nazareth. It is a reading of hope. Isaiah was
speaking to the Jewish people who had been exiled in Babylon after Israel had
been defeated and Jerusalem mostly destroyed some forty years before. Now the
king of Babylon had given the Jewish people permission to go home if they wanted
to. He had even given them money and letters ordering the Babylonian officials
who remained in Israel, to provide wood and stone and other materials for them
to rebuild the Temple. You can read the story of those happenings in the books
of Nehemiah and Ezra in your Bible; they are exciting and give us much to think
about.
But Isaiah was talking not only to the returning Jewish people, who had been
slaves. He was also talking to the poor people, mostly farmers and laborers, who
had been left behind in Israel. They had not been taken to Babylon, but they
were in almost as bad a situation as the returning slaves. Much of their land
had been burned over or destroyed. Many of their buildings had been knocked
down. Since most of the leaders of Israel, including most of the priests, had
gone into slavery in Babylon, the people left behind had gradually forgotten
what they knew about God's Law. They had taken up the worship of various pagan
gods and goddesses. Their life situation was terrible: the farms were messed up
and did not grow much. They were trying to rebuild their homes while living in
ruins left by the army. They were being ruled by Babylonian officials who
treated them like dirt and imposed heavy taxes. And they had lost whatever hope
and faith they had.
There are so many people like that today. People who have been laid off.
People who have lost their homes in the mortgage mess. Single parents who have a
tough time trying to look after their children and make a living at the same
time, often without even a high school diploma. Military wives, caring for their
kids and trying to make a living while worrying about their husbands overseas in
Iraq or Afghanistan. People who are discriminated against because they are
people of color, or immigrants, or physically or mentally handicapped, or have
different customs and cultures. People who are in despair and have lost their
hope, because of a failed marriage, a lost job, a death in the family. Isaiah is
talking to these people today, just as he did to the people returning from
Babylon 2,500 years ago.
What Isaiah says is clear and simple: God sees you are hurting, and God
is going to make a new beginning for all. The dry parts of the country will have
good water and be able to grow crops. The swampy places will also become fertile
farm land. The people who have no hope will be given hope and healing, according
to their needs. People who have been unjustly put in jail will be freed, as well
as people weighted down by fears and cares. People who have been robbed will
find resources again. The sick and handicapped will be healed. All this will
happen because God is a God of justice and mercy. This is the agenda
that Jesus outlined for himself when he began his ministry, that day in
Nazareth, several hundred years after Isaiah spoke. This is why Jesus choose the
passage from Isaiah to read.
And this is the agenda God gives us for today, here in America. We are given
the responsibility to carry on Jesus' work of justice and mercy. We need to help
people learn how to support themselves, how to take care of their children. We
need to work to heal and help the sick, weak, elderly and handicapped. We need
to join Jesus...and John the Baptist...in proclaiming the Good News of God's
Kingdom coming. We need to advocate for the oppressed and for those whom society
discriminates against.
Paul in his very first letter, the first one he wrote to the church he had
founded in Thessalonica, says much the same thing. While we wait for Christ to
come again to judge the world, we are to live according to God's and Jesus'
agendas and teachings. This is the best, in fact, the only way we
can proclaim the coming of the Kingdom of God, and prepare for the final
judgment at the end of the world.
Some people think that if they follow God's agenda as we have heard it
outlined today, their friends and neighbors will make fun of them or look down
on them. John the Baptist had a similar problem. John was the son of a priest of
the temple, Zechariah. Archaeologists tell us that the priests of the Temple at
the time of Jesus lived in quite a bit of luxury. Their homes were bigger and
better than the homes of the common people, and they were given a share of the
offerings that people made in the Temple, as part of their salary. Their life
style was, perhaps, more like an upper class person than like the farmers and
laborers of Israel. John, as the son of a priest, would be expected to become a
priest, too, and live the same lifestyle as other priests. But....we are told in
today's Gospel that John did no such thing. He felt called by God to be a
prophet. He dressed like a prophet, like the poorest of the poor. He ate what he
could find in nature, or perhaps what a kind person might offer him. He lived in
the wilderness. And...he proclaimed the Kingdom of God was coming, and called
people to repent, to clean up their lives, to be ready to meet God and do God's
work. I am sure that his dad and mom probably argued with him to dress properly
and come home and live in a proper house and go to school to become a priest.
But John did what God had called him to do, instead. And in doing this, he set
us an example: don't pay attention to what people think you should do. Pay
attention ONLY to what God tells you to do, and DO IT.
For this, John got himself targeted by the Temple leaders. Why wasn't this
son of a priest becoming a priest himself? Why was he lowering himself, mixing
with the common people, calling on good Jews to repent as if they were pagans?
Why did he take it upon himself to tell other people what God wanted them to do?
Jesus, you will remember, received the same kind of treatment from the Pharisees
and the Sadducees, who were the leaders of different parties within the Jewish
Temple. Both Jesus and John got killed for trying to follow God instead of the
ideas and customs of the leaders.
So, that gives us our agenda not only for Advent but for our lives: work for
justice and mercy. Collect food for the poor, volunteer to teach someone to
read, to be a Big Brother or a Big Sister. Help in a soup kitchen, volunteer in
a hospital or prison. Give your extra money to the Red Cross, the Rescue
Mission, or Food for the Children, or some other charity. Volunteer to babysit
for a tired young mother, or to drive someone to the doctor or the hospital or
to buy food. Find some way to work for justice and mercy and peace. Never mind
what your friends and family and neighbors say...just do what you know God wants
you to do. And you will find such peace for your soul as you have never imagined
or known before. Amen.
