This Reflection is taken from the Sunday Devotion written by this blogger for Christ Episcopal Church, Yankton, SD on December 6, 2020
Psalm 85:1-2, 8-13
Benedixisti, Domine
1 You have been gracious to your land, O Lord,
you have restored the good fortune of Jacob.
2 You have forgiven the iniquity of your people
and blotted out all their sins.
8 I will listen to what the Lord God is saying,
for he is speaking peace to his faithful people
and to those who turn their hearts to him.
9 Truly, his salvation is very near to those who fear him,
that his glory may dwell in our land.
10 Mercy and truth have met together;
righteousness and peace have kissed each other.
11 Truth shall spring up from the earth,
and righteousness shall look down from heaven.
12 The Lord will indeed grant prosperity,
and our land will yield its increase.
13 Righteousness shall go before him,
and peace shall be a pathway for his feet.
The Book of Common Prayer, 1979
Isaiah 40:1-11
Comfort, O comfort my people,
says your God.
Speak tenderly to Jerusalem,
and cry to her
that she has served her term,
that her penalty is paid,
that she has received from the Lord's hand
double for all her sins.
A voice cries out:
“In the wilderness prepare the way of the Lord,
make straight in the desert a highway for our God.
Every valley shall be lifted up,
and every mountain and hill be made low;
the uneven ground shall become level,
and the rough places a plain.
Then the glory of the Lord shall be revealed,
and all people shall see it together,
for the mouth of the Lord has spoken.”
A voice says, “Cry out!”
And I said, “What shall I cry?”
All people are grass,
their constancy is like the flower of the field.
The grass withers, the flower fades,
when the breath of the Lord blows upon it;
surely the people are grass.
The grass withers, the flower fades;
but the word of our God will stand for ever.
Get you up to a high mountain,
O Zion, herald of good tidings;
lift up your voice with strength,
O Jerusalem, herald of good tidings,
lift it up, do not fear;
say to the cities of Judah,
“Here is your God!”
See, the Lord God comes with might,
and his arm rules for him;
his reward is with him,
and his recompense before him.
He will feed his flock like a shepherd;
he will gather the lambs in his arms,
and carry them in his bosom,
and gently lead the mother sheep.
New Revised Standard Version Bible, copyright 1989 by the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Church of Christ in the USA, and used by permission.
REFLECTION
+ O come, thou Dayspring from on high and cheer us by your drawing nigh. +
Comfort. The very word conjures up a heartfelt desire that longs for it; some news that will bring comfort to us weary souls dealing with a very difficult year that has us coping with a deadly pandemic in an atmosphere of the contentiousness of politics.
Over the past several Sundays, we have reflected on the shadowy side of God’s compassion in the context of the question, “Where are we taking God?” We explored the applicability of the harsh sounding but important prophesies from the Old Testament and Jesus’ discussion of end times in the light of what is taking place in our world today. These were not comfortable readings nor were they comfortable reflections. The intent was to give voice to our feelings of discomfort by looking at its causes and finding affirmation in our scriptures that God is with us in the moments of our discomfort, even when such moments lead to feelings of abandonment.
Comfort. To know comfort is to have experienced feeling discomfort. To know love is to have experienced feeling unloved. To know forgiveness is to have experienced feeling unforgiven. The yin and yang dimension these complimentary opposites possess provides the momentum needed to keep us pursuing the comfort and peace this world longs for but cannot give.
Both the last Sunday of the last Church Year and the first Sunday of this Church Year were anchored in Jesus’ comments on the end times with his disciples. Having crossed that bridge, we find ourselves fully into the new Church Year. On this second Sunday of Advent we are offered a new perspective in what the well-known Christmas carol describes as “glad tidings of great comfort and joy.” As such, the question of where we are taking God in our journey through this life becomes where is God leading us on our journey through this life?
Comfort. That sense of ease that allows us to put up our feet, safe in the knowledge that everything will be alright is something that is truly longed for in our anxious world. The readings from the Psalms and the Book of Isaiah this morning couldn’t have come at a better time than in a year such as this. The answer to the question where is God leading us on our journey through this life is proclaimed in the first two verses of this morning’s psalm, “You have been gracious to your land, O Lord, you have restored the good fortune of Jacob. You have forgiven the iniquity of your people and blotted out all their sins.” If we are alert to the Advent call, we know through the eyes of faith “that salvation is near to us;" that it is present in our lives.
Perhaps the most intriguing lines in this morning’s psalm is “Mercy and truth have met together; righteousness and peace have kissed each other.” This anthropomorphic imagery of mercy and truth meeting like two people greeting each other and righteousness and peace kissing each other is nothing short of brilliant. To see rather abstract concepts take on a life of their own; meeting and kissing as if they were human individuals is purposeful. At a certain level, mercy and truth and righteousness and peace are conveyed through the shape we give them. The truly merciful welcome the truth and the truly righteous bring about peace.
Comfort. The writer of Isaiah’s prophecy uses this word to ease the discomfort felt by those Judeans who were taken into captivity by the Babylonians due to their unfaithfulness towards God. But God did not abandon them. In spite of their unfaithfulness, God was faithful and remained with them in their exile.
In the King James Version, the first two verses of today’s first lesson begins with the familiar, “Comfort ye, comfort ye my people, saith your God. Speak ye comfortably to Jerusalem, and cry unto her, that her warfare is accomplished.” I prefer that interpretation of the Hebrew because their warring ways did not result in God going to war with them. On the contrary, God says that their warfare was ended; a warfare with the spiritual darkness that led them into exile, a warfare with the spiritual forces that could have torn them apart as a people, and the spiritual warfare each individual undoubtedly suffered throughout their exile. To these exiles, the prophet shouts, “Prepare a highway for God” while in the wilderness of their exile and to take comfort in their discomfort because God was going to lead them home.
Comfort. As Christians, we see something universal in Isaiah’s prophecy. God remains with us in every wilderness moment and in every moment of our discomfort to comfort us; reminding us that all such moments are just that, moments. On this Sunday, we hear again in Isaiah the words we heard in Psalm 90, several Sunday ago: “All people are like grass” to which Isaiah adds, “The grass withers, the flower fades; but the word of our God will stand for ever.”
Time is fleeting. This moment is fleeting and will soon pass away, as will the moment that is me, the moment that is we, and the moment that is everything we see. What comforts us is what does not pass away; that creative desire which brought us into being in the first place and gave way to the Word made flesh, that Word we carry within, and that Word which will carry us home, Emmanuel - God with us.
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O holy Child of Bethlehem, descend to us, we pray; cast out our sin and enter in, be born in us today. O come to us, abide with us, our Lord Emmanuel!” Amen.
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Until next time, stay faithful.
Norm
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