Isaiah 55:6-9
Nineteenth Sunday after
Pentecost -
Pastor Troy Slater - Our
We read once
again the first verse of our OT text for this morning from Isaiah, chapter 55 -
"Seek the Lord while He may be
found; call on Him while He is near." …
Dear
brothers and sisters in Christ. As
Christians we know the truth that God is everywhere, right? God is everywhere. As the book of Proverbs states, "the eyes of the Lord are
everywhere."
"Omnipresent" is of course the fancy, theological term that is
used here. God is everywhere present. And so it probably doesn't surprise us any to
hear Isaiah, in our reading for this morning say, "seek the Lord while He may be found; call on him while he is near." No surprise here for we know that God is
near, after all, God is everywhere.
But if God
is everywhere, well then that means He is even in the tornado that levels a
town, right?; He's even in a hurricane that destroys a region; He's even in a
terrorist attack that shocks a nation.
If God is everywhere, then He's not just there in the beautiful sunset
or a grand mountain scene, He's there in it all.
Now, don't
get me wrong, I'm not saying God is the cause of the death and destruction we
so often see around us, after all, the Lord God made this world and it was "very good", He said. It wasn't until the fall into sin by Adam and
Eve - sin that we no doubt have continued - that death and destruction came
about. God is not the author of evil but
rather the sin that is in us and the sin that is around us is. But He's there in it - He's allowing it to
happen - even using it as His divine judgment and fatherly correction. God is so intimately involved in the affairs
of this world that as Jesus himself says, our heavenly Father knows the very
number of hairs on our head and not even a sparrow perishes apart from His
will. And so if Scripture says, "seek
the Lord while He may be found; call on Him while He is near", do we
want to? Do we want to seek Him, to find
Him? I mean maybe we should be afraid of
what we might get there.
Well, let's
keep reading our Old Testament text here.
"Let the wicked forsake his
way and the evil man his thoughts. Let
him turn to the Lord…" "Let
him turn to the Lord." Well now
Isaiah should know better than that, shouldn't he? I mean telling the wicked and the evil man to
turn toward the Lord - to seek him, to call upon him. I mean isn't that definitely asking for
trouble?
After all remember what Isaiah did
when he himself was brought into the very throne room of God to receive his
commissioning as a prophet of the Lord. Remember
what Isaiah's reaction was? "Woe to me," he cried, " I am ruined. I am a dead man for I am a man of unclean
lips and live among a people of unclean lips and my eyes have seen the King,
the Lord Almighty." You see
Isaiah knew that he was a sinful man among a sinful people and Isaiah knew that
sinners cannot stand before a holy and just God. Sin - and that means sinners - cannot come
before the Lord God in all His glory and live.
"Our God is a consuming
fire" Moses once told the people and in that fire all that is not holy
and righteous, is consumed. Isaiah knew
that. He knew that and so what is he
doing inviting, even encouraging the wicked, the evil, to turn to the Lord - to
enter His presence? What's he doing? Is he wanting them - us - to be destroyed? …
Well again, let's keep reading here. "Let
the wicked, the evil man turn to the Lord for He will have … mercy on him. Let him turn to our God, for He will… freely pardon."
… Mercy and pardon. Of course Isaiah
knew a little about God's gifts of mercy and pardon, didn't he? You might recall how after Isaiah's lament
that he was a dead man because he was a man of unclean lips in the presence of
a holy God, the Lord did something for Isaiah.
He did something. He had a seraph
- an angel - go to Isaiah with a hot coal and touch Isaiah's lips with it. The seraph then said, "See this has touched your lips; your guilt is taken away and your
sin atoned for." Brought into
the presence of a holy God, Isaiah, a sinful man was given forgiveness,
cleansing, guilt taken away, pardon for his sin. In the presence of a holy God, Isaiah was
given the free gift of mercy and pardon. … …
As you look around at the world in
which we live - and I suspect even in our own lives - there is certainly a need
for some good news isn't there? I mean our
faith tells us that God is everywhere - but yet, it doesn’t' often seem like it. So much in life seems so void of a loving and
caring creator God. The wars and the
bloodshed, the broken homes and the broken lives, the natural disasters and the
terminal diseases, the graveyards and the loneliness. Even with a God who is everywhere, we never
know what we're going to get in life although we can pretty much count on a lot
of dark valleys, a lot of struggles. I
suppose that's why so many these days seem to be searching for something more -
something spiritual. The thinking that
if we can find God - a god - well we can finally find our utopia. The thinking that we can somehow find or
build our own little heaven here on earth. .. So much searching. …
Well actually there are a few places
that I can tell you, that I can guarantee you in fact where God is present -
and I can even guarantee you what you'll get there. I can even guarantee that it's good
news. And no it's not on a mountaintop
or even on some pilgrimage to a strange and foreign land - it's not tied to yet
another government program or in some get-rich-quick scheme. No, rather scripture says, "if we confess our sins God who is
faithful and just will forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all
unrighteousness." This morning
we confessed our sin, didn't we? And
what did God do? He did what He always
does when we confess our sins, didn't He?
