When I read the Isaiah passage for the third Sunday of Advent, I knew that this was going to be my blog to write. Isaiah says that the heartbroken and the mourners will be the ones to rebuild, restore, and renew what was once devastated.
Let me say that again. The heartbroken and the mourners will be the ones to rebuild, restore, and renew what was once devastated.
Covid has wrought much devastation this year, and has in every way unmasked all kinds of pain that has been around for even longer. A few months ago I was dealing with my own, and I wrote this poem to God:
All my emotions
out here on the floor
for You
Can you handle me?
Can you handle our world?
Can you really be Lord
over all this?
All this mess
All this pain
Who is to blame
We are sick
and poor
and hungry
and lost
and anxious
and scared
and mad
and I want to
hold it together
but I need
the stability I never had
I need a home that’s mine forever
I need a family that never leaves me
Is it too much to ask?
You found me when I didn’t have a lot
And I found you
And you protected me
Did you?
Did you protect me?
Did you preserve me?
Did you hold together
the blood and veins and love
you knit and formed
in my mother’s womb
Redemption isn’t becoming new
It’s recovering
Returning
to the Beloved children we always were
the Beloved first laugh
they will never take away
Friends, if there is anything that I hope you take with you from Isaiah and from my poem, it is that God has not forsaken you. He has not forsaken me. In all of our devastation we will wear crowns of beauty instead of ashes, the oil of joy instead of mourning, and a garment of praise instead of a spirit of despair. We will be called oaks of righteousness, a planting of the Lord for the display of his splendor. This good news story of Christmas belongs to us, and it is the one thing that will never be taken away.
(Accompanying scripture= Isaiah 61, 1-4)