Repentance Has a Purpose
A sermon for Ash Wednesday on Isaiah 58:1-12
[photo by Annika Gordon on Unsplash.com]
Those of you who are used to hearing me in the pulpit will know that my preaching style does not really tend toward aggressive confrontation.
Only once in my career have I ever “pounded” on the pulpit, and that was done facetiously.
I don’t think I have ever angrily shouted in a sermon.
And my folks will tell you that if something does not go quite as planned during a service my go-to phrase is…. “you can’t mess up worship.”
Both pastorally and theologically, I would much rather dig into the power and meaning of grace than to practice condemnation.
Because, in my experience, grace is what transforms us.
Grace is what frees us from the bonds of sin and death (the patterns of life that turn us in on ourselves and away from God and neighbor), and grace is what empowers us to live according to the teachings and example of Jesus.
Condemnation, by contrast, calls us into shame, which is as likely to make us defensive, reactive, or avoidant as it is to inspire a spiritually transformative sense of conviction to motivate change.
Which makes today’s reading from the Prophet Isaiah a challenging preaching text.
“Shout out,” the voice of God exhorts the Prophet, “do not hold back! Lift up your voice like a trumpet! Announce to my people their rebellion, to the house of Jacob their sins.”
It is a call, a command even, to practice harsh confrontation. To deliver an unequivocal rebuke to God’s people that they are doing faith wrong and need to shape up.
And… ok, tonight is Ash Wednesday, the beginning of Lent.
And there are certainly traditions, across denominations, that emphasize penitence and awareness of our fallen nature during this season.
If there is any time that a little pulpit-pounding and accusatory rhetoric is appropriate it would be tonight.
But as one of the members of Abiding Peace recently commented to me: “it’s much more valuable to look at Lent as a time of self-reflection, examination and understanding leading to spiritual growth,” than to “get out the ole hair shirt.”
I appreciate this framing: It highlights that the key question, when it comes to the practice of our faith, is to ask what will help us to grow?
When I turn that question toward tonight’s reading from Isaiah, it illuminates so much more than the opening words of uncompromising condemnation.
The words are there, of course, but they have a point… and they have a purpose.
(Those are two different things, but I will get to that distinction.)
The point of the demand for the prophet to raise his voice about the people’s rebellion is to clarify what God’s actually requires from God’s people.
The people are, apparently, genuinely confused about why God is not receptive to their prayers and fasting.
They think that pious religious practices and the assumption that God is on their side are sufficient.
But, whatever might be happening in their individual piety, their society is deeply broken:
The prophet itemizes this brokenness:
They operate according to a morality that glorifies selfishness, serving their own interests even on fast days, when they should be especially oriented toward the command to care for their neighbors.
They demonstrate this selfishness by oppressing all their workers, devaluing the very people whose labor enables the society to thrive.
They indulge in temper and hostility, using their fasting, their self-righteous religiosity as an excuse to quarrel and to fight.
In other words, they reveal their supposed righteousness to be performative sackcloth and ashes… to ultimately be about demonstrating their moral superiority, rather than any genuine love for God or others, which is always at the heart of God’s law.
The point of the condemnation in Isaiah is to expose to the people just what is wrong with their collective behavior.
That purpose of the condemnation, however, is about more than illumination. The purpose is about change.
God and the prophet don’t just want their hearers to feel bad. They want them to transform their religious practice AND their society.
That is why the reading shifts from condemnation to exhortation: to a description of the fast that God does choose:
To loose the bonds of injustice and undo the straps of the yoke… diagnosing the patterns and policies that trap people in unjust systems and then dismantling them!
Letting the oppressed go free… by changing the circumstances and laws that unfairly hold down and restrain those without the resources to free themselves.
Sharing your bread with the hungry, and bringing the homeless poor into your own house… radically expanding expectations about the role of generosity and welcome in society.
Not to hide yourself from your own kin…which means everyone… each human being made in the image of God is our family.
These are not simple commands to obey, but they are clear, as is the prophet’s message:
Do you want God to recognize your faithfulness? Do you want to have God actually on your side? It will require a radical shift in business as usual.
And, really, that should be enough. God offering clear, unequivocal instructions about how to live and organize society should be enough to bring about change.
But there is more to the purpose of this prophecy than just the description of the required change.
There is also a promise: the promise of what this kind of change will produce.
The light that will spring forth like the dawn.
The healing that will come quickly.
God’s presence as a vindicator and a protector and a guide, who will satisfy your needs in parched places and make your bones strong.
But to me, the most inspiring promise in the final one:
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.
However broken the current reality… however far from the ideals of a just and faithful society…
It can be rebuilt…
The foundations can be reclaimed for future generations…
Those who hear and respond to God’s call through the prophet can be repairers and restorers of places in which the fullness of life that God intends can be lived.
I believe that the point and the purpose of our worship tonight is the same as it was for the people addressed by Isaiah:
The point is to illuminate ways in which our lives, especially on the societal level, are violating God’s will:
To rebuke any celebration of selfishness or oppression or aggressive combativeness.
To name as false religion everything that violates God’s law of love for our neighbor, especially our neighbors without power.
To remind us, in the words that we hear, and the songs that we sing, and the ashes that we rub into our skin that all is not as God intends it to be.
The purpose of this illumination is to call us into change not just in our own hearts but also in our responsibility to call for societal change as well:
By undoing systems and laws that cause oppression and injustice.
By ensuring that the needs of all are met and that all human beings are treated like kin.
By leaving here commissioned to be repairers and restorers, not in our own strength but in the strength of God who goes with us as a vindicator, and a protector, and a guide.
That, finally, is the grace that I always want to preach, the grace that really is what changes us.
Because I know, for me at least, I can understand and believe what God requires of me, but that doesn’t mean I’ll be able to do it.
Especially not when the task is as huge as working for repentance and change at the societal level.
But the promise that I can be a repairer of the breach… that I can be one of those who restore the streets that me and my children and generations to come will be able to live in with freedom… and that I won’t have to do any of that alone because God will be with me and with all who join me in answering the call?
That is a promise that gives repentance a purpose, no matter how difficult the task.
That is a grace that can empower transformation.
Thanks be to God.
