Isaiah 58:6-12 & John 1:1-15
6th October 2013
Not for ourselves but for the whole world were we born. This was the motto of the Liverpool Institute,
where Sir Paul McCartney (the former Beatle) went to high school. Non nobis solum sed toti mundo nati. It
left a deep impression upon him. No longer a secondary school today, but with
McCartney’s support it has become the Liverpool Institute for the Performing
Arts. The motto remains. McCartney incorporates these beautiful words into the
beginning of his composition, the Liverpool
Oratorio, which tells the story of growing up in Liverpool.[1]
The opening lines are sung by children.
Not
for ourselves but for the whole world were we born. It’s not explicitly Christian, but it could
be. For
the world... A world so loved by
God…. We don’t exist for ourselves. We exist for our neighbors, for the
wider, broader world.
From Isaiah’s perspective it’s what
God desires, it’s what’s near and dear to God’s heart: to bring light to the
dark places of the world. And people
with a heart for God have a heart, and people with a heart for God have a heart
for what God desires. This is the purpose
of faith, this is the end of our worship, this is the focus of discipleship,
what God wants us to do: loose the bonds of injustice—you and me, loose them,
now. Undo the belts attached to the yoke oppressing God’s people and weighing
them down—you and me, right now. Let the oppressed go free; break the yoke—right now, you and me. Break
it. Shatter it—every yoke. Share your resources, feed the hungry, provide
shelter for the homeless, become a place of safety for the exile, clothe the
naked, and don’t ignore the needs of those nearest you, right beside you.
And then do you know what will
happen when we engage in justice making, when we help liberate God’s
children? Do you know what will happen
when we care for the needs of the afflicted and shatter every yoke? “Then your
light shall break forth like the dawn, and your healing shall spring up
quickly;…” (Isaiah 58:8). Twice Isaiah makes this point, “Your light shall rise
in the darkness” (Isaiah 58:10).
The light rises not when the
darkness is gone, but rises within
the darkness. The transition from night
to day doesn’t occur in the moment, but gradually. The morning light appears in the darkness of
the night and then scatters the darkness. That’s what happens when we engage in
this work of light, the work of God.
What Isaiah is also getting at here
is that when we remove the yoke from our neighbors and break it, when we
“satisfy the needs of the afflicted” (Is. 58:20), the healing that springs up
will be the healing of the soul of the people, of the nation. It will yield the
healing of the people, of the community, of the nation. Parched places will become refreshing springs
for all to share (Is. 58:11). The ruins of civilization will be rebuilt, with new
foundations established providing for the future. When God’s people act this
way they will be known for posterity as Repairers of the Breach—meaning the
people who healed the holes and gaps of society, people who repaired ruptures and
healed the deep wounds of society—people who restored the streets so that people
could live in them and children play in them again with safety (Is. 58:12).
World
Communion Sunday reminds us that it’s not just our streets that need repairing (which they do), but that we as
Christians have a responsibility for our sisters and brothers around the world.
Why? Because through the Holy Spirit, we are connected to them. They share our burdens (they really do) and we
share theirs, particularly Christians in Syria (There was a moving article
in yesterday’s Washington Post about
the plight of Christians there.), or just two weeks ago we witnessed the worst
terrorist attack against Christians, at worship, in Peshawar,
Pakistan, or think of Coptic Christians in Egypt or the Protestant and
Roman Catholics in the Democratic Republic of Congo. It is integral to the health of a
congregation to have ties with the global church; yes, we have a lot to offer
the world; but the world has a lot, maybe more, to offer us, to teach us how to
love and serve Christ, to suffer with and for the gospel, to share with us some
of the joy of Christ.
World Communion Sunday is one of my
favorite Sundays of the year. Today, we
celebrate our connection to the wider world. As the world shrinks around us
daily (primarily through the internet) we’re come to know in new ways that we
are really one, not only as Christians, but that we share a common
humanity. “People on other continents
are not merely the other, the faceless crowd ‘over there.’ They are our other, members of our extended
family even though there is an ocean between us.”[2]
The contemporary writer and pastor Samir
Selmanovic makes a crucial point in this regard. Born in the former Yugoslavia
to a Muslim father and a Christian mother, but was raised an atheist, he later
became a Christian. Selmanovic echoes
Isaiah with this claim: “People who lived before us and will live after us are
connected to us as well. Everything we
do is linked to our past, and everything we achieve will be left in the hands
of those who will come after us. To alleviate suffering in a remote corner of
the world or in a remote time or future is not an act of charity anymore but an
act of solidarity.” … “Those who will be hurt or blessed by our
thoughts, prayers, or actions might be completely unknown to us, but our lives will affect them, and their lives will affect us. Whatever we do, say, prayer, or think now
matters to ‘them.’”[3] We are one.
The 13th century Chinese
poet Kauan Tao-Sheng (1262-1319) knew then what we need to remember now. She put it this way:
Take
a lump of clay,
Wet
it, pat it,
Make
a statue of you
And
a statue of me
Then
shatter them, clatter them,
Add
some water,
And
break them and mold them
Into
a statute of you
And
a statue of me.
Then
in mine, there are bits of you
And
in you there are bits of me
Nothing
ever shall keep us apart.[4]
“In mine, there are bits of you; in
you there are bits of me.”
What does this sound like? Doesn’t it sound like Communion? Eat this bread. Share this cup. In
remembrance. Remember—not just recalling
the past, but re-membeing, connecting
member to member, forming a larger body. Participating in the body of Christ. For this was Jesus’ mission and his hope for
us and for the world he died to save.
Before his death, Jesus prayed for
his disciples and for the world and said to God:
“I
ask not only on behalf of these, but also on behalf of those who will believe
in me through their word, that they may all be one. As you, Father, are in me and I am in you,
may they also be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent
me. The glory that you have given me I
have given them, so that they may be one, as we are one, I in them and you in
me, that they may become completely one, so that the world may know that you
have sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me” (John 17:20-23).
That the world might know how much
it is loved. May it be so.
[1] Paul McCartney
and Carl Davis, Liverpool Oratorio,
(EMI Records, 1991).
[2] Samir
Selmanovic, It’s Really All About God:Reflections of a Muslim Atheist Jewish Christian (Jossey-Bass, 2009), 243.
[3] Selmanovic,
244.
[4] Kauan Tao-Sheng,
untitled poem in Theodor Reik, Of Love
and Lust (New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1,949), 73.
