"Do Not Be Afraid -- You are loved" -- God

Isaiah 43:1-7New International Version (NIV)

Israel’s Only Savior

43 But now, this is what the Lord says—
    he who created you, Jacob,
    he who formed you, Israel:
“Do not fear, for I have redeemed you;
    I have summoned you by name; you are mine.
2 When you pass through the waters,
    I will be with you;
and when you pass through the rivers,
    they will not sweep over you.
When you walk through the fire,
    you will not be burned;
    the flames will not set you ablaze.
3 For I am the Lord your God,
    the Holy One of Israel, your Savior;
I give Egypt for your ransom,
    Cush[a] and Seba in your stead.
4 Since you are precious and honored in my sight,
    and because I love you,
I will give people in exchange for you,
    nations in exchange for your life.
5 Do not be afraid, for I am with you;
    I will bring your children from the east
    and gather you from the west.
6 I will say to the north, ‘Give them up!’
    and to the south, ‘Do not hold them back.’
Bring my sons from afar
    and my daughters from the ends of the earth—
7 everyone who is called by my name,
    whom I created for my glory,
    whom I formed and made.”

When I first read these words this week, a calmness and peace came over me.  When we do some research we will find there is good reason for this.  Chapters 40-55 of Isaiah were written while the Israelites were living in exile in Babylon.  They needed to be comforted.  Our scripture for today is actually seen as poetry when read in Hebrew so it is not only the words used but also the tone that offers this comfort and peace.  Today, the lectionary celebrates the baptism of Christ and today we will look at the calming and peaceful effects of Christ’s baptism.

We live in a world that is so easily offended by.... everything.  Some of the political correctness of the world is for the better but some of it is simply not.  When we think back to a “simpler” time, we were probably less offended simply because we were not offered so much information.  The only ways something could offend us was either through the radio, tv, newspaper or the old fashion version of talking to someone face to face.  We still have all of those things but add Facebook, Twitter, Snapchat, email, Youtube and really any number of social/sharing apps.  In 2010, every two days we generated as much data as human history had recorded up until 2003.  But our connectivity to one another means that we know a lot more about one another.  This most likely means we know more things about each other that we do not like.

This evolution of data and statistics is pretty impressive.  The nerd that dwells deep inside me would like to delve into the history of data collection and statistics starting with the Ishango Bone dating back to 18,000 BCE that was found in modern day Uganda.  But I won’t....  I couldn’t find anymore statistics like the one I shared with you dating back to 2010 and the exact data we generate simply because it has become almost too difficult to quantify that information in today’s world.  So, why do I feel like this is important?  Many of us feel like we want to go back.  Many of us feel like we do not enjoy living in today’s world.  Many of us feel like the political correctness of today’s world is too much.  Many of us feel like the political climate we live in is overbearing.  We rarely see compromise out of our elected officials.  Many of us feel like we would like to go back to the “simpler” times.  In other words, we too may feel like we are in exile, that we live in a world that is foreign to us.  Therefore, the comforting words of Isaiah 40-55 still resonate with us today, and more specifically Isaiah 43:1-7.  

“Do not fear, for I have redeemed you.  I have summoned you by name.  You are mine.”  Earlier this week, I had seen reports saying that “do not fear” or some variation of it was in the Bible 365 times.  So I did some looking to find out.  Here is what I found, the phrase “do not fear” is used in its intended context about 80+ times and other word pairings are used another 30+ times.  A far cry from 365.  But one blog post made the comment that once is enough.  I couldn’t agree more.  We often see fear as something that is crippling.  Fear is something that keeps us from moving and sets off a deep rooted terror that makes us weak.  But for every reason we are afraid, there is someone who has shone bravery in that moment.  Whether we need our husband to kill a spider... Or we need our wife to scare away a garter snake.... Or that terrifying video of the Philadelphia police officer who heroically chased down his assailant after being shot three times.  Fear can cripple us but it can also excite bravery and courage.  God does not want to cripple us.  Fear no longer cripples us because of the courage and bravery of Christ.  Our relationship with God should not be used to scare us into “behaving correctly.” Thich nhat Hanh said, “Fear keeps us focused on the past or worried about the future.  If we can acknowledge our fear, we can realize that right now we are ok.  Right now, today, we are still alive and our bodies are working marvelously.  Our eyes can still see the beautiful sky. Our ears can still hear the voices of loved ones.”  If anything, to be “God-fearing” means to be brave and full of courage on God’s behalf and on the behalf of those can not face the fear themselves.

“When you pass through the waters, I will be with you; and when you pass through the rivers, they will not sweep over you.  When you walk through the fire, you will not be burned; the flames will not set you ablaze.”  This phrase is most likely why this scripture was chosen for today’s lectionary as we celebrate the baptism of Christ.  When we pass through the waters of baptism, God is with us.  When we pass through the rivers of life, God will not let them sweep over us.  When we walk through the fires of life, God will not allow them to burn us.

“Since you are precious and honored in my sight, and because I love you.”  What else is there?  What else do we need to know?  God tells us to not be afraid.  He tells us that He loves us.  He has marked us as His own just as He did Christ.  So, where does this leave us?  Where, as Christians, do we go from here?  In a world that is continuously producing exabytes of data.  In case you’re wondering, an exabyte is one billion billion. And projections for 2015 were that we produced about 966 exabytes last year.  With all of this data, we still have a very simple task before us.  To let others know that we care about them and that God loves them.  

The world will be better served by Christians who are not easily offended.  Who stand up for the rights of others.  Who seek justice and truth in all that they do.  The world is a better place when Christians get off of their high horses and start getting their hands dirty.  While it is true that we are supposed to be in the world and not of the world, we need to make sure we do our best to be a part of the solution and not the problem.  We could argue until we're blue in the face about gun rights, the state of the middle class, refugees, immigration, even about college athletics but how many of us are that passionate about our faith?  How many of us are willing to walk through the waters, rivers and fires with God?  With one another? And I don’t mean we do this by reposting stuff to our Facebook timelines.  I mean, how many of us are willing to get to really know one another?  Look at it this way: remember when I said social media apps allow us to get to know one another better and sometimes we find things we do not really like?  Well, like it or not, that is the world we live in today.  Consider it an exile, consider it what you will but we are called to love despite the faults of others.  Do you know the definition of redeemed: to compensate for the faults or bad aspects of something.  That is exactly what God does for us.  He compensates for our faults.  

In perhaps one of the best articles I have read in awhile, a woman named Jamie Bruesehoff wrote about why it is important for children to be in church, why it is important for parents to brave the self-imagined embarrassment of bringing them there, and why it is important that the congregation embrace these families.  There is a lot from the article that I could quote but this is what I want us to hear right now, “It matters that they [children] learn that worship is what we do as a community of faith, that everyone is welcome, that their worship matters. When we teach children that their worship matters, we teach them that they are enough right here and right now as members of the church community. They don't need to wait until they can believe, pray or worship a certain way to be welcome here, and I know adults who are still looking to be shown that.”  In closing, this not only translates to children and young families in church.  This translates into the rest of our lives.  We gather strength from one another.  We compensate for one another’s faults.  We walk through the waters, the rivers and fires with and alongside one another.  “Do not be afraid, for I am with you....”  This is God speaking to us.  This is us speaking to our children, our friends, our neighbors, to our fellow human beings.  This is where we find our peace.  Amen.