From His very throne in heaven He announced His Word of forgiveness for
the sake of His son, Christ and His cross.
The word of heaven came to us here on earth. .. And here in a few
minutes we will humbly kneel around our Lord's table and what will He give us
there? .. I can guarantee you what he'll give you there. "Take
eat this is my body, given for you. Take
drink the blood of my covenant shed for the forgiveness of all your sins."
.. Mercy, pardon for sin, a foretaste of that heavenly feast that is to come. Here in His Word, Here in His Sacraments - at
His table - at His font - Here God is present for you. Here God is present to have mercy upon you,
to freely pardon - I guarantee it. No,
even better, Jesus has guaranteed it by His blood.
No matter who you are, know matter
where you've been, what you've done, where you're going, the Lord God is here
to freely have mercy upon you and to freely pardon. God is everywhere - yes yes
to be sure - but here in His Word - in His Sacrament - He's here for you. He's here to give you - yes you personally,
you individually all his grace and mercy won by Jesus and His cross. You know it's kind of like how we all have
that basic need to be loved, right? To
be loved by somebody, and preferably by those whom we love. If we tell someone that we love them we want
them to tell us back that they love us. And
we don't want them to say, "Well I love you too. For I love everybody." No we want them to say to us, "I love
you" personally, individually. None
of this generic love, we want it personal.
That's kind of how it is with our
Lord's Word and Sacraments. Yes God is
everywhere, but at the baptismal font, He called you by name. Yes God is everywhere but in His Word of
absolution He pronounces His forgiveness upon you regarding each and every one
of YOUR specific sins. God is everywhere
but at His table He puts His body and blood given and shed for you into your
hand and into your mouth. That's
actually why I try to usually address each of you by name during the
distribution of the Lord's Supper. It's
a way of emphasizing that this is the Lord's gift to you - this is His answer
to you for all the chaos going on in our lives and around our world. It's
personal. God is present here, for you.
…
Of course our OT reading then ends
with the truth that how our Lord deals with His people - that is with us
sinners - it's all really just too beyond our comprehension. For He says, "For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my
ways. As the heavens are higher than the
earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your
thoughts." Mercy and pardon for me? Yes even for me, the worst of sinners, to
borrow a phrase from
And so yes indeed let us "seek the Lord wile He may be found; let
us call on Him while He is near. Let the
wicked forsake His way and evil man His thoughts. Let us turn to the Lord and He will
have mercy on us and to our God, for He will freely pardon." Yes God is everywhere, God is everywhere, but
in Jesus and His cross and His resurrection, that cross and resurrection given
to you in His Word and His Sacraments, God is here, He's here for you with
mercy and pardon. Amen.
FROM LECTIONARY AT LUNCH -
Dr. Tim Saleska
God is "near"
God is everywhere - but this
is not necessarily Gospel - we're still looking for Him because by our sin we
have been separated from him. To our
rebellious nature, God seems to be nowhere.
So where/when is it that God is "near" in a way we may
"seek" him? When he is there
with forgiveness/pardon - where He has bridged the gap for us. That is, through Word and Sacraments (see
verse immediately following this text) where God comes to us with His
forgiveness/pardon by Jesus.
You love someone and you want
to know if they love you. They say,
"of course I love you, I love everyone." That does you no good. You want to hear, "I love
you." Where do we hear that? Communion, baptism, absolution. Although w/absolution, still temptation to
say, well the pastor's talking to everyone, not necessarily, just me.