mend thine every flaw
Shout out, do not hold back!
Lift up your voice like a trumpet!
Announce to my people their rebellion,
to the house of Jacob their sins.
The Lord speaking of his beloved nation.
“Day after day they seek me.
As if they were people that practiced righteousness,
they ask of me righteous judgments,
‘Why do we fast, but you do not see?
Why humble ourselves, but you do not notice?’
Look, (says the Lord)
you serve only your own interest,
You quarrel and fight, and strike with a wicked fist.
What you do
will not make your voice heard on high.
Is such the worship that I choose,
that you pretend to humble yourself?
Is it to bow down the head like a bulrush,
and to lie in sackcloth and ashes?
Do you think THAT
makes you acceptable to the Lord?
Is not THIS the worship that I choose:
to loose the bonds of injustice,
to let the oppressed go free,
To share your bread with the hungry,
and bring the homeless poor into your house;
when you see the naked, to cover them?
THEN, and only then, your light shall break forth like the dawn.
What a sad, pathetic, plaintive cry from God is this morning’s oracle from Isaiah. The Lord speaking to his chosen nation through his chosen people. I wonder if God gets sick of saying this to no avail? I wonder if you get as tired hearing it as I do reading and preaching it?!
Thus says the Lord: “I know you want to please me. I hear you, I see you yearning to draw near to me. But you’re doing it all wrong, and - - bad, worse, worst - - you do it for selfish reasons only”.
The startling news is that God’s cry is not to his people two thousand eight hundred years ago, it’s to us here, now, this morning, to us, to America. But are we the least interested in what the Lord asks of us? Did you even listen as Isaiah’s oracle was read? I dare say, you paid no attention to Isaiah, but were waiting instead for the Gospel. Well, folks, this IS the Gospel, and it’s not good news.
The Isaiah prophecy from which we read is the Word of the Lord indeed. “In God we trust” : we claim America as a godly nation, but God contradicts us, calling us to hear what God requires if we want to return to God’s favor from the hell we have made of our national heritage, a hell of sin that drives us far from God.
God shed his grace on thee: do we wonder that the Lord despairs of us today as he despaired of Israel in the 8th century BC? Isaiah 58 is the Lord telling us what we must do to keep our side of God’s covenant with us. God says, disgusted,
You are selfish as a people, and each one is obsessed with Your own personal salvation.
I say “You shall love your neighbor as yourself”, but You are so unloving toward Your neighbor that it blasphemes Your national character, indeed Your very presence in my sight.
Exasperated, God says, “You whiners: ‘Why don’t you notice us when we fast? Why should we humble ourselves when you pay no attention to us?’”
God says, Jiminy Christmas, It’s all about You. Everything you do to impress me, you only do to please and serve yourselves. You quarrel and fight. You bob your heads at me like cattails blowing in the wind, but you treat each other hatefully. You dress in sackcloth and mark your forehead with ashes, then, like Superman emerging from the phone booth, you say “God, look how humble we make ourselves, aren’t we great!”
Are you crazy? Is it possible you really think you please me? You call this worship? You call this sacrifice? You call this a Life in Christ? You call this One nation, under God? Do you think I am so petty a God as to demand and care about such nonsense - - bobbing your heads and donning your humility costumes of sack cloth and ashes? Remember this on Ash Wednesday and, for God's sake, Matthew 6:17, WASH YOUR FACE before you so proudly go out in public to show the world how humble you are.
God mend thine every flaw: God says, get this straight. If I’ve said this once, I’ve said it a million times: here’s what I ask, expect and demand of you:
Justice, righteousness, lovingkindness
instead of division, prejudice and hatred.
Do not speak evil of others.
In this rich land, no one must go hungry. No one homeless. No one lacking medical care. No one without a safe place to sleep tonight.
No one lacking proper clothing. No one going to bed cold or hungry. Every child going to school wearing shoes, and warm clothes in winter. And a toothbrush, every child a toothbrush, does every child in this land have a toothbrush? Thus says the Lord.
And the oppressed: you despise every human being who is different from you. Black people. Brown people. Jews. Muslims. Even each other: Democrats, Republicans.
Hispanics. Immigrants. Beggars. Homosexual people, gays and lesbians. Jesus Christ, you even hate gays and lesbians for loving each other. Addicts, alcoholics, druggies, hoodies. People who do not look like you. People who do not think like you. People who do not vote like you. People who do not believe what you believe. God does not care what you say you believe, God only cares how you live life because of it.
People who do not speak English - - did you actually think God speaks English because YOU speak English? No, Hebrew. The God of Israel, the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob speaks Hebrew. Do we actually think God is like us? God in Heaven forbid!
Persevere in resisting evil, your greatest evil being your self-certainty and your contempt for people who are different from you.
Seek and serve Christ in ALL persons, not those who are like you.
Strive for justice and peace among ALL people, not just those you approve of.
Respect and honor the dignity of EVERY human being, especially seeking out people who are different from you. For heaven’s sake, become aware of yourself.
