Fr Peter Helman

“Who is like me?” (Isaiah 44:7)

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Dear beloved of God,

The reading we have this morning in the Daily Office from the prophet Isaiah begins with a question for all time.
“Thus says the Lord, the King of Israel and his Redeemer, the Lord of hosts:
I am the first and the last; besides me there is no God. Who is like me?”
This question rises up in our hearts when we search the horizon of our world, beset as it is by the gods of fear and hopelessness, of violence and greed, of death and indifference. The needy are forgotten. The hope of the poor is taken away. The violent bear it away, as someone once wrote.

We search for signs of God’s power and presence in a world receding from justice and hope. We look to the hills, as the psalmist wrote, and ask “from where is my help to come” (Ps. 121)?

Isaiah beheld the violence and chaos of his day and age, like we do ours, and the word of the Lord came to him, as it has to us. He was to proclaim with boldness the righteous judgement of God and the unquenchable hope of God’s reign. God is in the midst of the world, and God alone saves, therefore do not fear or be afraid. God hears the voice of the oppressed, who cry out for equity and justice. God thwarts the schemes of the wicked and treacherous.

Hope is not an easy thing to proclaim when the day seems far spent and the darkness settles in. But hope is not lost, for deliverance belongs to the Lord, and it will surely come.

We each remember a time when we saw the unmistakable power and presence of God at work in the world, showing the strength of his arm, casting away the works of darkness, putting down the mighty from their seat, filling the hungry with good things, exalting the humble and meek.

We read from the book of the prophet Isaiah this morning as we celebrate the birth of another prophet, Martin King, Jr., through whose word the Lord declared that death holds nothing before the never-failing love of God. Love is stronger than death, and many waters cannot quench hope.

Dr. King gave his life for hope. He shunned the violence of the oppressor but loved them still with the love of Christ, as Christ did for his enemies. He called us to the unceasing work of justice and loving-kindness for the oppressed. He called the oppressor to repentance. With Isaiah, he saw the suffering of the world against an alternative vision where God remains the final power and authority, such that we live and die for the work of undoing death by love.

The truth of Christian faith is that we are made volunteers for sacrifice. We are volunteers for sacrificial love. What do we gain if we lose everything to worship the false gods of violence and indifference? What do we gain if we do not have love?


In Christ,
Fr. Peter