Rector’s Reflections
Tuesday 3rd December 2024
Keeping Advent with the Prophet Isaiah
In yesterday’s reflections, I shared some thoughts on how it can sometimes be hard for us to place our future in God’s hands. We like to make our own plans, and think that by doing so we will be in control of our future. Just like King Ahaz, back in the 8th century BCE. King Ahaz had already made his mind up in relation to a crucial matter of foreign policy, and he wasn’t prepared to be open to the possibility that God wanted him to consider another option. Why was Ahaz unprepared to change his mind? It might have been a question of pride: Ahaz might have considered that his judgment was always correct, and so he didn’t need to consider the possibility that he might in fact be in the wrong. But it might also have been a matter of fear. Perhaps Ahaz was frightened at what people would think if he changed his mind. Perhaps he was frightened of God, and what God might wish to say to him.
There is much in the Book of the Prophet Isaiah which touches on the topic of fear. When we read this book, we are reminded of how large a role fear plays in most of our lives. Isaiah has plenty to say on the topic of fear, and I will limit myself to three of his insights.
To start with, Isaiah is telling us that a healthy and life giving spirituality needs to face the whole range of emotions in our lives. It is not enough simply to rejoice in the joy and happiness which comes from knowing the reality of God’s love for us and our world. It is not enough to be able to look into the future with the eyes of hope, confident that the future is full of the riches of God’s blessing. We also need to face the fact that we have our worries and fears, too. Yes, we see the light of God’s love shining in the darkness. But there is still the darkness of fear and worry, and sometimes the light from the candle of hope seems so small and so fragile.
Good religion needs to help us to face the darkness in our own hearts and the darkness in our world. It also needs to help us to live with the darkness, and even to overcome it. If religion focusses its attention solely on all that is joyful and wonderful, it will leave us enslaved to our fears- and then the chances are that it will be our fears that will drive the direction of our lives and the choices we take. We might not like the fact that sometimes we are afraid, and that at times our fears might not appear to be entirely rational. We might not like the fact that at times we might be afraid of God, despite all the talk about how much He loves us and cares for us. But the ability to feel fear is very much part of what it means to be a human being.
Isaiah would go on to say that our fears can be divided into two categories: good fear and bad fear. “Good fear” can be a great benefit to us, in that it warns us against taking courses of action which are not in our best interest. To take an example: we might be fearful that if we were to drive our car along country roads at 100 miles an hour, we might have a bad accident. This would be a “good” fear in that the feeling of fear helps to preserve our life and the lives of other road users. “Good fear” can be embedded in a relationship of love, and it can be an expression of that love. Hence for Isaiah, it is no bad thing for us to have a “good fear” of God Himself. God is after all the Creator of all that exists, the Almighty One, Omniscient, Perfect and All-loving. His nature is completely different from our own nature as human beings. It is only natural for us to feel a sense of fear when we draw near to such a Being as the Creator of the Universe.
But Isaiah would go on to say that being honest about our fears is not enough. We need to be freed from the chains of our fears. And the good news is that this is precisely what God has done for us, and so our task as human beings is to recognise the reality of this freedom. We are to live as men and women who have been freed from the bondage of fear, so that we may enjoy a life of freedom, a life which is life in all its fulness.
Let me finish with the following words from Isaiah: “ ..Now says the Lord, he who created you, O Jacob, he who formed you, O Israel: Do not fear, for I have redeemed you; I have called you by name, you are mine. When you pass through the waters, I will be with you; and through the rivers, they shall not overwhelm you; when you walk through fire you shall not be burned, and the flame shall not consume, for I am the Lord your God, the Holy One of Israel, your Saviour…You are precious in my sight, and honoured, and I love you… Do not fear, for I am with you…” [Isaiah 43, verses 1-5]
I wonder: how might God be wanting to free us from our fears this Advent?