For those who like to preach from all three lectionary texts, the stated readings for this Sunday could cause a preacher great perplexity. How on earth do they all fit together? The Epistle lesson deals with the variety of gifts given by the Spirit to the church. The Gospel lesson recounts Jesus' first "sign" at the wedding at Cana, when the water turned into wine, became the symbol of his blood poured out for us all. Our Isaiah text concerns the eschatological future of Jerusalem. Other than the reference to a wedding in John and here in Isaiah, the texts seem to have nothing in common.
Actually all three texts can be used to speak of the church. Through years of tradition, the Christian Church has been identified with Jerusalem as the "Zion of God." "O Zion haste, thy mission high fulfilling," we sing. If we keep that traditional imagery, Isaiah 62:1-5 then may be used as a proclamation to the church, and the central thought of the passage is that the church will be given two new symbolic names: "Hephzibah," meaning "my (that is, God's) delight is in her," and "Beulah" meaning "married" (that is, to the Lord. This is the passage from which we get the phrase "Beulah land").
God will give us new names, but like the peoples in the story of the Tower of Babel, we in the church have always tried to "make a name for ourselves" (Genesis 11:4). To be sure, we call ourselves evangelicals or liberals, Presbyterians or Baptists, Methodists or Episcopalians, and so forth. But beyond that, we have always been concerned with our image. We want our church to be known as a mega-church or as a socially-active denomination in the U.S. And locally, we want others to acknowledge that we are the most successful church in town, or the friendliest. We point to our lively youth groups and our magnificent choirs, to the beauty of our sanctuary or to our historic past. We glorify our programs and our mission budget, all in the effort to show others that our congregation is preeminent and surely the one to which any sensible Christian would want to belong.
If we would identify with the Zion of Isaiah, however, perhaps we should ask ourselves if our names are really "Forsaken" and "Desolate" as the prophet says. Because we have so often tried to glorify ourselves and our own programs rather than God, is our name actually "Forsaken"? Have we forsaken our true mission of glorifying God? Have we loved ourselves more than we have loved God and neighbor? And have we followed our own plans rather than the plans that the Lord has for us?
If that is true, then perhaps are we also "Desolate," as the prophet announces? Do we really have a place in God's ongoing purpose? Is there any lasting, eternal meaning to the programs we are carrying out? Is what we are doing in our congregation designed to further God's plan for all people, to bring in his kingdom on earth even as it is in heaven? Or are we a little group whose work will disappear in the sands of time and finally be insignificant?
These are very hard questions for any congregation to face, but perhaps the Word of the Lord that comes to us this morning from Isaiah is intended to make us face the questions and to evaluate our church's life once again. Whom are we serving in this church, God or ourselves?
Our text from the Third Isaiah (chs. 56-66) is not intended to be an announcement of judgment, however. It is what is known as a "salvation oracle," and the ultimate message that it brings is not bad news but good.
Despite Judah's ongoing sin -- and ours -- despite the church's neglect of the things of God for the service of itself, God nevertheless plans for his people his bright future (note the reference to light in v. 1) and not the dark future that our faithlessness deserves. Always God's mercy breaks into the world to bring the fulfillment of his plan of love.
There will be deliverance and salvation for God's covenant people (v. 1), for Judah and for the church, and our lives will be shaped to be a thing of beauty in the hand of our God (v. 3), which is a beautiful metaphor for the loving care with which God our King will claim us, God will so transform his church that it will be a delight to him (v. 4), a "bride" over which the divine "bridegroom" can rejoice (vv. 4-5). We in our sin cannot transform our own life as a church, but God can and will.
The language of God as the bridegroom and husband of his people is frequent in the scriptures. Already in earlier prophetic writings, Israel was spoken of as the bride of God (Jeremiah 2:2; Ezekiel 16:8; Hosea chs. 2-3). And our Lord took up that language in his teachings to refer to himself as the bridegroom (Mark 2:19-20 and parallels; Matthew 25:1, 5, 6, 10; cf. John 3:29; Ephesians 5:32). Thus, the Apostle Paul's hope for the church is that it will be presented as a pure bride to Christ (2 Corinthians 11:2), and the future vision of Revelation is that in the Kingdom of God, the church will come "down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband" (Revelation 21:2; cf. vv. 9, 17; 19:7), "without spot or wrinkle or any such thing" (Ephesians 5:27), holy and without blemish. In short, God will so work in the life of the church that he will purify us and deliver us from all sinful ways. We are not worthy to enter the Kingdom of Heaven, but in Christ, God will make us new, until we can be the people in whose midst he promises to dwell in delight forever (Revelation 21:3).
The prophet prays for that future salvation in our text. He says that he will never cease praying (v. 1) or give God rest until God "establishes Jerusalem and makes it a praise in the earth" (v. 7). Surely, for the same happy outcome for the church, we should pray also. Indeed, every time we pray the Lord's prayer, we utter that petition: "Thy kingdom come on earth even as it is in heaven." "Lord," we are saying in so many words, "purify thy church. Make us holy and whole, so that we are a delight to you. Transform us by your Spirit to be the church you intended us to be. Prepare us to be your Bride in the new Jerusalem of your kingdom." And perhaps if we earnestly, consistently pray that prayer, and mean it, we will open our lives more and more to God's transformation of us.