For the rest of the week, I would like to look at one of the readings from the Hebrew Bible set for Sunday, a beautiful prophecy in Isaiah, in which God announces: “For I am about to create new heavens and a new earth.”
I spent yesterday on Capitol Hill, lobbying for passage of background check laws to reduce gun violence. And I thought, as I walked the halls and corridors of Congress, rushing from House to Senate office buildings and back, that most of the people who choose the political life do so because they want to participate in remaking the earth. Very few get rich doing it, and the stresses are unbelievable. You have to have a desire somewhere to help make life better, for at least some of the people some of the time.
This passage is a timely one for me, given what I’ve been doing this week at the Brady conference. Background checks work. It’s been proven – as it has been that the 40% of purchases that manage to sidestep background checks result in gun violence that makes us all less secure.This passage gives voice to the yearning for peace and security which should be the birthright of every man, woman and child – and animal – on this planet. It articulates beautifully the hope of a restored creation living in harmony:
I will rejoice in Jerusalem, and delight in my people; no more shall the sound of weeping be heard in it, or the cry of distress. No more shall there be in it an infant that lives but a few days, or an old person who does not live out a lifetime…
Reading that, I can’t help but think of the men and women I met this week who lost little children and spouses, brothers and uncles to gun violence. I think of the residents of Newtown facing the first anniversary of the loss of so many children; of people in Bridgeport and Chicago mourning their dead – the sound of weeping never quite dies away.
I think of the promise of security and work and rest envisioned in this prophecy:
They shall build houses and inhabit them; they shall plant vineyards and eat their fruit. They shall not build and another inhabit; they shall not plant and another eat…
This is true peace, when each person can live in safety in their own home, bringing up their children to thrive in trust. This is the world God says he is bringing into being. This is the promise we are invited to participate in making real.
What do you long for when you think of God making a new heavens and a new earth?
What aspect of life in this world do you feel called to help renew? Where do you want to put your energies? Start by praying about that area, and imagining yourself making a difference, in the power of the Spirit.
What do you see yourself doing or saying? Keep inviting God into it.
I know I will keep working and praying for peace on our streets.
“They shall not hurt or destroy on all my holy mountain, says the LORD.”
I believe in the power of love to transform and convert the most evil heart. I have to, despite evidence to the contrary. The evidence is not more powerful than the power and the promise of God. God is creating the new heavens and the new earth – and we are here at the beginning. Every day.
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