Focusing
There’s a lot of sorrow in the world – in our lives and in the lives of others, both near and far away. In the midst of this, what does it mean to say to anyone – especially someone in a bad time, or facing something hard in their life – what does it mean to say, “Merry Christmas” and “Happy New Year”?
Is Christmas a way of escaping the hard stuff for a few days? Or does Christmas tell us something hopeful we need to know about the bad times and the hard things in life?
Scripture Reading: Isaiah 35:1-10
In today’s reading, the prophet Isaiah is speaking to the people at a very difficult time. Their kingdom is in ruins. Over many generations, they have suffered from corrupt rulers. Many people are trapped in cycles of poverty and disadvantage. There is constant fighting between factions, for control and advantage. Faith in God has been degenerating for some time. And now the Assyrians – an empire to the east, are knocking at the door, and the prophet knows they are an easy target.
The invaders will destroy everything, and the people themselves – those who have anything to offer, will be taken away to live in exile in the service of the Assyrian Empire. To the people of Israel, having everything taken from them will be like being back in the desert. Except this time, it will seem there is nothing ahead for them to look forward to. This time, they will fear there’s no more promised land on the far side of it. Into this dark and fearful time, Isaiah speaks these words of faith and hope.
The desert will rejoice,
and
flowers will bloom in the wastelands.
The desert will sing and shout for joy;
it
will be as beautiful as the Lebanon Mountains
and
as fertile as the fields of Carmel and Sharon.
Everyone will see the Lord's splendor,
see
the Lord’s greatness and power.
Give strength to hands that are
tired
and
to knees that tremble with weakness.
Tell everyone who is discouraged,
“Be
strong and don't be afraid!
God
is coming to your rescue …”
The blind will be able to see,
and
the deaf will hear.
The lame will leap and dance,
and
those who cannot speak will shout for joy.
Streams of water will flow through the desert;
the
burning sand will become a lake,
and
dry land will be filled with springs.
Where jackals used to live,
marsh
grass and reeds will grow.
There will be a highway there,
called
“The Road of Holiness.”
… Those whom the Lord has rescued
will
travel home by that road.
They will reach Jerusalem with gladness,
singing
and shouting for joy.
They will be happy forever,
forever
free from sorrow and grief.
Reflection
What a wonderfully hopeful and encouraging reading.
“The desert will rejoice,
and flowers will bloom in the wastelands.
The desert will sing and shout for joy;
it will be as beautiful as the mountains of Lebanon.
… There will be a highway there called ‘The Way of Holiness.’
Sinners and fools will not find their way there,
but those whom the Lord redeems
will travel home by that road.
They will reach Jerusalem with gladness,
singing and shouting for joy.”
In the prayer book I’ve been using for morning prayer for the past year or so, the final blessing that sends me on my way for the day, is this:
“May the peace of the Lord Christ go with you, wherever he may send you.
May he guide you through the wilderness, protect you through the storm.
May he bring you home rejoicing at the wonders he has shown you.
May he bring you home rejoicing once again into our doors.”
Every time I read that blessing – still, no matter how many times I have read it, I get caught by those lines, and have to think about them anew each day: “may he guide you through the wilderness, protect you through the storm.” And by the affirmation that this is precisely “[where] he may send you” as the way to finding your way back home – back to where and how and with him you really need to be.
I think of all the wildernesses and storms we face. On a personal level, sickness and weakness. Bereavement and grief. Loss and sorrow. Break-ups and break-downs.
On a global level, the pandemic and all its fallout in our economic and social systems, the breakdown of the old normal in so many ways and in so many areas of life, a future that seems more violent, more bleak, more conflicted and more fearful than we expected.
And how are we to think about these things as people of faith, and of openness to God in all things?
Are the “bad” and hard things that happen in life, things that we as God’s people shouldn’t have to suffer, and that God – if he is God, saves us from having to suffer, and rescues us from if we do?
Or do the “bad” and hard things in life, just happen to us all in some way – because that’s part of what life is, part of this great project of life and that God – if we really let him be God as he desires to be God for us, helps us face it, and embrace it, and grow in some way in love of Go and love of neighbour because of it?
The people of Israel, when they suffered the loss of their kingdom, the loss of the temple and the holy city, the loss of their economy and culture and life as God’ people in the world, felt like they were back in the wilderness and the desert that they had come from.
It seemed like a calamity and the end of the world. And in some ways, it was.
It seemed like a terrible punishment and a terrible price to have to pay. And in some ways, it was.
It was something they wished God would save them and insulate them from, something against which God would give them a safe and comfortable shelter, something that God would keep them from having to suffer along with other, less chosen people. But it wasn’t.
Instead, the prophet says, it’s in the desert that new life will come. It’s in the wilderness that new things will bloom for you and come to life in you, and be signs to you and to others of the love of God at work in the world as it is.
It's in the hard times and in the storms that your eyes and ears will be able to see and to hear new things, your legs will walk in new places and your hands reach out in new ways, and your voice will learn to praise God in new ways and for new kinds of things. And as you move beyond the old normal – now broken and irretrievable, you will find in the chaos of the new normal, the pieces you need for a new and truer life – the things you need to grow a little more towards who and how you are really meant to be.
Every Christmas, I try to find a Christmas book to give to the grandkids – a single Christmas book of some kind for the whole family to read – or have read to them, together. Spoiler alert! This year’s book is “A Northern Nativity” by William Kurelek.
William Kurelek was a Canadian painter and writer who died in 1977 at the age of 50, and who through his lifetime painted many series of pictures based on Christian themes and images. “A Northern Nativity” is a series of a dozen or more paintings that portray the birth of Jesus if it were to happen today in Canada. In the paintings, Christ is shown being born to Mary and Joseph to Inuit, to other First Nations, to blacks, to poor and marginalized people of all kinds, and in the settings that today are equivalent to a borrowed stable in an unfamiliar place – places like a city mission, a grain barn, a country schoolhouse, a boxcar on a railway siding, a poor fisherman’s shack.
It's a moving meditation on who and where Jesus is in the world, and where we are called to meet him, if we are really to know and love him.
And what I think needs to be said, is that William Kurelek – the creator of these deeply sacred images, was himself a troubled person – one step out of mainstream normality. He suffered depression and mental illness, spent time in an institution, was largely unrecognized through much of his life, was not successful in the way the world measures success.
But as the prophet says, sometimes it’s the desert and not just the well-tended garden that is the place where God’s joy is known, and it’s in the wasteland not just in the greenhouse that the flowers we most need, will bloom.
I don’t know what this means for you. For me, it has meant being attentive and open to the places of sorrow and grief that I suffer myself or encounter in others, not running from them or trying to escape them, but intentionally spending time in those kinds of places, and letting God lead me through them to where, and what and how I am really meant to be. To let the bad and hard things I and others suffer, help me grow in openness to God and in genuine love of all others around me.
In other words, to grow in love of God and of neighbour, because isn’t that how and where we are meant to be? Isn’t that what it means to come home to our selves and to God?
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