Wash yourselves; make yourselves clean;
     remove the evil of your doings from before my eyes;
cease to do evil,
     learn to do good;
seek justice,
     rescue the oppressed,
defend the orphan,
     plead for the widow.
 
Come now, let us argue it out,
     says the LORD:
though your sins are scarlet,
     they shall be like snow;
though they are red like crimson,
     they shall become like wool.
Isaiah 1:16-18 (NRSV)

In this passage, God extends to us an invitation to engage in honest and forthright debate, unencumbered by the trappings of deceit and fury. God beckons us to emerge from our cloistered hideaways of sin and indifference. This invitation carries with it both the threat of punishment and the promise of renewal. It is an invitation to meet God humbly at the foot of the cross, and to be held accountable to the one suffering there on our behalf. Far from offering a guarantee of our own salvation, these commands point up at the paschal lamb whose death has opened the possibility of new life for all. The directives assume that we have already committed ourselves to repentance, and ask only that we put aside our own pride and serf-serving nature in order to care for those in our midst who do not have the ability, the resources, or the voice to care for themselves.

We are to "seek justice"; although this is not a call to economic equality or a rationing of resources, it is a prohibition of favoritism in legal and economic situations, especially of favoritism that arises as a result of power and influence--even if unintentional or unsolicited. We should "rescue the oppressed"; irrelevant to the prophet is whether this rescue comes at our own expense, financial or bodily. We are instructed to "defend the orphan"--even if this means leaving our positions of relative power and affluence in order to care for the child who has no one to support her. We are directed to "plead for the widow", that is, to take the side of society's most vulnerable people in court cases and in public policy decisions.

Maddeningly, we have been left without specific instructions on how best to participate in these life-giving and dignity-preserving ideals...but we are reminded as people of faith that these are the ideals for which we are to strive in our daily lives and in every political decision we make. Our sins have been washed clean in baptism thanks to the condescension (in the less pejorative meaning of the term, "descend in order to be with") of Jesus Christ to be with us. Let us not continue to do evil by refusing to be with those of lower social stature than ourselves.

Contributed by Jeremy
Sunday September 13, 2009
Liturgical Year B Week 42
Sunday Gospel Readings:
Lectionary 24 (Proper 19)
Fifteenth Sunday after Pentecost