Sermon December 13, 2020 Isaiah 7: 1-16 Rev. Peter Hofstra
Over
the last two weeks, we have looked to Jeremiah and to Micah, to how these
prophets speak to their own time and place, and how they speak to the full plan
of God. In addressing their
present moment and crisis in the life of God’s people, and what God is doing,
they also speak to the full plan of God, looking forward to the moment when all
these crises will pass because there will be the one King, the Messiah, who
will emerge to make all things right.
Jeremiah
and Micah, each of these prophets spoke in the wide sweep of the history of
Israel. Assyria’s conquest of the north
and the Babylonian exile of the south are the backdrops against which they are
preaching. Our passage from Isaiah is
also in that sweep, but in a particular moment.
King Ahaz of Judah is facing off a double threat. King Pekah of the Northern Kingdom and King
Rezin of Aram were allied to invade and take over the Kingdom of Judah. Jerusalem would fall and they already had a
king picked out, the son of Tabeel-vs. 6 (whom we do not know).
Ahaz
knew he did not stand a chance against this double threat. Verse 2 tells us 2When the house of
David heard that Aram had allied itself with Ephraim, the heart of Ahaz and the
heart of his people shook as the trees of the forest shake before the
wind. Ahaz does NOT seek out the Lord. Instead, the Lord sends Isaiah to find Ahaz,
Isaiah and his son, and it is to a particular address, at the end of the
conduit of the upper pool on the highway to the Fuller’s Field. And God promises that this invasion is not going to happen. God is pretty specific in verse 7, “It
shall not stand and it shall not come to pass.”
In verse 10, again God spoke to
Ahaz, apparently because Ahaz was not buying it, and God said, “Ask for a
sign, let it be deep as Sheol-deep as death-or high as Heaven.” Ahaz would not, as the Bible puts it, put God
to the test. It seems that not only did
Ahaz not believe but he did not want to believe either. Then Isaiah concludes, 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.” Ahaz is of the House
of David. Isaiah tells Ahaz that his
attitude is making even God tired. So
here is the sign: A young woman is with child and shall bear a son, and
shall name him Immanuel.
These words resonate in the
Christmas Story in Matthew 1. Matthew
has discovered that his betrothed is pregnant and is planning to ‘put her away
quietly’. This is when God comes to him
in a dream and reveals his part in the Christmas event, quoting Isaiah 7: 14, All this took place to fulfil what had been
spoken by the Lord through the prophet: 23 ‘Look, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and
they shall name him Emmanuel’, which means, ‘God is with us.’ This is
a prophecy to Gabriel’s visit to Mary in the Gospel of Luke, that the Holy
Spirit shall come upon her.
For King Ahaz, God is promising a son, promising one
whose name means “God is with us” precisely at the moment when Ahaz is
convinced that God is no longer with him, as he anticipates invasion. In the wide history of his time, the invasion
never comes. Both Aram and the Northern
Kingdom are going extinct, conquered and carried off by the Assyrians.
But here again is a passage that speaks to and transcends
the immediate circumstances of King Ahaz and points to the coming birth of
Jesus. What do we know so far? Jeremiah tells us he shall be of the House of
David. Micah tells us he shall be born
in Bethlehem. They both say he will
shepherd, will care for the people. Now
we know it is a virgin who shall conceive and bear a son and his name? “God is with us”!
Which is Jesus.
Jesus is God with us. Jesus is
God come down from heaven to live among us, to teach us, to show us the proper
way to live, and ultimately, to lay down his life to save ours. All this is the product of God’s love for
us. It shall be a miraculous birth, a
virgin birth. And while each of us needs
Christ’s intervention in our lives, Ahaz has a particular need at the moment of
God’s words.
But see how he sits on the fence.
In the first part of the passage, he does not seek after the Lord, but
the Lord comes after him, in the person of the prophet Isaiah. In the second part, God offers Ahaz the
opportunity to ask for any sign that the king can think of to show God’s power
is present for him. But in this
instance, Ahaz backs away from that opportunity. God’s prophet says that God lays out this
possibility, this offering of a sign.
But Ahaz does not want ‘to test’ the Lord. I am sorry, but that sounds a little thin.
It would be easy to knock Ahaz for his lack of faith, even in the face
of God’s immediate presence and power.
