3/14/04

Isaiah 55:1-9
1 Corinthians 10:1-13
Luke 13:1-9

I'll admit I don't watch too much television during the week - the early morning news while I'm on my exercise bike, the news at 10 before I drift off to sleep, and maybe an occasional prime time program or sports event if the home team is in a winning mode, and I'm not tied up with something here at church. We get the full whoop de doo cable package at our home in Harwich, so when I'm down there, I occasionally watch a movie.

If you get cable, I'm sure you've noticed how they keep repeating the movies again and again. I understand that this is because the network execs are aware that many of us flip channels - I know, it's only supposed to be men who do this, but from my personal experience, women do also. Many of us flip channels, especially when it comes to watching our favorite flicks. Many folks "drop-in" on a movie for a few minutes just to catch a particular scene they may remember, then they channel surf to another movie and drop in on that one for another fifteen minutes or so, again and again. (i)

In our culture of convenience, shrinking attention spans, and instant gratification, I suppose such "dropping in" is a harmless enough habit, yet even "harmless" ones have a way of shaping our lives. If we're programmed to only "stay tuned" for fifteen minutes or so, then how do we give our full attention to God for 60 minutes each Sunday? Know what the average length of one of my sermons is? - between 13 and 14 minutes. Any longer and some folks would be tuning out or falling asleep.

Too often we approach discipleship as something we can just "drop in" on; or we'll "stop by" church on a Sunday whenever the mood strikes us, but not too often. Don't want the neighbors to think we're religious fanatics. Drop-in movie habits can cross over into behaviors we'd rather not admit - like drop-in spirituality or "drop-in discipleship" where we give a nod to God for a small percentage of the week, and then there's business as usual for the rest of the time. We take a nibble of worship here, a sip of Bible reading there, a quick prayer while we're in the car between cell phone calls. But if these fleeting moments, these short bursts of faith encounters, like our movie viewing on TV, if these are all we have time for with God, it's not enough. Such religious shallowness is contrary to a mature faith life, one that grows in wisdom and faithful discipleship. A little dip here, a little sip there will not result in a deeper relationship with God, nor will it answer any of the big questions of life: Why am I here? What purpose does God have for me? What's going to happen in the future? What's it all about? God has something different, something more in mind for each of us, a life far richer, far deeper, far more fulfilling than anything we can obtain with a quick fix. (ii)

This is one of those Sundays when all three lectionary lessons are chock full of preachable goodies, and it's hard to choose between them. I'm going to zero in on Isaiah today, but first, a few brief remarks on all three lessons which have in common at least two themes: food and drink tied to hunger and thirst for God, and an urgent call to repentance tied to receiving what God has promised. (iii)

Isaiah begins with references to thirsting for water, wine, and milk, and hungering for bread and rich food. It concludes with the wicked forsaking their ways, repenting, and returning to the Lord. We'll spend more time with both these concepts shortly.

In Corinthians Paul compares his people to the early Israelites in the wilderness, who were fed spiritual food (manna) and spiritual drink (water from a rock - which Paul identifies with Christ), but people who because of their disobedience, did not make it into the Promised Land. He is concerned with God's covenant faithfulness and also with the danger of our taking it for granted. (iv) Thus the Corinthians and we are to watch out, and even when we think we're standing, to repent, so that we don't take the chance of falling.

Finally, in our passage from Luke, the hunger/food reference is to a fig tree that doesn't bear fruit, probably a symbol for Israel that echoes an earlier verse about bearing "fruits that befit repentance." Repentance is stressed in the first part of the passage also. Though calamity is not necessarily the result of past sins, still God calls us to repentance, to change our sinful ways, and to follow God's ways. Divine mercy is illustrated in the gardener who gives the tree yet one more year to turn around and be fruitful, symbolically for us, another chance for repentance.

The setting for our passage from Isaiah is Babylon in Assyria (present-day Iraq) around 540 years before Christ. About 50 years earlier the people of Israel had been force-marched from the ruins of Jerusalem into exile in this foreign land, and they've been here at this point for about two generations. But the end is in sight. Because of the Edict of Cyrus at this time, the Israelites are granted the right to return to their homeland.

