A
Meditation on Isaiah 6:1-8
1.
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| Hall of Remembrance |
The memorial itself is a stunning complex of buildings, libraries, plazas and sculpture: and it tells a story that continues to this day, a story that lingers still in the DNA of churches, synagogues and countries around the world. At least, it seems that way to me.
I remember standing that day in the strangely lit Hall of Remembrance, a sad and powerful place illuminated by a single and eternal flame. And I remember looking out over the names of European concentration camps engraved in stone on the floor, places like Dachau and Auschwitz and Buchenwald. I felt a disorienting presence in the hall that day, an awareness of evil, larger than any evil I’d allowed myself to believe possible in the world I love. Dachau and Auschwitz and Buchenwald. Their names alone make me nauseous and angry and embarrassed.
The corridors of the memorial at Yad Vashem tell the chilling and awful story of anti-Semitism: its birth in the thinking of ancient Christian thinkers and its slow and gruesome evolution over centuries. And while there were brave Christians in the 30s and 40s, Christians who stood up to Nazi ideology and bravely defied genocide and war, more often than not the church silenced dissent in those years and publically blessed bigotry and mayhem. How do you make sense of that as a Christian? How does it not rattle your confidence, your faith in the Christian project itself?
2.
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| Palestinian Dancers |
The group we bless this morning travels together with questions like these: not expecting easy answers or any answers at all really. It’s a remarkably brave and thoughtful delegation, committed to humility and one another. And we travel together to share the questions themselves, to puzzle over the immensity of it all, and to create a community of compassion devoted to courage and honesty and peace. There will be tears: at Yad Vashem for sure, and standing before the awful concrete wall separating Israel from the occupied West Bank, and meeting Palestinian fathers and Israeli mothers who’ve lost children to the wretchedness of war. And we will honor those tears and listen for the voice of God in those tears and pray through those tears for peace.
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| Call of Isaiah |
The occasion of all this is some
kind of religious festival, a great gathering at the temple Isaiah attends in
his official capacity as prophet and seer.
It may even be an annual New Year’s Celebration in which the One God of
Israel is enthroned every year as the true King, the only King, the great King
of heaven and earth. And something about
that enthronement, something about God’s mysterious creativity and unreachable
holiness gets to Isaiah that day. And he
sees God sitting on the high throne, and he sees the smoky presence of the
divine being filling the temple and everything around it. And he hears heavenly beings chanting an
ecstatic refrain: “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts; / the whole earth is
full of his glory!” So it’s not only
that Isaiah is struck by his own weakness, by his own fragile heart and unclean
lips. He’s also blasted, in this moment,
by the wonder, the immensity, the wildly unpredictable oneness of God. This is Isaiah in the temple. This is Isaiah at Yosemite. This is Isaiah watching the sun set on a
perfect Santa Cruz evening. The great 20th
century Rabbi, Abraham Joshua Heschel once said: “Wonder rather than doubt is
the root of all knowledge.” And wonder
humbles Isaiah. Wonder sets him free.
So he says, “I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips; YET my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts.” And it’s that YET, the one little YET, I want us to turn to and celebrate and honor together this morning. We are tiny creatures in a world with huge problems; and YET we see God working in the lives of ordinary people, and we see that we are called to action too. We are fragile and broken people in a world of intractable conflict and violence; and YET we see God reaching out for new partners and taking our hands in hope and solidarity. We are so easily distressed by life and by a thousand different anxieties; and YET we are capable of wonder and awe, inspired by humpback whales in the bay and tiny hummingbirds flitting among the roses. We are a people of unclean lips; and YET we can sing and we can praise and we can forgive and we can speak peace to one another in ways that change history and transform cities and generations.
So he says, “I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips; YET my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts.” And it’s that YET, the one little YET, I want us to turn to and celebrate and honor together this morning. We are tiny creatures in a world with huge problems; and YET we see God working in the lives of ordinary people, and we see that we are called to action too. We are fragile and broken people in a world of intractable conflict and violence; and YET we see God reaching out for new partners and taking our hands in hope and solidarity. We are so easily distressed by life and by a thousand different anxieties; and YET we are capable of wonder and awe, inspired by humpback whales in the bay and tiny hummingbirds flitting among the roses. We are a people of unclean lips; and YET we can sing and we can praise and we can forgive and we can speak peace to one another in ways that change history and transform cities and generations.
See what I mean about the YET: it’s
everything here. It’s everything to
Isaiah. And it’s everything to us. “I am a man of unclean lips,” cries the
prophet, “and I live among a people of unclean lips; YET my eyes have seen the
King, the Lord of hosts.” The
unpredictable oneness of God speaks to us.
The mystery of the great “I AM” calls out for us. The immensity of God in the temple meets us
and touches us and says: “Who will go for us?”
3.
