August 14, 2005 Des Moines

TEXT: Isaiah 56:1-8

Setting More Places

Way, way back in 1972, one of the so-called “Texas Outlaw” singers named Kris Kristofferson released a kind of musical social commentary titled Jesus Was a Capricorn that called attention to a particular human characteristic.

’cause everybody’s gotta have somebody to look down on
Who they can feel better than at any time they please
Someone doin’ somethin’ dirty decent folks can frown on
If you can’t find nobody else, then help yourself to me

While not, perhaps, the finest piece of musical or lyrical composition, Kristofferson’s insight into the human condition is telling, sobering, and if the scripture reading is any indication, historically consistent through the generations. Everybody’s gotta have somebody to look down on. Even, as it turns out, those who themselves have experienced some of the most conspicuous exclusion. They, too, often turn around and practice some of the most strident exclusivity shutting out others.

The Hebrews, for example, knew what it was like to be castaways. Abram, who drifted without a home; Joseph thrown into the pit and sold into slavery by his brothers; Moses in the bulrushes as an infant or fleeing for his life as a young man. For those listening to Isaiah offer his “word of the Lord,” life as an exile and outcast was a chronic mindset. The smell of it would have choked Jerusalem like the rendering plant chokes Des Moines on a southeast wind .

And so when the Israelites began to return from foreign exile, began to rebuild their city and homes and reestablish their culture, the question very shortly arose, “What kind of people will we be?” For some, the most important consideration was purity – boiling away the contaminating practices and foreign elements that had managed to dilute and distort their distinctive character. This point of view was advocated by the likes of Ezra and Nehemiah whom you can read about in the biblical books that bear their names. As priest and governor, they insisted on strict adherence to the law, ethnic cleansing that may have stopped short of genocide but included casting aside foreign wives and any children they had borne.

But there were other voices. Someone, for example, began to retell the story of Ruth, just such a foreign wife from generations earlier, whose descendant had been none other than the legendary King David. And then there was Isaiah. Scholars aren’t at all sure to whom this prophetic voice belonged. They are quite sure he wasn’t the same Isaiah who stands behind the first third of this Old Testament book, and the consensus has built over the years that he is still separate from the voice in the center section of this book. If “First Isaiah” cautioned Israel about the kind of lifestyle that would lead to destruction at the hands of a conquering enemy, and if “Second Isaiah” tried to comfort the exiles and instill hope once his predecessor’s prophecies proved true, then this “Third Isaiah” sought to shape the minds and hearts of those recreating the nation and integrity of Israel after the Babylonian captivity came to an end.

This rebuilding was fraught with challenges. There were construction projects both large and small – homes, public buildings, fortifications, and at the center of it all, the Temple. There was basic infrastructure to recreate. But there was social capital to reestablish as well. You see, not everyone had been taken away. Some had remained in Israel, who were now challenged by the reentry of exiles coming home. There was jealousy between those who had stayed behind and those who were returning – power plays, distrust, competing values, and the fact that lives had gone their separate ways. And underneath it all, this persistent, nagging question: who are we going to be? What kind of people are we shaping together?

So what, according to Isaiah, is God’s message to these outcasts? By what values and principles were they to be guided? “Don’t look at the box,” Isaiah counseled them, “look at the contents inside.”

By way of example, he lifts up two kinds of people ripe for exclusion, and makes room for them at the table. Eunuchs and Foreigners. The latter we understand pretty well – people we might look at and safely speculate, “You’re not from around here, are you.” If purifying the gene pool is important, then it almost goes without saying that you don’t want a bunch of foreigners discoloring the water. The former group we probably don’t want to spend a lot of time explaining in the midst of a family hour. Suffice it to say that eunuchs were men who had been physically altered – most commonly to make themselves employable in imperial circles. For both physical reasons, then, and for political ones, eunuchs had been excluded from polite and religiously observant company. So when Isaiah proclaims that God will…

give them an everlasting name

that shall not be cut off

…the pun is absolutely intended.

What is important, Isaiah contends, is religious fidelity, not external category. The issue is not one’s ethnic origin nor one’s physical capabilities; the important thing is one’s faithfulness: do you keep the Sabbath, do you make choices that please God, do you keep the covenant; do you maintain justice and do what is right? These are the relevant questions for holy community; not one’s body, not one’s sexual or political orientation; not one’s place of birth. What interests me, God says – and what ought to interest you – is the orientation of one’s heart.

So what kind of community are we in the process of building? Who are we inviting to the table, and does Isaiah compel us to set a few more places? It’s not as simple or as obvious as it might begin to sound.

There has been a battle brewing this year in Charlotte, North Carolina around the school system. Some residents of the northern suburbs of the city want to secede from the county wide school district and create their own. The issues are no doubt many, but the core of them are familiar: some parents feel like the current system disadvantages their kids – drags them down, in fact, with the weight of lesser intellects and roudier behaviors. Socio-economics seems to be playing a part in the battles – read that as money and race.

Apparently the rhetoric has gotten as roudy as the classrooms. In response to the controversy, the pastor of a prominent Methodist church in Charlotte wrote an opinion piece for the Charlotte Observer that, in part, says this:

When I listen to talk of “secession” in Mecklenburg County, I realize that we have already been seceding from one another informally for quite a long time. We’ve clustered ourselves in parts of town with people just like us, ensconced our kids in private schools, moved to gated communities or fled to the exurbs where our kids grow up, learn and play with people just like us.

All of this seems self-evidently good, and to question it I risk drawing the ire of parents who love their children and want only the best for them. Sometimes, though, I worry that we love our children too much. We dote on our children, give them everything and shelter them from all discomforts. For my little princess, everything must be perfect; she must have the best teacher in the best school and if difficulties arise, we flee to a better place.

But does this help or harm my child? As a parent, is my objective to churn out kids with the highest possible test scores and class rank, so they can get into the best school and make the highest possible salary, or do I want my children to become good and wise, citizens who care about the public good Am I not supposed to be building within my child character, community-mindedness and compassion? Do we get there by forever holding up mirrors to our children, surrounding them with people just like us? Or is virtue won when we are stretched by the one who is different and by circumstances that are not smooth and perfect for me.

I have a novel, radical suggestion, requiring no legislation or budget. We have tried busing and neighborhood formulas, but we have never tried loving each other. We can integrate or resegregate, but we do not love each other. We do not even know each other, so how could we possibly love each other.

One year ago at the YMCA Prayer Breakfast, I reminded good Christians that Jesus said, “When you have a dinner, do not invite those who can invite you back, but invite the poor, maimed, lame and blind.” I suggested that if a decent percentage of Christians in Charlotte got serious about doing what Jesus said, this city would be transformed.

Jurgen Moltmann wrote that “the opposite of poverty is not property, but the opposite of both is community.” (James C. Howell, “Instead of Seceding, Try this Radical Idea: Love” in The Charlotte Observer March 7, 2005).

A radical idea – in Israel, in Charlotte, and yes, even Des Moines: Community – the opposite of both poverty and property; community as the very table of God; where we expend less energy finding someone to look down on, and more energy seeking the kind of happiness that comes from maintaining justice, doing what is right, keeping the Sabbath, abstaining from evil, finding joy in the company of God and each other, and building with God a house of prayer for all peoples.

Might it be so in this house of prayer that we continue to build – and in the community beyond that our fellowship has ability to shape.