But such is the power of despair.
There is a double-barreled invasion pending. That is the geo-historical reality. But there is a theological reality that is
at play here as well. Because to read
the Old Testament is to read about God’s power to use external enemies as the
stick to change the behavior of God’s own people. When they turn from God, God reminds them
that, except by the grace of the Almighty, they do not have a firm hold on the
Promised Land.
Put those things together, and Ahaz is looking at two things. On the one side, God is telling him no
invasion is coming. But on the other, he
sees invasion coming. And invasion means
punishment from God. Does that feel
familiar? We know God is telling us one
thing but the evidence of our own senses is telling us something else, usually
something terrible.
Unfortunately, that is not uncommon at Christmas, even more so as we
celebrate a pandemic Christmas in 2020.
There is the power of God made manifest in the birth of Jesus, but
despair has overcome it in the lives of mortals. Depression spikes in this season. Suicide rates go way up. These things happen in the face of this most
wonderful time of the year.
So, a pastoral hazard is to attempt a dime-store psychological analysis
of what is going on. It is not
surprising. One of the responsibilities
of the pastor is to work at the interface between God and humanity. It is to recognize what contributes to the
sinful culture that pervades the world.
Which is good, but it can become a problem when we, as pastors, get out
of our lane and start considering how we might take the best of pop psychology
and sociology to diagnose the ills of the world.
But that undercuts the work and power of God in the face
of human despair. For example, we might
diagnose Ahaz with grief at the coming loss of his nation. He is denying the power of God in so
doing. We now have one of the seven
stages of grief that we could turn to.
But that takes us outside of our theological work, outside of thinking
about God of the Bible.
From the Bible, we know God recognizes grief, God understands
despair. The full gamut of emotions are
revealed in God when God is dealing with the people during the Exodus-even to
the point where God was so angry that God proposed starting over through the
line of Moses.
What do we learn about God in this passage? We learn that in time of despair, the Lord
does not leave us alone, but will come to seek us out. Whether we are in a position to recognize
that, well, that is something else. But
when Ahaz shut down to the promises of God, God kept at him. And the message got more specific. No longer was it a generalized promise that
God would prevent the invasion. No, God
got specific. God pointed to the coming
of Jesus.
What was at the root of Ahaz’ despair? He knew the power of God but he didn’t believe
it would make a difference. That despair
may defy everything that he knew and that we know about God and God’s love, it
may fly in the face of all the evidence of the Almighty, but it is still there. So what can we do? We can depend on the fact that God’s does not
leave us behind.
It may be the ongoing nudge, God coming to us again and
again with the message of hope in Jesus, like the annual coming of Christmas! It may be a grand demonstration. Maybe Ahaz did not get through his despair
until he saw the invasion fall apart.
Maybe it is God coming alongside of us in our despair and crying with
us. Maybe it is the right person, sent
at the right moment, who speaks God’s word of peace that manages to poke a hole
in the despair.
What I am trying to say is that God’s power will
overcome. God knows where we are and
what we need and God will provide. That
is what Christmas is about. It is about
hope. It is the hope of the Messiah sent
to save the world. It is the hope that
broadcasts so big at Christmastime.
God told Ahaz to ask for a sign, something the king was
not willing to do. So God provided the
sign of God’s own accord. A young woman,
a virgin, shall conceive and give birth to a Son. This sign came to pass at Christmas. Maybe that is why there is such seasonal
depression at this time of year. The joy
that is seen and that registers as happening around us is a reminder of what
that person does not have, the wonder of a personal relationship with Jesus.
But God has made provision for that. For every person who is blue and knocked down
by this season, there are so many others who know the joy of Jesus. I trust in the Lord that we are those who
know that joy. Because God’s provision
for the sharing of the Good News to all humanity is that it be shared through
us. Yes, the angels sang for the
shepherds, but then they went out singing, and sharing that joy of Jesus’ birth
with anyone who would listen.
A young woman is with child and she shall call his
name Immanuel. Each year, at the
moment of the shortest days of the year, we celebrate the coming of the
Christ-child. When things seem their
darkest, the light of heaven shines upon us once more. Let us pray that this light flood the lives
of all who need our Lord so much. Amen.
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