Sermon - Isaiah 58:1-12

There are people in my family, and probably also in yours, who, when they get hungry and need food, tend to get out of sorts, even angry.  In other words, when they get hungry, their actions and behavior show it.  Their hunger causes them to be cranky and snap at others.  They develop that condition we often describe as “hangry.”  When we see this condition arise, we usually quickly work to fix the problem as soon as possible.  

Hunger is something that prompts a response.  And, throughout history, people have used the sensation of hunger to prompt a certain kind of response, a deeper sense of spiritual awareness in their lives by practicing fasting.  Fasting is spiritual practice utilized by people of many religious backgrounds in the belief that, by doing so, one will be drawn closer to God.  When used as a spiritual practice, it can help create more space for worship and reflection in one’s life. 

Fasting and worship are the spiritual practices described in our reading from Isaiah this morning as we find the people of Israel engaged in devoted acts of worship. The words of this passage were written around 520 BCE when the people had returned to Jerusalem following the exile.  The people were longing to live into the promises that are hoped for after extreme hardships.  Having been released from exile, they were trying extra hard to make things right because they did not want to return to the path that led them into what they perceived as great judgement and punishment.  They truly were hungry for a relationship with God.  So, they regularly and steadfastly gathered for worship.  In the process, they made worship look good.  That is where they put all their energies.  But, it did not take long for them to become so consumed by this that they became isolated from the rest of the world, closed off to anything beyond the walls of their worship space.  You see, what they did not do was let worship trouble their consciences and shape their way of living.  They did not want to make connections between their worship and their neighbors.  They ignored the poor and anyone else they wanted to choose to ignore.  Even though their intentions may have been genuine, they missed some of the point of what worship is all about. 

So, Isaiah critiques their worship practices, especially their fasting.  He says their fasting is self-serving and hollow.  They are just pretending to be righteous while allowing injustice to continue in their own backyards.  He offers very stern reminders that the practices of fasting and worship are not just about going through the motions.  It is about what happens after that, namely, how they are to live in the world.  Isaiah tells the people that rather than being so focused on hunger as a spiritual practice of fasting, their worship and fasting should make them hungry for something more – for breaking the bonds of injustice.  Then he gives several simple, concrete ways that they can accomplish this.  He identifies basic human needs – food, shelter, clothing, and indicates that these are the hunger pangs in the world that need undoing and he calls the people to be a part of that undoing process.  They are called to share bread, offer shelter, and cover those in need, even at the risk of exposing one’s very self. 

Theologian, Walter Brueggemann notes something important for us to understand about this reading in our context.  He writes that these instructions are not:

a theoretical debate about the merits of socialism or capitalism, a debate that is a smoke screen about human need and human resources. There is here no debate about governmental public welfare or “the private sector.” The poet does not care and would be likely to say, ‘Do it either way, but do not talk about the private sector in order to avoid public welfare, do not focus on public welfare in order to exempt the private sector.’ What we are in any case talking about is hunger, homelessness, nakedness, and your bread, your house, your self.

Isaiah gives us a definition of true worship, relative to how the people of God care for the most vulnerable in their midst. No doubt these words hit home with a people who had not too recently been in similar positions themselves, as strangers in Babylon, living in a foreign land, struggling to make it and longing to return to Jerusalem.

Isaiah brings the people of Israel back to their roots, with encouragement to plant and build and grow, and to help others do the same. In all of their attempts at worship and fasting, the people had been crying out to God, clamoring for a response and acknowledgment of how good of a job they were doing. The beginning of this reading echoes their frustrations that they are not getting the attention they feel they deserve. Isaiah says that perhaps it is because their worship has not been complete. By offering them the missing pieces, Isaiah helps again guide the people of Israel back home and into a connectional relationship with God – one that is only found when connecting with all of God’s children. And that means it is about the way we treat all others!  The prophet concludes with the promise that when this is the kind of worship they choose to embrace, “light shall break forth like the dawn” (Isaiah 58:8) and “light shall rise in the darkness” (Isaiah 58:10).

In today’s gospel reading, Jesus says a something similar.  He continues his sermon on the mount with similar message.  He says, “Let your light shine.”  Jesus called the disciples, and calls each one of us, to do more than just hole up inside our Sanctuary walls and practice a private faith. Worship is not meant to be just a “me and Jesus” private moment. It’s meant to be a time when we recognize and experience the incredible relationship God has with the world through Jesus Christ, who connects us not only with God, but with all others and the world.

When talking about Jesus’ words to us today, Lutheran theologian and professor, Barbara Lundblad, connects his message to the words of the prophets before him, including Isaiah, when she writes:

For Jesus, salt and light came out of a long tradition of biblical teaching: salt and light were images for the law of God. Salt and light must take us back to the fullness of the law and the prophets, and the fullness of Jesus’ radical teaching in this Sermon on the Mount. The prophets plead for fullness of life: freedom from oppression, bread for the hungry, homes for those who have none, clothing for the naked. Is this not what it means to be the salt of the earth, to keep this prophetic word alive in the midst of our world? If we lose this vision, if we give in to other values, if we forget God’s longing for justice, our salt has lost its taste. If you think Jesus’ call is impossible, remember that the One who is our bread is with us and within us, empowering us to be salt and light in this world.

Friends, our worship should make us hungry for what is to come, eager and enthusiastic to go out and live as followers of Christ in the world. That hunger is represented each time we gather around the table for communion, as we demonstrate our longing for a closer relationship with Christ, and as we join together in the meal which Christ has prepared. We consume the “bread of life” and the “cup of salvation,” and are then refreshed by the Holy Spirit, filled and restored. But for what? Isaiah has some answers, and Jesus did, too.  The answer is to go out.  We are called to go out into the world and participate in relationships will all others, especially the most vulnerable in this world, doing so in the name of the One who came to be in relationship with us.  Both of our readings this morning call us, good little worshippers in the pews, to NOT let our worship in this sanctuary be all that our faith is about.  If we only focus on what is happening within these walls, and how good we are at it, we have missed the point.  Our worship of God should not end when Bruce’s postlude is over; that is where it should begin. The truest sign of our worship happens on Monday through Saturday, as we live out our faith in the world.

Listen again to Jesus’ words to us today as I read them from Eugene Peterson’s translation, The Message.  Listen as Jesus speaks to you:

Let me tell you why you are here.  You’re here to be salt-seasoning that brings out the God-flavors of this earth.  If you lose your saltiness, how will people taste godliness?  You’ve lost your usefulness and will end up in the garbage.  Here’s another way to put it:  You’re here to be light, bringing out the God-colors in the world.  God is not a secret to be kept.  We’re going public with this, as public as a city on a hill.  If I make you light-bearers, you don’t think I’m going to hide you under a bucket, do you?  I’m putting you on a light stand.  Now that I’ve put you there on a hilltop, on a light stand – shine!  Keep open house; be generous with your lives.  By opening up to others, you’ll prompt people to open up with God, this generous Father in heaven. 

 

          So, go my friends, leave here with a deep hunger, a hunger that drives you to go out to the world, living and proclaiming God’s justice, God’s love and peace for all people, and telling of a way of life that will bring healing to the world.