Power to Put it Right

Power to Put it Right

Text:  Isaiah 42:1-9

Two flip charts each with one of these words:  Justice/Power. 

Brainstorm with the congregation what comes to mind when they hear these words.  On the left write positive ideas about justice/power and on the right, negative.  Write down the ideas.

Explore issues of power/justice in the newspaper...

Michael Mosley article (how do we know we will be servants of the LORD’s right ways?)

Salman Tasseer’s stand for what is right resulting in assasination.

Explore the sex gangs and exploitation of young, vulnerable girls

            “It’s a travesty of justice!”  A criminal slips through a legal loophole and gets away scot free.  A judge hands down a sentence that, in legal terms, is ‘just’ but appears to victims and the public as being too light.  There is often indignation that person is sent to prison and released early.  As tragic is a miscarriage of justice when a person is convicted of a crime they did not commit and spends years behind bars.  The litany of wrongs that need to be righted in the justice system is long.  Calls for reform are rarely silent.  Who has the power to put it right?

            The servant of the LORD has a mission to make justice a reality.  Who is the servant?  Christians immediately associate these words of Isaiah with Jesus’ baptism.  Jesus is plunged into the murky waters of the Jordan by his cousin John.  Submerged in darkness Jesus’ breath suspended in momentary death, he is in solidarity with the anguish of the human condition.  The skin of the river burst open as Jesus emerges and gasps for breath, he is in solidarity with us for life.  The heavens are torn.  A voice speaks, “This is my Son, the Beloved, with whom I am well pleased” (Mt. 3:17).  And those who would follow Jesus go down to the river and join in solidarity with Jesus in death and life as the much loved children of God who bring pleasure to him.

            The words we read in Isaiah 42:1-4 is the first of four poems known as ‘Servant Songs’.   Biblical scholars are divided.  Some see the servant as a particular individual whilst others see the servant as the community of Israel.  There is another way of seeing the servant.  Because this is a song – poetic verse – is it not possible that the servant refers to every individual who pursues justice within the community?  The poetic language is fluid and so, depending on how we read it we can identify particular individuals who’ve been pivotal servants of the LORD and at other times see the faithful community as the servant of the LORD.  The strength of this approach is that is does not demand that the identity of the servant to be fixed in stone.

            The LORD describes his servant as the one he supports, chooses, and takes pleasure in.  The servant is given the spirit of the LORD to accomplish his mission of bringing about justice.  The servant isn’t an Atlas carrying the world on her or his shoulders.  The servant works for justice in the strength given by the LORD. 

            This servant embarks on his mission in stark contrast to the accepted norms.  Justice is not enforced through coercion of any kind.  The servant goes about his business quietly.  He is not a loud mouth marching through the streets bellowing over the voices of others.  He does not shout people down. 

            The servant goes about his mission gently.  Such is his tenderness that he will not snap off the reed that is cracked and hanging limp.  The flame spluttering and gasping for life he will not snuff out.  Establishing justice will not be achieved through Holy War but through the healing of brokenness and the nurturing of light (and life). 

        The servant goes about his mission persistently.  He does not give up.  He will not blow out a smouldering flame nor will he burn low and die.  He will not snap off the broken reed nor will he be crushed.  He will pursue God’s just ways until far away coastlands plead for him to come and teach them justice. 

Speaking to his servant in vv. 5-9, the LORD makes plain his being and his relationship to his servant.  The LORD created everything by stretching out the heavens like tent canvas, spreading the earth like a craftsman hammering out a piece of metal and giving breath and spirit to human beings. 

The fabric of the creation is woven together with the threads of justice.  Justice...God’s right ways...come unravelled when those opposed to God’s ways unpick the seams at the edges of society, ignoring the rights of the poor.  The seams of society are frayed and those who are on the margins...those weak because of poverty...those weak because they have no one to look after them – the widow, the orphan and the foreigner...those weak because they cannot access those who have the power to give them justice, they suffer. 

            The servant is the LORD’s child, called to his right ways and taken by the hand and protected.  The LORD’s servant is given as a covenant – an unbreakable promise to all people.  The LORD’s servant is a light to all the nations giving perception to those who are blind, setting prisoners free from dark dungeon cells.  The servant of the LORD will reveal the glory of the LORD and the futility of worshipping idols – all that is not God.  The ‘former things’ – the carving of wood and the crafting of metals to impotent gods is giving way to ‘new things’ – the praise of Him whose name is the LORD.  Giving glory to the LORD and serving his right ways will restore justice to the fabric of creation.

            Will you and I be the Lord’s servants seeking his justice?