The prophet whom scholars refer to as Second Isaiah issues one of the great invitations in scripture, an invitation to a dinner that will be far more satisfying

than getting an engraved invitation to the White House or to Buckingham Palace - because the meal will last far longer, and because the invitation comes from the Creator of the Universe! God invites the people to abundant life. But what's happening is that many of the Israelites have gotten used to living in Babylon, some are even prospering, and they don't care much about the idea of returning to their homeland and rebuilding a ruined city and country. "Why do you spend your money for that which is not bread?" asks the prophet. Especially when they could have the genuine bread from God that will satisfy their deepest hungers for no cost at all. (v) He asks in effect, "Why waste your blood, sweat, and tears, your wealth, and all that is yours in a place that will never be your home? If you are thirsty or hungry, all you have to do is return to the place where God will sustain you and provide for you, to the land where you used to live in a covenant relationship with God, a relationship that can happen again." (vi)

Second Isaiah is asking the people in that time and place to resist the temptations so apparent in their world, to climb out of their comfortable ruts, to make a break with their old ways of living, to let go of their sinful habits and bad thoughts, and to take the risk of venturing back to God, who will show mercy and forgiveness, back to this primary relationship they'd abandoned. So also today, God calls each of us to resist the temptations that are so alluring in our world, to resist the enticements of a consumption-driven society, to climb out of our comfortable ruts of religious consumerism, of shallow spirituality, of "drop-in discipleship" to let go of all our sinful thoughts and deeds - and to repent and return to a deeper relationship with God. What the prophet urges them to follow, we would do well to observe ourselves. It is a whole set of commands that redirects our attention away from what we've been doing, to what God is doing, and to what God wants us to do.

We begin in the first verse with three imperatives: "come, buy, and eat!" Come - God sets the table, but we have to pull up the chair and sit down. We have to take some initiative. We as disciples respond to God's faithfulness by taking actions of our own, in a variety of ways - coming to God in prayer, coming here to be part of this faith community, coming together in works of outreach, compassion, and justice, and in many other ways.

Buy - Or perhaps buy into what this faith experience is about. Another way of saying this is to commit, to take the step, the leap, the plunge, to be willing to assume some of the responsibilities tied to the life of faith. This is what most of us and our new members this morning have done regarding our relationship with Pilgrim Church, why we all read our UCC Statement of Faith on these days, especially the line that says: "God calls us into the Church to accept the cost and joy of discipleship." We're not called to a drop-in discipleship or a willy-nilly membership, but to one where we're "to be servants in the service of the whole human family," and so on.

Eat - Partake, experience, taste, savor the goodness of God. I love the Italian word, mange; it's so visceral, so expressive. There's an anthem the choir sings based on Psalm 34:8 - "O taste and see that the Lord is good; happy are those who take refuge in him." What God offers to us is nourishing to our souls. As we say in the communion liturgy, "Take and eat, this is the body of Christ broken for us for our salvation."

As we move through the lesson two more imperatives jump out at us, sounding very similar: listen and incline your ear. Listen - listen carefully to me, says God through the prophet. Pay attention to what God is saying - not only through the scriptures, but also through people of faith, through the church, in your prayer life, in the world that God has made. Being attuned to God means tuning out competing voices, tuning out those who speak in voices contrary to God's message of love, joy, peace, and acceptance. Incline your ear - We are to position ourselves so that no noise or interference will drown out the voice of God. We need to dig out our spiritual earwax that reduces the voice of God to no more than a mutter. (vii) The Lord says to us in Isaiah, "Incline your ear, and come to me, listen, so that you may live." Listening for God's voice is very important.

The last three imperatives are seek, forsake, and return, and we'll look at all these together, because they form the foundation for repentance. We are to seek the Lord while God may be found. We are to pursue God single-mindedly, to search diligently, to make God a priority in our life. If we take advantage of the opportunities we have to walk with God, we'll be better for it. If we have not been successful in seeking the Lord, then in all likelihood we will have fallen into the trap of wicked ways and unrighteous thoughts, both of which need to be forsaken. "Let the wicked forsake their way, and the unrighteous their thoughts." Abandon whatever impedes your relationship with God; determine those things that are holding you back, and let them go. After letting go of the bad, grab onto the good and "return to the Lord." When we turn to what is right, good, and positive, God will have mercy upon us and give us abundant pardon.

If we can manage to follow all these admonitions - come, buy, eat, listen, seek, forsake, and return to the Lord, we'll be on our way to a more mature discipleship. But it won't be easy; most of this is counterintuitive. This is why we're reminded by the Lord: "For my thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your ways my ways." The crux of mature discipleship is a different way of living our lives, a purpose-driven life aligned with God's purposes. The life that God invites us into is not a quick drop-in and drop-out, not a little bit of this, and a little bit of that. The mature life of faith is one that feasts on the riches of a deep and abiding relationship with God. We're not talking about fast-food religion, but more, a sumptuous elegant dinner, one that we linger over, savor, and enjoy. It requires some time and we need to be attentive to the details, but it's worth every mouthful. There are no shortcuts to being a disciple of Christ.The costs are significant, but the joys outweigh them all. To our new members I say welcome to this part of your faith journey. We're glad you decided to become part of our church family; we're glad that when you "dropped in" on us, you decided to stay. Amen.

The Pilgrim Church of Duxbury

Rev. Kenneth C. Landall