Feeling anxious? You have
every right to! Christmas is coming
up. You’ve got lots to do. Plus there’s plenty on the news to worry
about: wildfires and natural disasters, North Korea’s missile program, the
proposed changes to the federal tax code, health care legislation, and the
seemingly endless stream of executives or public persons going down on sexual
harassment charges. Then there’s the
greater social tension of our nation dividing itself into groups of political
ideology and being unable to listen to each other, let alone work
together. What should you worry about,
and what shouldn’t you worry about? And
how do you know what’s true and what’s not.
Sometimes even the truth gets skewed into absurdity.
It happened decades ago, but the 1950
senatorial primary campaign in Florida is a great example. Incumbent Claude Pepper was opposed by George
Smathers. Pepper was especially strong
in the “Bible belt” or northern part of Florida. To shake the hold Pepper had on these people
Smathers developed a special speech making use of certain facts: Pepper was a Harvard Law School
graduate. He had a niece who was a
member of a Senate subcommittee. And he
had a sister who was an actress in New York.
His speech went something like this,
“Are you aware, my friends, that in his youth Claude Pepper was found
matriculating in Harvard, that before marriage he habitually indulged in
celibacy. Not only that, he was
practicing nepotism in Washington with his own niece; and he has a sister who
is a thespian in wicked Greenwich Village.
Worst of all, my friends, Claude Pepper is known all over Washington for
his latent tendency toward overt extraversion!”
It was all true. It was all compliments! But the way you say it changes the tone
entirely.
What’s true? What’s not?
And there’s more than national affairs to make you anxious. As individuals we have our own livelihoods to
worry about, our own children to worry about, our own health and wellbeing to
worry about. There are family dynamics
and tensions. There are financial
challenges, and on and on can go the list.
Enter then the prophecy we read from Isaiah 40.
Usually when I preach about a text I
tell you to pay close attention to the text.
Don’t overlook important details, and don’t bring to the text all sorts
of assumptions that aren’t there. But in
the case of this one you probably understood it more clearly if you weren’t
really paying attention!
The details of this are confusing and
a little bizarre. Perhaps the biggest is
in verse 2 when it says, “[Jerusalem] has received from the Lord’s hand double
for all her sins.”
What does this mean that God would be
demanding double payment for sins? Talk
about something to make you anxious! How
cruel could God be? Biblical scholars go
all over the place on this one. Many try
to find a root to it in the religious laws.
Others try to say it’s a bad translation and that the Hebrew root word
really is intended to mean more completeness than double. I even pulled out my commentary on Isaiah
published in 1852 to find out what they said about it!
Most scholars say not to get too
worked about it, that it passage is more of a poem than a literal teaching and
the author is just using the word double as a literary flourish.
Once you’ve swallowed that pill there
are plenty of others. Let’s look at one
other in the text. God says that all
people are like grass, their constancy is like the flowers of a field. Is that
an insult?
Commentators go all over the place
with that one too. But in the end most
agree that it is best to take a step back from the text and just let the whole
thing, troubling parts and all, speak to us tenderly. After all, it is intended to be a prophecy of
peace.
In this busy season with: shopping and
cards and decorating and baking and parties and concerts and all sorts of
things it all seems important and everyone in anxious. A message of peace would be nice.
But a message of peace can go two
ways. Let’s also be aware that not
everyone is busy this time of year. I
think this is the time of year that if you’re too busy you wish you could take
a break. But if you are someone who is
not busy at this time of year – if you have no one to shop for, and no one to
see your decorations, and no one to write cards to, and no concerts or parties
to attend, and no one to cook for, you start to think something is wrong with
you, or wrong with your life.
Last week I was visiting one of our
members who lives in a nursing home. In
one of the big central rooms there was a small band playing and singing all
sorts of Christmas carols. They were
singing with great gusto, and the nursing home staff were trying to be as
energetic as possible, but nearly all the residents just stared off into space,
taking in nothing. I do remember one old
lady enthusiastically stomping her foot on the footrest of her wheelchair. And there were a few people nodding along in
time to the music, but otherwise there was no response. Not even music therapy could spread Christmas
cheer there.
For many of those residents Christmas
probably meant an extra visit from their children who lived nearby. Maybe a grandchild in college would stop in
to say high while he or she was home on Christmas break, and maybe bring a
flower or a card. It was a memory care
unit, so many of the residents aren’t even aware that it’s Christmas. On the whole it was a pretty depressing
scene. I credit the staff and the band
for doing their best, but what was the point?
At that moment I was glad to be too
busy, but the scene also creates anxiety for the future.
Too busy… not busy enough… anxiety
everywhere… the world’s always in a tail spin.
Let’s let that ongoing reality really sink in.
Then Isaiah speaks, “Comfort, O
comfort my people says your God.”
Prepare the way of the Lord, make a smooth place. God is at work and God is coming. The biggest, grandest, most important plans
and accomplishments of our lives are to God nothing more permanent than the
flowers in a field. Our constancy is
like grass which withers.
We are nothing, and all that we worry
about is nothing compared to God. The
word of our God will stand forever Isaiah says.
God comes with might, true might, mightier than any earthly arsenal than
can ever be put together. At the same
time Isaiah tells us that God will feed his flock like a shepherd; he will
gather the lambs in his arms, and carry them in his bosom.
Though we are nothing, our mighty God
claims us and keeps us. Too busy, not
busy enough, the world endlessly going crazy, God is here. God is at work. God is in charge.
That is the perspective Isaiah wanted
his original readers to have. And that
is the perspective we should have too.
There are many things to be anxious about in life. Anxiety can be a good thing sometimes. But ultimately let God be the anxious
one. And we instead hear the words of
Isaiah as he speaks that our lives can be ones of calmness, wholeness and peace
when we can trust things to God.
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