Tuesday, March 23, 2004
Lenten Fast
The Venerable Martyr Nikon of Sicily
6th Hour: Isaiah 40:18-31 1st Vespers: Genesis 15:1-15 2nd Vespers: Proverbs 15:7-19
Isaiah 40:18-31 RSV, especially vs. 27: "Why do you say, O Jacob, and speak, O Israel, 'My way is hid from
the Lord, and my right is disregarded by my God'?" With this probing question, the Prophet Isaiah took the ancient People
of the Covenant to task for complaining that God was unconcerned about their problems. They believed God was
indifferent to them - to His own People! Could what happened to His People be hidden from God's sight?
Such remarks disclose that they were disconnected from God. Still, for those who speak in this way, God might just as
well not exist. They expect nothing from Him and seek nothing from Him. Does not this view fit remarkably well with the
modern naturalism of Western culture that makes decisions and actions without reference to God, and considers that, since
He is neither measurable nor tangible, He is functionally irrelevant to everyday life?
Isaiah rebuked his fellow countrymen for such pessimism about themselves, life, and God. He knew that, as a People, they
bore the name Israel from their forefather Jacob, a man who had wrestled and prevailed with God, after which God
renamed him, "Israel" - meaning "struggled with God." Thus was Isaiah shocked: how can you say such things as these?
How can you be so negative? Is God an idol (vss. 18-20)? Have you not seen that God is the Lord of men and nations (vss.
21-24)? Look at the creation He fashioned and governs (vss. 25-26). God has not withdrawn; rather, those who wait on
Him shall be renewed (vss. 28-31).
In the first three verses of today's reading, Isaiah targets Israel's idolatry - absorption in things: "Surely by these kinds of
remarks you do not propose to adopt idolatry, do you?" He invites the discouraged to compare the Lord with any god
fashioned by human artisans, even the best idols, made to last for centuries through the use of gold, silver or "wood that
will not rot" (vss.18-20). Isaiah implies, of course, that idols do rot and fall apart over time. Investing one's primary life
energy in created things is madness, a point the Lord Jesus Himself echoed: "For what shall it profit a man, if he shall gain
the whole world, and lose his own soul?" (Mk. 8:36).
Next, Isaiah chides his pessimistic countrymen: "Has it not been told you from the beginning?" (vs. 21). God "sits above
the circle of the earth" (vs. 22). He "makes the rulers of the earth as nothing" (vs. 23), and He blows upon them, and they
wither (vs. 24). If you choose to worship princes, they scarcely are planted before they are carried off "like stubble" (vs.
24).
Isaiah continues: "With whom would you compare 'the Holy One?'" (vs. 25), and he turns to God's work as Creator. Look
at the stars, the sun, the moon, the sky. They follow their appointed courses just as their Creator determines. Prediction of
their times to appear and to set below the horizon are the result of God's active power and might (vs. 26).
See how the verse quoted at the beginning is the key to the whole of Isaiah's Prophecy (vs. 27). Furthermore, see how,
once the challenge is stated, the Prophet returns in the final verses to summarize what he has called his readers to consider
up to this point. But now all is focused on God's nature: the Lord is everlasting (vs. 28). God is the Creator of the ends of
the earth (vs. 28). The everlasting God does not faint as men do; rather, He gives power to the faint (vss. 29,30). Since
"His understanding is unsearchable" by any human means, it is best for men to "wait for the Lord;" for if they do they
"shall renew their strength, they shall mount up with wings like eagles, they shall run and not be weary"(vs. 31).
The reason men in Isaiah's time or in the present feel that God is uninterested is because they do not wait upon Him. Let us
give up all weary pessimism, and worship the Lord.
Come let us worship and fall down before Christ. Save us, O Lord, who sing unto Thee!