Stretching across those 44 acres at Yad Vashem is a walkway they call the Avenue of the Righteous Among the Nations. It’s a simple walkway, with well-kept trees and lively native plants and flowers. And each tree along the way is marked with a plaque honoring a Gentile, a non-Jew, who risked life and reputation to save Jews during the awful years of the European Holocaust. There’s nothing flashy about the Avenue of the Righteous—and it’s a small part of the much larger memorial. But it reminds me nonetheless of the prophetic call, and the daring and faithful souls who’ve responded through the years. “Who will go for us?” asks the Holy One. “Send me!” they say. “Send me!”
Among the names on the Avenue are André and Magda Trocmé, and their little church in Le Chambon, France. Beginning in 1942, Pastor Trocmé and his Huguenot congregation created small “safe houses” in their village and hid Jewish families in their homes. When Nazi patrols came looking, these same Jewish families were shuttled out to nearby fields and hidden away in nearby forests. Shortly after the war, a church member recalled that as soon as the soldiers left, Christians would go into the forest and sing a song. When the Jews heard that song, they knew it was safe to come home.”
Stretching across those 44 acres at Yad Vashem is a walkway they call the Avenue of the Righteous Among the Nations. It’s a simple walkway, with well-kept trees and lively native plants and flowers. And each tree along the way is marked with a plaque honoring a Gentile, a non-Jew, who risked life and reputation to save Jews during the awful years of the European Holocaust. There’s nothing flashy about the Avenue of the Righteous—and it’s a small part of the much larger memorial. But it reminds me nonetheless of the prophetic call, and the daring and faithful souls who’ve responded through the years. “Who will go for us?” asks the Holy One. “Send me!” they say. “Send me!”
Among the names on the Avenue are André and Magda Trocmé, and their little church in Le Chambon, France. Beginning in 1942, Pastor Trocmé and his Huguenot congregation created small “safe houses” in their village and hid Jewish families in their homes. When Nazi patrols came looking, these same Jewish families were shuttled out to nearby fields and hidden away in nearby forests. Shortly after the war, a church member recalled that as soon as the soldiers left, Christians would go into the forest and sing a song. When the Jews heard that song, they knew it was safe to come home.”
André
Trocmé knew he was but one man, in one church,
in a colossal crisis. He knew he was a
broken man in a broken world. And yet,
faith insisted on his participation in a movement for peace and people. God reached out for partners and lovers and
friends. “Look hard,” he used to say to
his congregation, “for ways to make little moves against destructiveness.” Look hard for ways to make little moves
against destructiveness. So the people
of Le Chambon secured forged identification cards for Jewish guests and then
helped many access a kind of ‘underground railroad’ to cross the border to
safety in Switzerland. Historians
estimate that three to five thousand Jews were hidden in this way, by the
people and churches of South Central France.
In January 1971, Yad Vashem recognized André and Magda Trocmé as “Righteous Among the Nations.” Later this month, we’ll find a tree on the Avenue there and their names on the plaque just below. It’s devastating really how few of these souls there were during the Holocaust, how few Christians heard the voice of compassion and risked something to act in love. But the Trocmés and the Bonhoeffers and the others are there at Yad Vashem—to remind us that God never stops calling and that it’s in our DNA, it’s in our bones, it’s in our hearts to respond.
In January 1971, Yad Vashem recognized André and Magda Trocmé as “Righteous Among the Nations.” Later this month, we’ll find a tree on the Avenue there and their names on the plaque just below. It’s devastating really how few of these souls there were during the Holocaust, how few Christians heard the voice of compassion and risked something to act in love. But the Trocmés and the Bonhoeffers and the others are there at Yad Vashem—to remind us that God never stops calling and that it’s in our DNA, it’s in our bones, it’s in our hearts to respond.
We are, many of us, maybe all of us, overwhelmed by the enormity of the world’s pain. This summer’s war in Gaza has reminded us of the stubborn, intractable conflict still ripping at the heart of the Holy Land itself. In parts of Europe and parts of our own country, anti-Semitism is rearing its ugly head and breathing bigotry and danger again. There’s ISIS in Iraq and Syria and Ebola in West Africa and too much violence on American TVs and in American schools. It’s tempting to claim impotence and throw our hands up and give in. Sometimes it’s even reasonable.
But we are Isaiah’s sisters, Isaiah’s brothers, Isaiah’s synagogue, Isaiah’s church. And we stand in the stream of saints like André and Magda Trocmé, Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel, Pastor Dietrich Bonhoefer, Rosa Parks and Martin Luther King. They believed that as awful and as colossal and as devastating as evil can be: God is just as grand, love is just as powerful, and faith can heal the world. They believed that Isaiah’s call, Isaiah’s faith is our faith too. And we can hear in the wind, and through our tears, that call to compassion and courage and truth-telling. Our broken hearts can speak light to darkness. Now as then.
“Who will go for us?”
asks the Spirit. “Who will go for us?”
asks the God of the poor and the young.
“Who will go for us?” asks the occupied Palestinian and the terrorized Israeli
and the frightened American.
And we say, with Isaiah
and all the others, “Here am I; send me!”
We say, together in faith, “Here am I; send me.”
Amen!
