Friday after Ash Wednesday

“Then Your Light Will Break Forth”

On this first Friday in Lent, and the first Friday in March as well, it is our joy to have as our first reading perhaps the greatest passage from the book of the prophet Isaiah and certainly one of the greatest passages in the Old Testament. Located at the beginning of what is known as Trito (or Third) Isaiah that runs from chapter 56 to the end of Isaiah in 66, it speaks a truth that is always worth hearing again and again. Third Isaiah, written by an unknown author after the return from the Babylonian captivity (around 530 B.C.), famously begins with a promise of redemption to any who turn to the God of Israel, the one, true God. “For my house will be called a house of prayer for all nations,” it memorably proclaims in 56:7.

Here today at the start of chapter 58, the prophet urges that his message be shouted “like a trumpet” to all of Israel, that they have failed in their religious practices and that they are really actually rebels. Trito-Isaiah tells them in no uncertain terms why this is so, for “You do as you please and exploit all your workers. Your fasting ends in quarreling and strife, and in striking each other with wicked fists.” If that is how their religious practices, their “fasting” ends, he tells them, then how can they expect anything from the God whom they profess to be seeking?

Finally, Trito-Isaiah tells them what God’s true religion (fasting) actually is. It bears repeating in whole. “This, rather, is the fasting that I wish: releasing those bound unjustly, untying the thongs of the yoke; setting free the oppressed, breaking every yoke; sharing your bread with the hungry, sheltering the oppressed and the homeless; clothing the naked when you see them, and not turning your back on your own.” Every generation needs to hear this prophecy over and over again. No matter what our religious practices are, no matter how noble they may seem, if they do not end in doing the above, basically in taking care of “the poor,” then they are of little use. Religion must end in love of our neighbor, especially our neighbors in need, or it is not true religion. It is not anything! As Paul unforgettably told the Corinthians, “If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing.” (1Cor 13:2)

It is this love for one another, Jesus’ final commandment to his disciples at the Last Supper, that everything we do is supposed to lead us to. Otherwise, again in the great words of St. Paul, it is all “a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal.” Do we sometimes, like the ancient Israelites of Isaiah’s time, find ourselves asking God, “Why have we fasted, and you have not seen it? Why have we humbled ourselves, and you have not noticed?” It is then that we need to truly humbly ask ourselves, was it done from love?

Isaiah is triumphantly clear about what would happen if we did everything from this love given to us in Christ, instead of out of our selfish motives. “Then your light will break forth like the dawn, and your healing would quickly appear; Then you will call, and the LORD will answer, Here I am!” Isaiah continues in the reading tomorrow that follows today’s, with continual exultations of what will happen when we turn completely to God and learn to do everything out of this love God gives us in Jesus. It concludes with, “Then you shall delight in the LORD, and I will make you ride on the heights of the earth!”

What greater promise from God is there than this? What more could God pledge to us if we would but trust in God and nothing else? What could more motivate us to seek it with all our hearts that we might respond in love for our neighbor? It is now Lent and now is the favorable time. We are here to love one another, to take care of one another, to help one another. Let us resolve to begin doing so in full earnestness and trust in God today. “Then the LORD will guide you always… you will be called Repairer of Broken Walls, and Restorer of Streets with Dwellings.” (Is 58:11a-12b)