Hang in there

Isaiah 56:1-8

 In our reading from Isaiah we heard something unexpected. Isaiah, albeit second Isaiah is addressing his prophecies to the exiles in Babylon and of course is wholly devoted to Israel’s God At this moment he finds himself on the threshold of the fulfillment of earlier prophets’ expectations. So he is moved to say:

“Maintain justice and do what is right for my salvation is close at hand.”

Risen next door to  the Babylonian empire are the Medes who under Cyrus will become what we call the Persian empire stretching form the Persian Gulf to the Mediterranean, a powerful force which would capture the city of Babylon and indeed be welcomed as a liberator. This is the main thrust and hope of Isaiah’s prophecy and he starts by telling the Israelites to “hang in there.”  For at the moment the reality of life for the exiles and for those who have started to return is harsh. Even following these simple rules though is difficult.

Maintain justice and do what is right. “Happy,” he goes on to say, “is the man who refrains from any wrongdoing.“ You will notice that I have substituted the word EVIL, which for us denotes an extreme with a softer word which I hope captures the sense of trying always  to do what is right rather than what may be considered wrong. This seems evident enough but we are not good at this; our corporations and government institutions local and national and even whole countries spend a great deal of time arguing that what they do is “what the law allows”. Which is not the same thing at all! For example:

My friend’s benefits were stopped, the benefits that they lived on. They were stopped because they had not replied to a letter asking them a question. It could have been observed that over the years my friend had always replied to letters in fact had been diligent in doing so - so something was wrong, it might have been asked were they ill? It might have been asked were they alive? It might have been asked as was the case whether the letter had ever been sent or not delivered. But the law allowed the benefits to be stopped, so stopped they were. This was not maintaining justice and doing what was right.

And the rewards for doing right are considerable: “for my salvation will come and my deliverance will be revealed.” And - here is the unexpected bit even to the foreigner and the eunuch. Now Isaiah will be familiar with Deuteronomy especially chapter 23:1 to which I draw your attention as it explains in graphic detail, too much for before the watershed, that eunuchs shall not be admitted to God’s assembly and goes on to say the same about foreigners.

Isaiah as I said was wholly devoted to Israel’s God but now he is able and moved to say that being a people of God does not depend on ancestry, which is remarkable for the Jewish nation of his day,  but depends on following the Lord, holding fast to his covenant for whoever you are if you do this you will be brought to his Holy mountain.



Isaiah speaking God’s word is prophesying both near term, that there will be deliverance for the exiles from Babylon
and long term, that the coming of the suffering servant will change everything for everybody.

And this is why we have always to seek to do what is right, to maintain justice and not to do simply what is allowed.

Hang in there.