If you would like to read through the Daily Office, complete with prayers and hymns, I use this almost every day.

February 3, 2017

Epiphany IV (Psalm 69:1-23(24-30)31-38; Isaiah 56:1-8; Galatians 5:16-24; Mark 9:2-13 )

Isaiah 56:1-8

¹ Thus says the Lord:
Maintain justice, and do what is right,
for soon my salvation will come,
and my deliverance be revealed.

² Happy is the mortal who does this,
the one who holds it fast,
who keeps the sabbath, not profaning it,
and refrains from doing any evil.

³ Do not let the foreigner joined to the Lord say,
The Lord will surely separate me from his people;
and do not let the eunuch say,
I am just a dry tree.
⁴ For thus says the Lord:
To the eunuchs who keep my sabbaths,
who choose the things that please me
and hold fast my covenant,
⁵ I will give, in my house and within my walls,
a monument and a name
better than sons and daughters;
I will give them an everlasting name
that shall not be cut off.

⁶ And the foreigners who join themselves to the Lord,
to minister to him, to love the name of the Lord,
and to be his servants,
all who keep the sabbath, and do not profane it,
and hold fast my covenant
⁷ these I will bring to my holy mountain,
and make them joyful in my house of prayer;
their burnt-offerings and their sacrifices
will be accepted on my altar;
for my house shall be called a house of prayer
for all peoples.
⁸ Thus says the Lord God,
who gathers the outcasts of Israel,
I will gather others to them
besides those already gathered.

First, I’m sorry for the gap in posts this week. I got a pretty serious cold that knocked me out for a few days. So…to the both of you who read this (one of whom is my mom!), my apologies! 🙂

This has more recently become a favorite passage of mine, as I continue to see how much Isaiah had a huge influence on Jesus’ conception of his own ministry (and how some NT writers picked up on other themes in Isaiah). It is clear that Jesus has a heart for the outcast. And even though he spends much of his ministry amongst the Jewish people, he has a strong disposition toward those who are excluded.

I’ve often heard this passage as a reference to a world mission impulse and perspective. Jesus quotes part of this passage as he overturns the money changing tables in the court of the Gentiles. The idea is that such activity was keeping the nations (ta ethne-Gentiles) from worshiping in the Temple. God’s intent is that all people groups from all over the world should worship him. And this is true.

However, Isaiah mentions two groups of people specifically: eunuchs and foreigners. These are the people who Yahweh wants to be in “in my house” and “in my walls” and on “my mountain.” The salvation of the Jewish people, the ingathering of the exiles, is directly tied to the inclusion of the “others”, both within their tribe and from other tribes. The presence of the eunuchs and the foreigners during the worshiping activity of the Temple is meant to be a sign that points to the future reality of the kingdom.

And the call for the people of God is to maintain justice and do what is right, which seems to at least mean inclusion of these groups of people. Those who are most disadvantaged and outcast and those who don’t belong. And we would agree with this…in principle. But what about in practice?

You see, the thing about the money changers is that they were actually providing a service. Or at least they thought they were. But the service had become oppressive and encroached upon the place created for the “others”. Commerce and transaction had replaced welcome.

Are there places where we have pushed out the other? Are there institutions (religious or otherwise) which may actually alienate and exclude in the name of proper order? Have we replaced doing what is right with doing what seems proper or efficient?

And then there’s this whole emphasis on the sabbath…but we will have to save that for another time.