The time has come for shouting and not holding back. The prophetic moment has arrived. The Word of God is laser focused on our day in history and upon us who profess to be the people of God. God is calling out a new radicalism (radix = root), rooted in His heartbeat for justice, mercy, and compassion. Those who would follow the prophetic, pastoral, praise/liturgical, and  priestly/gospel word to the church today will be considered a peculiar people.

The Word bears down upon the hearts of the religious, the practitioners of holy days and sacred fasts. It points to the hearts of men and women who are pious, devout, and diligent about sacerdotal duties. It pierces and it indicts.

It raises the question of what sort of fasting and religious exercise pleases God and what sort does not.

God is contemptuous of our religious activity if, while we practice it, we are contemptuous of the poor, the powerless, the disenfranchised, the oppressed, and the broken people of this world. If we practice or benefit from the practice of marginalizing groups of people or individuals, He is not impressed with our most heartfelt cries of devotion or sacrificial acts of self-denial.

God wants to see action and it looks a lot like justice, mercy, and compassion.

The fast He chooses and that which honors Him and pleases Him, is the kind that liberates people. It is the kind of fast that mobilizes His people to make a difference in the world.

He wants us to leave our houses of worship with a renewed commitment to stand with “the least of these,” and to love our neighbors as ourselves. He wants us to walk away from our transcended moments and enter into the pain and suffering of the world. He wants us to walk out of our assemblies to stand by those who stand alone or a targets for insult, persecution, bigotry, or any other form of injustice.

This will convince God that we have truly fasted and truly worshiped.

Here is the PROPHETIC word.

Isaiah 58:1-12
“Shout out, do not hold back! Lift up your voice like a trumpet! Announce to my people their rebellion, to the house of Jacob their sins. Yet day after day they seek me and delight to know my ways, as if they were a nation that practiced righteousness and did not forsake the ordinance of their God; they ask of me righteous judgments, they delight to draw near to God. "Why do we fast, but you do not see? Why humble ourselves, but you do not notice?" Look, you serve your own interest on your fast day, and oppress all your workers. Look, you fast only to quarrel and to fight and to strike with a wicked fist. Such fasting as you do today will not make your voice heard on high. Is such the fast that I choose, a day to humble oneself? Is it to bow down the head like a bulrush, and to lie in sackcloth and ashes? Will you call this a fast, a day acceptable to the LORD? Is not this the fast that I choose: to loose the bonds of injustice, to undo the thongs of the yoke, to let the oppressed go free, and to break every yoke? Is it not to share your bread with the hungry, and bring the homeless poor into your house; when you see the naked, to cover them, and not to hide yourself from your own kin? Then your light shall break forth like the dawn, and your healing shall spring up quickly; your vindicator shall go before you, the glory of the LORD shall be your rear guard. Then you shall call, and the LORD will answer; you shall cry for help, and he will say, Here I am. If you remove the yoke from among you, the pointing of the finger, the speaking of evil, if you offer your food to the hungry and satisfy the needs of the afflicted, then your light shall rise in the darkness and your gloom be like the noonday. The LORD will guide you continually, and satisfy your needs in parched places, and make your bones strong; and you shall be like a watered garden, like a spring of water, whose waters never fail. Your ancient ruins shall be rebuilt; you shall raise up the foundations of many generations; you shall be called the repairer of the breach, the restorer of streets to live in.”

We need repairers of breaches and restorers of streets today.

Who is happy then? Who walks in great joy and fulfillment? It is the person who throws in his or her lot with the poor. The one who freely lends (a Hebrew euphemism for giving it away) is free. The one who is merciful and compassionate enjoys giddy pleasure here and eternal reward beyond this place. Light shines in the darkness for them. They irritate the wicked masses who grind their teeth in anger and malign them for their intentions and their deeds, but God honors them and they stand fast forever.

Here is the PRAISE/LITURGICAL word.

Psalm 112:1-10
1 Hallelujah! Happy are they who fear the Lord *
and have great delight in his commandments!
2 Their descendants will be mighty in the land; *
the generation of the upright will be blessed.
3 Wealth and riches will be in their house, *
and their righteousness will last for ever.
4 Light shines in the darkness for the upright; *
the righteous are merciful and full of compassion.
5 It is good for them to be generous in lending *
and to manage their affairs with justice.
6 For they will never be shaken; *
the righteous will be kept in everlasting remembrance.
7 They will not be afraid of any evil rumors; *
their heart is right; they put their trust in the Lord.
8 Their heart is established and will not shrink, *
until they see their desire upon their enemies.
9 They have given freely to the poor, *
and their righteousness stands fast for ever; they will hold up their head with honor.
10 The wicked will see it and be angry; they will gnash their teeth and pine away; *
the desires of the wicked will perish.

