A Chosen Reputation--January 11, 2023

A Chosen Reputation--January 11, 2023

"Thus says the God, the LORD, who created the heavens and stretched them out, who spread out the earth and what comes from it, who gives breath to the people upon it and spirit to those who walk in it: I am the LORD, I have called you in righteousness, I have taken you by the hand and kept you..." [Isaiah 42:5-6a]

I don't think I am as amazed as I should be at the way God uses power--because it really is breathtaking.

More to the point, it is kind.  To hear the Scriptures tell it, the way God uses the infinite, omnipotent, universal power of being "God" is remarkably tender.

As we continue through the poem we call Isaiah 42, we get this reminder here of the tension between God's sheer creative power and God's choice to channel that power in gentle love.  The prophet reminds us that God has created everything from the vast distances of outer spaces and the luminous swirling strands of galaxies and stars to the abundance of life on earth... and that this same God calls people by name and leads us by the hand.  

This is so different, so refreshingly different, from the ways we often measure power and calculate its magnitude.  As a child of the Cold War, I can remember learning words like "kiloton" and "megaton"--words to describe how many thousands or millions of tons of TNT it would take to equal the explosive force of this nuclear bomb or that ballistic missile, and how much more terrifyingly destructive they were than the bombs [tiny, by comparison] dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Hanging in the air was the constant awareness that the superpowers had enough of those weapons in their arsenals to destroy all life on Earth many times over.  And of course, decades after the fall of the Berlin Wall, those weapons are all still there, holding onto their cataclysmic potential the same as always, but now with thirty years' more of additions and advances. We are used to quantifying power in terms of what we can blow up with it.

But here the prophet teaches us to think of God's power in terms of the worlds God has made--that is, in terms of creation, rather than destruction.  To be sure, Isaiah and the rest of the biblical chorus of voices would all affirm that God can destroy as well as to create, to tear down as well as to build up, and to vanquish as well as to vivify.  But knowing that God is hypothetically able to annihilate the universe, here the prophet describes God solely in terms of creation: God is the one who stretched out the skies, spread out the earth, and breathed life into every living thing.  

And, my goodness, even that image of giving life is remarkably tender, isn't it?  Instead of picturing God as shocking us to life with a lightning bolt, or forging the universe like a blacksmith hammering on a cosmic anvil, the prophet pictures God breathing into us.  That can't be a gale-force hurricane wind, or else we would be destroyed in the act of being created; it is a soft and gentle breath that wakens us to life.  And from there, the prophet says, God has called the people [in this case, a band of despairing exiles, languishing under the boot of Babylon] by name and takes them by the hand. You don't do that for strangers, and you certainly don't do it for someone you regard as an enemy.  The Almighty One who made the universe is revealed here to be the Gentle One who takes us by the hand with kindness, like a parent standing at the intersection ready to lead a frightened child across the street.

That's worth holding onto in a world that still has a death-wish and so often only thinks in terms of destruction.  The God who has limitless power both to establish and to eliminate chooses to be revealed in terms of tenderness.  The God who could choose anything to be known for--tornados, volcanoes, black holes, or tsunamis--chooses to be known as the One who calls us by name and takes us by the hand.  In a time when so many seek to build their reputations on bluster and bullying, it is gospel good news that the Almighty is revealed in tenderness.

Today, let us lean on the assurance of God's kindness, and let it shape the way we choose to relate to people around us, as well.

God of mercy and of might, take us by the hand again today, and let us hear you call our name.