Today’s Daily Lesson comes from Isaiah chapter 7 verses 10 through
10 Again the Lord spoke to Ahaz, saying, 11Ask a sign of the Lord your God; let it be deep as Sheol or high as heaven. 12But Ahaz said, I will not ask, and I will not put the Lord to the test. 13Then Isaiah said: ‘Hear then, O house of David! Is it too little for you to weary mortals, that you weary my God also? 14Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign. Look, the young woman is with child and shall bear a son, and shall name him Immanuel.
This is an obscure Scripture, but one important to understanding the risk-taking demands of faith.
Ahaz, the King of Judah, is afraid of war with the threatening Aramites. But he is not to be afraid, he is told; and the Prophet Isaiah is sent to tell him so. And to prove it, the Prophet tells Ahaz he is to ask for a sign from God.
But Ahaz interprets this challenge as an act of disobedience, as putting God to the test.
Ahaz’s fear confounds him. It makes him see good as evil and an act of obedience as disobedience. It’s his fear cloaked as fidelity that keeps him from taking the leap of faith.
Significantly, this is the Old Testament Lectionary text that is paired with the text from Matthew about Joseph and Mary in the New Testament. Again, Joseph like Ahaz, is afraid to take Mary as his wife as she’s been found to be with child. This, to Joseph, is a grave sin. But in fact, it’s not a sin; it’s the mysterious work of the Holy Spirit. It’s an act of God. And as if to underscore the point, Matthew the writer quotes from today’s Isaiah Lesson:
“Behold, the young woman shall conceive and shall bear a son, and shall name him Immanuel.”
Immanuel, “God is with us.” So we must not be afraid. And we must not allow our fears, cloaked in religion, to keep us from acting with faith. For the life of faith demands that we listen not only to what somebody has said God said, but what God is saying. It’s about taking chances, and risking boldly, and having the guts to say yes to the sign of the times. It’s what Joseph did in the Bible and what more of us ought to do now.
There’s a popular benedictory prayer I like, attributed to William Sloane Coffin and used weekly by my predecessor at Broadway, Steve Shoemaker, with lines I really like:
“May God give you the grace
never to sell yourself short;
grace to risk something big
for something good;
grace to remember that the
world is too dangerous
for anything but truth and
too small for anything but love.”
May God give us this grace; and may we in turn accept it.
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