Happy people are people who have encountered the living God and it has radicalized their understanding of the world and revolutionized how they treat people.

How then, does one proclaim the mystery of God? How does one find the words or conceptual ideas to express that which is known only through a curtain of wonder?

If our words were loftier and our intellects keener, would we be able to wrap our minds around the vastness of God? Would clever speech assist us in expressing the inexpressible?

No. Eye has not seen. Ear has not heard. The heart has not absorbed it all. More is unknown that known. It is deep. It is wide. It is profound. It is mysterious.

Yet. It is simple and it is knowable in Christ, whose mind we have been given through the Spirit.

We are invited to enter into His presence, not to be made smarter or more intellectual in our understanding of God, but to experience God. We are not elevated by the same criteria as the powers of this age. Just as our wealth and privilege do not impress God, neither do our erudite ideas nor eloquent speech. In the same way that God honors the poor and those who honor the poor, He elevates those who humbly enter into His presence through the simplicity and nakedness of prayer with more question marks than exclamation marks.

The Mind of Christ!

Here is the PASTORAL word.

1 Corinthians 2:1-16
“When I came to you, brothers and sisters, I did not come proclaiming the mystery of God to you in lofty words or wisdom. For I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ, and him crucified. And I came to you in weakness and in fear and in much trembling. My speech and my proclamation were not with plausible words of wisdom, but with a demonstration of the Spirit and of power, so that your faith might rest not on human wisdom but on the power of God. Yet among the mature we do speak wisdom, though it is not a wisdom of this age or of the rulers of this age, who are doomed to perish. But we speak God's wisdom, secret and hidden, which God decreed before the ages for our glory. None of the rulers of this age understood this; for if they had, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory. But, as it is written, "What no eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor the human heart conceived, what God has prepared for those who love him"– these things God has revealed to us through the Spirit; for the Spirit searches everything, even the depths of God. For what human being knows what is truly human except the human spirit that is within? So also no one comprehends what is truly God's except the Spirit of God. Now we have received not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit that is from God, so that we may understand the gifts bestowed on us by God. And we speak of these things in words not taught by human wisdom but taught by the Spirit, interpreting spiritual things to those who are spiritual. Those who are unspiritual do not receive the gifts of God's Spirit, for they are foolishness to them, and they are unable to understand them because they are spiritually discerned. Those who are spiritual discern all things, and they are themselves subject to no one else's scrutiny. "For who has known the mind of the Lord so as to instruct him?" But we have the mind of Christ.”

Speaking of the Mind of Christ, He did speak His mind.  The words of Jesus are uncomfortable for us to hear. They challenge our assumptions and rock our views of the world.

He wants us salty and bright.

He does not lower standards for us as He interprets the law and its intent in light of His presence and Kingdom call. To the contrary, He raises the bar. He demands total allegiance and radical re-identification of His followers as citizens of a new governing authority.

Identification and orientation are turned inside out, and upside down, spun around, and resettled as something that resembles nothing the world has ever seen, a truly salty torch of light in a dark and flavorless world.

Jesus redefines life, religion, society, and everything else and takes us on the wildest right of our lives into the adventure of genuine discipleship. He invites us to dance and He leads.

It is life changing and world changing and it is the only reality, once we are in it, that makes any sense at all.

Here is the PRIESTLY/GOSPEL word.

Matthew 5:13-20
"You are the salt of the earth; but if salt has lost its taste, how can its saltiness be restored? It is no longer good for anything, but is thrown out and trampled under foot. "You are the light of the world. A city built on a hill cannot be hid. No one after lighting a lamp puts it under the bushel basket, but on the lampstand, and it gives light to all in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father in heaven. "Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets; I have come not to abolish but to fulfill. For truly I tell you, until heaven and earth pass away, not one letter, not one stroke of a letter, will pass from the law until all is accomplished. Therefore, whoever breaks one of the least of these commandments, and teaches others to do the same, will be called least in the kingdom of heaven; but whoever does them and teaches them will be called great in the kingdom of heaven. For I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.”

So then, by grace and through faith, with a new commitment to give all, we embark today, on the next leg of our journey, knowing we shall fail again and again. But we also know that with each failure, we have a new opportunity to be renewed, forgiven, and recommissioned to God's kingdom mission. No one has this perfected but the One who leads us and invites us, but we can begin and then, begin again.

New Revised Standard Version Bible, copyright 1989, Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved. The New Revised Standard Version Bible may be quoted and/or reprinted up to and inclusive of five hundred (500) verses without express written permission of the publisher, provided the verses quoted do not amount to a complete book of the Bible or account for fifty percent (50%) of the total work in which they are quoted.