Wednesday of the Third Week of Advent

 Lectionary: 189

I am the LORD, there is no other;
    I form the light, and create the darkness,
I make well-being and create woe;
    I, the LORD, do all these things.
Let justice descend, O heavens, like dew from above,
    like gentle rain let the skies drop it down.
Let the earth open and salvation bud forth;
    let justice also spring up!
    I, the LORD, have created this.

Among the many memes of social media and the Internet, a more pleasant one sounds, "Be still and know that I am God!" The reassuring message, often presented with soothing images of earth, sky, and sea, is actually a battle cry, taken from Psalm 46:

Come and see the works of the LORD,
who has done fearsome deeds on earth;
Who stops wars to the ends of the earth,
breaks the bow, splinters the spear,
and burns the shields with fire;
“Be still and know that I am God!
I am exalted among the nations,
exalted on the earth.”
The LORD of hosts is with us;
our stronghold is the God of Jacob.

Given the rising militarism of armed hate groups in the United States and around the world, I find the meme no less reassuring for knowing its setting among the psalms. We have a stronghold in God! The Lord is with us. 

A similar shout sounds in today's first reading, "I am the Lord, there is no other." We have to get that into our heads. We should begin each day and complete each evening with reflection upon those eight words. If we add a ninth word, it is a fervent, "Amen!" It is especially reassuring during the rush of the holiday season when the weather, darkness, preparation, and festivity conspire to rattle and frazzle us. 

Isaiah places today's reassuring meme not in the din of battle but within the setting of nature; or, if you prefer, our ecological environment. There is light and darkness, gentle rain and silent dew, and the quiet governance of God over the vast and beautiful universe. 

Those who would separate religious issues from climate change and the environment obviously read a different bible, avoiding the Hebrew prophets entirely. They knew that nothing happens which God has not ordained, whether it be infestations of locusts, droughts, storms, earthquakes, epidemics, or the advance and retreat of armies. 

Our scriptures do not present a godless world; they cannot imagine mechanical or impersonal forces which are not directed by a Personal God. If it is there, Someone meant it to be. 

Nor is there luck, fate, or karma in the Bible. They don't play cards or throw dice. When the soldiers cast lots for Jesus's clothing, they commit sacrilege on several levels, not least for using the lots which are used by the pious to discern God's will. You remember that the apostles cast lots when they chose Mathias to replace Judas. 

I used to play cribbage with an elderly priest -- God rest his soul -- and I often wondered if the Lord wasn't the third player in the room. Somehow the old fellow won although his mind was slipping and he could neither count the meld nor remember who won the last game. When I dealt him a perfect hand of twenty-nine points I knew I was being had by a higher power. 

Someone might say that was an accident. I don't think so. Why shouldn't a centenarian receive a perfect cribbage hand after a long life of service in the Church, even if he couldn't recognize it? 

Unlike our secular kith and kin -- a polite word for atheism -- Christians see the hand of God everywhere. His blessing hand is there in millions of people commuting safely by air, land, and sea every day; his healing hand is in our sick rooms and hospital beds; and his punishing hand is there in the pandemic. (If it's not punishment, it is certainly punishing. And if it walks like a duck...!) 

In today's gospel Jesus also points to the obvious to validate his ministry:

“Go and tell John what you have seen and heard:

the blind regain their sight,

the lame walk,

lepers are cleansed,

the deaf hear, the dead are raised,

the poor have the good news proclaimed to them. 

It's not hard to see God's hand in the natural world around us and the bizarre world of human affairs. It's not hard to believe that God speaks to us in historical events, and especially in the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus. What is hard -- so hard it's nearly impossible -- is to deny God's sovereign presence among us. 

"I am the Lord; there is no other!"