The gospel of the Lord is that we are not baptized into salvation, either for this life or the life to come. We are baptized into the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, to serve, here and now, to serve God by loving others. The gospel of the Lord is that the only way to love God, the only way to love God, the ONLY way to love God is lovingkindness to people who are not like you, especially those you despise.
Therefore, thus says the Lord,
If you remove the yoke from among you,
And stop pointing the finger,
And stop speaking evil of others,
If you offer your food to the hungry
and satisfy the needs of the afflicted,
THEN your light shall rise in the darkness”,
says the Lord.
++++++++++++++++
Sermon or homily in Holy Nativity Episcopal Church, Panama City, Florida on Epiphany 5A, 9 February 2020, the Rev Tom Weller. Text: Isaiah 58.
Isaiah 58:1-12
Shout out, do not hold back!
Lift up your voice like a trumpet!
Announce to my people their rebellion,
to the house of Jacob their sins.
Yet day after day they seek me
and delight to know my ways,
as if they were a nation that practiced righteousness
and did not forsake the ordinance of their God;
they ask of me righteous judgments,
they delight to draw near to God.
“Why do we fast, but you do not see?
Why humble ourselves, but you do not notice?”
Look, you serve your own interest on your fast day,
and oppress all your workers.
Look, you fast only to quarrel and to fight
and to strike with a wicked fist.
Such fasting as you do today
will not make your voice heard on high.
Is such the fast that I choose,
a day to humble oneself?
Is it to bow down the head like a bulrush,
and to lie in sackcloth and ashes?
Will you call this a fast,
a day acceptable to the Lord?
Is not this the fast that I choose:
to loose the bonds of injustice,
to undo the thongs of the yoke,
to let the oppressed go free,
and to break every yoke?
Is it not to share your bread with the hungry,
and bring the homeless poor into your house;
when you see the naked, to cover them,
and not to hide yourself from your own kin?
Then your light shall break forth like the dawn,
and your healing shall spring up quickly;
your vindicator shall go before you,
the glory of the Lord shall be your rear guard.
Then you shall call, and the Lord will answer;
you shall cry for help, and he will say, Here I am.
If you remove the yoke from among you,
the pointing of the finger, the speaking of evil,
if you offer your food to the hungry
and satisfy the needs of the afflicted,
then your light shall rise in the darkness
and your gloom be like the noonday.
The Lord will guide you continually,
and satisfy your needs in parched places,
and make your bones strong;
and you shall be like a watered garden,
like a spring of water,
whose waters never fail.
Your ancient ruins shall be rebuilt;
you shall raise up the foundations of many generations;
you shall be called the repairer of the breach,
the restorer of streets to live in.
Lift up your voice like a trumpet!
Announce to my people their rebellion,
to the house of Jacob their sins.
The Lord speaking of his beloved nation.
“Day after day they seek me.
As if they were people that practiced righteousness,
they ask of me righteous judgments,
‘Why do we fast, but you do not see?
Why humble ourselves, but you do not notice?’
Look, (says the Lord)
you serve only your own interest,
You quarrel and fight, and strike with a wicked fist.
What you do
will not make your voice heard on high.
Is such the worship that I choose,
that you pretend to humble yourself?
Is it to bow down the head like a bulrush,
and to lie in sackcloth and ashes?
Do you think THAT
makes you acceptable to the Lord?
Is not THIS the worship that I choose:
to loose the bonds of injustice,
to let the oppressed go free,
To share your bread with the hungry,
and bring the homeless poor into your house;
when you see the naked, to cover them?
THEN, and only then, your light shall break forth like the dawn.
What a sad, pathetic, plaintive cry from God is this morning’s oracle from Isaiah. The Lord speaking to his chosen nation through his chosen people. I wonder if God gets sick of saying this to no avail? I wonder if you get as tired hearing it as I do reading and preaching it?!
Thus says the Lord: “I know you want to please me. I hear you, I see you yearning to draw near to me. But you’re doing it all wrong, and - - bad, worse, worst - - you do it for selfish reasons only”.
The startling news is that God’s cry is not to his people two thousand eight hundred years ago, it’s to us here, now, this morning, to us, to America. But are we the least interested in what the Lord asks of us? Did you even listen as Isaiah’s oracle was read? I dare say, you paid no attention to Isaiah, but were waiting instead for the Gospel. Well, folks, this IS the Gospel, and it’s not good news.
The Isaiah prophecy from which we read is the Word of the Lord indeed. “In God we trust” : we claim America as a godly nation, but God contradicts us, calling us to hear what God requires if we want to return to God’s favor from the hell we have made of our national heritage, a hell of sin that drives us far from God.
God shed his grace on thee: do we wonder that the Lord despairs of us today as he despaired of Israel in the 8th century BC? Isaiah 58 is the Lord telling us what we must do to keep our side of God’s covenant with us. God says, disgusted,
You are selfish as a people, and each one is obsessed with Your own personal salvation.
I say “You shall love your neighbor as yourself”, but You are so unloving toward Your neighbor that it blasphemes Your national character, indeed Your very presence in my sight.
Exasperated, God says, “You whiners: ‘Why don’t you notice us when we fast? Why should we humble ourselves when you pay no attention to us?’”
