Shout loudly; don’t hold back;
    raise your voice like a trumpet!
Announce to my people their crime,
    to the house of Jacob their sins.

2 

They seek me day after day,
    desiring knowledge of my ways
    like a nation that acted righteously,
    that didn’t abandon their God.
They ask me for righteous judgments,
    wanting to be close to God.

3 

“Why do we fast and you don’t see;
    why afflict ourselves and you don’t notice?”
Yet on your fast day you do whatever you want,
    and oppress all your workers.

4 

You quarrel and brawl, and then you fast;
    you hit each other violently with your fists.
You shouldn’t fast as you are doing today
    if you want to make your voice heard on high.

5 

Is this the kind of fast I choose,
    a day of self-affliction,
    of bending one’s head like a reed
    and of lying down in mourning clothing and ashes?
    Is this what you call a fast,
        a day acceptable to the Lord?

6 

Isn’t this the fast I choose:
    releasing wicked restraints, untying the ropes of a yoke,
    setting free the mistreated,
    and breaking every yoke?

7 

Isn’t it sharing your bread with the hungry
    and bringing the homeless poor into your house,
    covering the naked when you see them,
    and not hiding from your own family?

8 

Then your light will break out like the dawn,
    and you will be healed quickly.
Your own righteousness will walk before you,
    and the Lord’s glory will be your rear guard.

9 

Then you will call, and the Lord will answer;
    you will cry for help, and God will say, “I’m here.”
If you remove the yoke from among you,
    the finger-pointing, the wicked speech;

10 

    if you open your heart to the hungry,
    and provide abundantly for those who are afflicted,
    your light will shine in the darkness,
    and your gloom will be like the noon.

11 

The Lord will guide you continually
    and provide for you, even in parched places.
    He will rescue your bones.
You will be like a watered garden,
    like a spring of water that won’t run dry.

12 

They will rebuild ancient ruins on your account;
    the foundations of generations past you will restore.
You will be called Mender of Broken Walls,
    Restorer of Livable Streets.

The Feast I Choose

“Great moments are born from great opportunity.”  These words are attributed to the legendary hockey coach Herb Brooks, in the movie Miracle, which tells the story of Team USA’s stunning upset of the Soviet Union in the 1980 Winter Olympics.  “Great moments are born from great opportunity.”  In the movie, Brooks offers these words to his team, all composed of recent college graduates, in the minutes before they face a Soviet team considered one of the greatest hockey teams of all time.  Most people would not have viewed that night as an opportunity for the Americans.  Herb Brooks and his young team saw things differently.  By games’ end, in spite of all the odds, they had been proven right.  Great moments are born from great opportunity.  And great opportunities often take us by surprise.  

Our passage for today is in many ways about great opportunities, opportunities which in this case, are hiding in plain sight.  Today, we hear from the prophet Isaiah, speaking to the Israelites in the aftermath of tragedy.  587 years before Jesus, the Babylonians had sacked Jerusalem and deported the Israelites still remaining in the land into exile.  Our passage for today is one of many Israelite attempts to make meaning out of this event, and our passage for today comes to a conclusion similar to many others at the time.  “You quarrel and brawl, and then you fast, you hit each other violently with your fists.”  Speaking in the present tense but referring to events in the past, our passage for today explains the exile as a consequence of Israel’s false piety, a piety that manifests as private devotion, but never reaches into their outer life.  

And then comes the opportunity.  After calling them out, God tells the Israelites what real faithfulness means: “Releasing wicked restraints, untying the ropes of a yoke, setting free the mistreated,” “Sharing your bread with the hungry, and bringing the homeless poor into your house,” clothing the naked, building and maintaining relationships, honoring others in conversation, and removing the yoke, ending practices of oppression.  All of these things constitute true faithfulness, the fast that God chooses for us.  And then, our passage ends by sharing with us what God will do when we choose this fast for ourselves.  “[God] will rescue your bones.  You will be like a watered garden, like a spring of water that won’t run dry.  They will rebuild ancient ruins on your account; the foundations of generations past you will restore.  You will be called Mender of Broken Walls, Restorer of Livable Streets.”  In the midst of the desolation of exile, the Israelites have been given an opportunity: choose faithfulness individually, and by the power of God experience healing collectively.  The exile was the greatest trauma the Israelites ever experienced.  Now, God will heal that trauma, breaking into human affairs to multiply their faithfulness into a total reversal of the past.  

If these words had been spoken to us, would we be bold enough to believe them?  We come from the tradition that tells stories of Jesus feeding thousands with some bread and a few fish, of disciples whose nets overflowed with fish, because they listened to Jesus’ advice, and cast those nets on a different side of their boats.  We come from the tradition of Peter the fisherman, and Paul the moral failure, who by God’s grace kept the early church alive through oppression and persecution.  We come from the tradition of a man named John Wesley, who stood in the presence of God, felt his heart strangely warmed, and spent the rest of his life teaching others about the God he had encountered.  John Wesley’s ministry was so effective that his efforts might have prevented a French-style revolution in England.  We might not always remember it, but we come from a tradition that believes in God’s ability to multiply the sustained faithfulness of one or two ordinary people, and truly change the world.  

A few weeks ago, when Trinity was covered in snow and ice, Ben, Bill, Brian, myself, and a group of our students went to work to remove it.  Breaking up ice with a sledgehammer is hard work, as is slamming into it with the steel end of a shovel.  But after a few minutes of work, we succeeded in opening up several cracks in the ice.  We used those cracks to get under the ice, and once we got under the ice, we began to pry it off the ground in chunks.  These chunks started small, but as the day went on, we took up more and more.  In a few hours, the white of snow and ice had disappeared, replaced by the red brick of the Welcome Center steps.  Sometimes, human hearts work the same way.  And we never know when the next act of faithfulness will be the one to finally open a crack, and send God’s sanctifying grace rushing in.  

Today, as we begin Lent, I charge you to keep the fast that God has chosen for us.  I charge you not to fast from chocolate, or soda, or social media, but to fast from fear, and whatever else keeps you from following the commands of Isaiah.  I charge you to untie the ropes of a yoke, and set free the mistreated.  I charge you to share your bread with the hungry, clothe the naked, bring the homeless poor into your house, and to provide abundantly for those who are afflicted.  I charge you to forsake wicked speech and finger pointing, looking outward not so that you might find people to blame, but people to help.  And I charge you to remember that you worship a God who multiplies, a God who will take your faithfulness, and use it to restore ruins, repair broken things, and heal the wounds of generations.  Great moments are born from great opportunity, and if we truly want a better world, God’s grace has made it possible for us to help create it.  Lent is here.  The time is now.  Keep the fast God has chosen for you, and be amazed at all the good that God will do through you.  Amen.