March 5, 2012
Genesis 22: 1-18 + 116 + Romans 8: 31-34 + Mark 9: 2-10
The first reading last weekend that opened the word of God for our Lenten Sundays was the story of Noah. Today the story of Abraham speaks to us, then will come Moses, Cyrus, and finally Jeremiah. Central to our prayerful celebration of Lent is the truth and the reality of Covenant. This holy season begins with the first Covenant and ends with the final Covenant on Holy Thursday. As we work our way toward that Holy Night when the God makes his final covenant with us through the Body and Blood of his Son, we shall remember all the covenants that have taken human kind deeper and deeper into the mystery of God’s love for us. The story of Noah is a story of salvation and recreation. It is the story of life’s triumph over death for the obedient faithful. It is a story full of promise through which God is revealed as a promise maker and promise keeper. Nothing is asked of Noah in that covenant. There are no conditions. It is pure gift. It simply introduces God’s promise, and with rich powerful images that speak to every Christian sensitive to the symbols with which we speak, water covers the earth, sweeps away all that is evil, and creation begins a new with God’s promise that death will never come again.
Today it is the story of a father and a son that reveals to us a God who will provide. It is about way more than Isaac’s death. It is about the death of us all. Abraham is not the first nor the last to be put to test. He is not the first asked for a sacrifice, and neither is Isaac. Each of us is required to make Abraham’s sacrifice. We must all face letting go of our most beloved person, task, accomplishment, possession, or joy. Everything dear to us, everything we love, everything given to us by God is subject to death; it’s own and our own.
The essence of the story is this: “Is God good?” and “Will God Keep the Promises?” It is the question that will rise up in our face every time we are separated from what we love. The death of a spouse, a child, a parent, a brother or sister puts that question right in our faces: “Is God good?” We lose a job, we lose our home, we lose our dignity to old age or some terrible illness that robs us of our independence and freedom, and there is one question: “Is God good?” and “Is God going to keep God’s promises?” A physician says to us: “There is no hope, nothing more to do.” and the question in front of us is: “Is God good.”
Abraham is our “father in faith” because he embodies the final act of faith that all of us must make. We all make sacrifices, and we all stand before the terrible separation from all we hold most dear.
The point of remembering this profound yet simple truth is that our God does the same. “This is my beloved Son.” God says from afar. “The only begotten” one of a kind, is not held back by God. God does not ask what God has not done. God asks for mercy, God give mercy. God asks us to forgive. God forgives. God asks us to sacrifice and serve. God sacrifices and serves. God makes a promise, we make a promise. If God keeps that promise, then we shall keep that promise
Just about ten days ago we marked our faces with ashes that remind us that we are going to die, every single one of us. We are going to be separated from one another and from life itself. The simple message in those ashes is: “Get ready.” We also marked our faces with a cross because by that cross we know we shall live. The simple message of that cross is: “Get worthy of it.” which is exactly what this season of Lent is all about: getting ready to die, and getting ready to live forever.