Sermon 1/19/2020 “Sing a new song”
Preacher: Jo J. Belser
Location: Church of the Resurrection at Immanuel Church, Alexandria, VA
Text: Isaiah 49:1-7
Day: 2Epiphany, Year A
The backstory of our first lesson today is that the leaders of God’s people were in exile. They weren’t in the wilderness, exactly, but I’ll bet they felt like they were in the wilderness because they were in a place not their own, in a land not of their choosing.
The people had been told they were going to get to return home to return to Jerusalem, and they were preparing to go. But the people had discovered things at home are not as they had left them. Their Temple and city were rubble, and those left behind were worshiping false gods. They had no song to sing in praise to God.
In our first lesson the prophet reflected in the frustrations of the people at their situation. The prophet spoke as if he were Israel itself, telling the world what God had done for them. The prophet wrapped the people in their identity by reminding them of their mission.
What was Israel’s mission? “To glorify God.” This is the purpose of all life, “To glorify God,” to worship God. The question is, how? How was Israel to glorify God? What did God desire of Israel for having brought this people into being, sheltered their existence, and given them a God-mission, a way for them—specifically—to glorify God?
We know the answer to these questions, at least for Israel. God wanted a people whose identity was wrapped in God, to be the crucible—the womb—into which the Christ would enter the world. However, Israel didn’t know its purpose in this way yet. Israel was learning—in the words of our Psalm, that God would hear their cry and give them “a new song… a song of praise to our God.”
The people were discouraged. They had dreamed of going home, but now feared that returning to a devastated land would make them a laughingstock among the nations. In their judgment they would be deemed a failed nation and their God disparaged. Israel hadn’t yet learned that when we “lift every voice and sing” praise to God despite our trials, “many … will stand in awe and put their trust in the Lord.”
These people returning from exile were no longer young. Their children were adults, back “home” somewhere among the rubble or in Samaria and many didn’t worship the one true God. What’s more, their children’s children didn’t know they were People of God, in existence to glorify God.
The prophet interpreted the people’s situation differently. Seen through the eyes of faith, this was their triumphant hour. They were ready to return from exile—how often does that happen? They surely would put their rubble right. “Not to worry,” said the prophet. “You’re judging the situation all wrong. God has created us as a people, molded us by everything we have done to be a Light to the Nations. God has chosen you, called you by name. Despite all appearances, you [we] are bringing light into a dark world.”
But the people didn’t feel like a “Light to the Nations.” Look at how FEW of them there were, compared to the past. Look at how old they had gotten, how ill they were, how poor in cash.
What the people didn’t understand—focused as they were on their situation—is how God was even then sheltering them, keeping them safe, polishing them as a people blessed by their faith in God and in each other. Instead, they were afraid other nations or even history would judge them poorly.
Our lesson today assures us that God is God, even of our difficult situations. Our lesson reminds us God is waiting for us to “be gathered to him,” waiting for us to remember that “God is our strength and our salvation,” waiting for us to sing a new song of praise to him.
These aren’t empty words. When we are discouraged, when we face great difficulties, when we are marginated due to our perceived class or ethnicity or gender identity or age or our health condition… however the world judges us to be worthless, this is actually a place of power. Why? Because in difficult situations we are more likely to be open to hope and faith, more likely to turn to God and trust him.
Sometimes people tell me the message of today’s lesson is all well and good, if our concern is how HISTORY will tell our story. They point out God works on a much longer time span than any of us will live. They complain, in a way, that they are hurting NOW, legacy be durned.
I am very sympathetic to this perspective. After all, for example, God’s people returned from exile and faced the grueling work of rebuilding everything. After all—to use another example—did the people who we enslaved in this country get relief from the lashes of whips and the burden of injustice by knowing their legacy would forever redeem them?
Absalom Jones thought so. In a sermon he preached on January 1, 1808, Mr. Jones reminded his people that Good sees our afflictions as he saw the people’s afflictions in Egypt, and God does not forget us. He said our only response is to “sing to the Lord a new song” for the “marvelous things” he is creating from our bad situation. He said that, through our pain and tears, we are to give thanks for how God is using our situation to “come down in new ways to put the situation right in ways we cannot always perceive. “Let us sing praises to him,” Rev. Jones said, “and talk of his wondrous works.”
This is what we did today. We affirmed by singing a new song in lieu of the Psalm that God has “brought [us] out” of the mess [we were] in…, [putting] a new song in [our] mouth, a song of praise to God.”
And, for good measure, we will sing our lesson today in yet another way during our recessional when we “Lift every voice and sing” these words:
“God of our weary years
God of our silent tears
Thou who has brought us thus far on the way
Thou who has by thy might
Led us into the light
Keep us forever in the path, we pray.”