God says, Jiminy Christmas, It’s all about You. Everything you do to impress me, you only do to please and serve yourselves. You quarrel and fight. You bob your heads at me like cattails blowing in the wind, but you treat each other hatefully. You dress in sackcloth and mark your forehead with ashes, then, like Superman emerging from the phone booth, you say “God, look how humble we make ourselves, aren’t we great!”
Are you crazy? Is it possible you really think you please me? You call this worship? You call this sacrifice? You call this a Life in Christ? You call this One nation, under God? Do you think I am so petty a God as to demand and care about such nonsense - - bobbing your heads and donning your humility costumes of sack cloth and ashes? Remember this on Ash Wednesday and, for God's sake, Matthew 6:17, WASH YOUR FACE before you so proudly go out in public to show the world how humble you are.
God mend thine every flaw: God says, get this straight. If I’ve said this once, I’ve said it a million times: here’s what I ask, expect and demand of you:
Justice, righteousness, lovingkindness
instead of division, prejudice and hatred.
Do not speak evil of others.
In this rich land, no one must go hungry. No one homeless. No one lacking medical care. No one without a safe place to sleep tonight.
No one lacking proper clothing. No one going to bed cold or hungry. Every child going to school wearing shoes, and warm clothes in winter. And a toothbrush, every child a toothbrush, does every child in this land have a toothbrush? Thus says the Lord.
And the oppressed: you despise every human being who is different from you. Black people. Brown people. Jews. Muslims. Even each other: Democrats, Republicans.
Hispanics. Immigrants. Beggars. Homosexual people, gays and lesbians. Jesus Christ, you even hate gays and lesbians for loving each other. Addicts, alcoholics, druggies, hoodies. People who do not look like you. People who do not think like you. People who do not vote like you. People who do not believe what you believe. God does not care what you say you believe, God only cares how you live life because of it.
People who do not speak English - - did you actually think God speaks English because YOU speak English? No, Hebrew. The God of Israel, the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob speaks Hebrew. Do we actually think God is like us? God in Heaven forbid!
Persevere in resisting evil, your greatest evil being your self-certainty and your contempt for people who are different from you.
Seek and serve Christ in ALL persons, not those who are like you.
Strive for justice and peace among ALL people, not just those you approve of.
Respect and honor the dignity of EVERY human being, especially seeking out people who are different from you. For heaven’s sake, become aware of yourself.
The gospel of the Lord is that we are not baptized into salvation, either for this life or the life to come. We are baptized into the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, to serve, here and now, to serve God by loving others. The gospel of the Lord is that the only way to love God, the only way to love God, the ONLY way to love God is lovingkindness to people who are not like you, especially those you despise.
Therefore, thus says the Lord,
If you remove the yoke from among you,
And stop pointing the finger,
And stop speaking evil of others,
If you offer your food to the hungry
and satisfy the needs of the afflicted,
THEN your light shall rise in the darkness”,
says the Lord.
++++++++++++++++
Sermon or homily in Holy Nativity Episcopal Church, Panama City, Florida on Epiphany 5A, 9 February 2020, the Rev Tom Weller. Text: Isaiah 58.
Isaiah 58:1-12
Shout out, do not hold back!
Lift up your voice like a trumpet!
Announce to my people their rebellion,
to the house of Jacob their sins.
Yet day after day they seek me
and delight to know my ways,
as if they were a nation that practiced righteousness
and did not forsake the ordinance of their God;
they ask of me righteous judgments,
they delight to draw near to God.
“Why do we fast, but you do not see?
Why humble ourselves, but you do not notice?”
Look, you serve your own interest on your fast day,
and oppress all your workers.
Look, you fast only to quarrel and to fight
and to strike with a wicked fist.
Such fasting as you do today
will not make your voice heard on high.
Is such the fast that I choose,
a day to humble oneself?
Is it to bow down the head like a bulrush,
and to lie in sackcloth and ashes?
Will you call this a fast,
a day acceptable to the Lord?
Is not this the fast that I choose:
to loose the bonds of injustice,
to undo the thongs of the yoke,
to let the oppressed go free,
and to break every yoke?
Is it not to share your bread with the hungry,
and bring the homeless poor into your house;
when you see the naked, to cover them,
and not to hide yourself from your own kin?
Then your light shall break forth like the dawn,
and your healing shall spring up quickly;
your vindicator shall go before you,
the glory of the Lord shall be your rear guard.
Then you shall call, and the Lord will answer;
you shall cry for help, and he will say, Here I am.
If you remove the yoke from among you,
the pointing of the finger, the speaking of evil,
if you offer your food to the hungry
and satisfy the needs of the afflicted,
then your light shall rise in the darkness
and your gloom be like the noonday.
The Lord will guide you continually,
and satisfy your needs in parched places,
and make your bones strong;
and you shall be like a watered garden,
like a spring of water,
whose waters never fail.
Your ancient ruins shall be rebuilt;
you shall raise up the foundations of many generations;
you shall be called the repairer of the breach,
the restorer of streets to live in.