Richard Mallory

Presence
by Steve Garnaas-Holmes

It was no messenger or angel
but God’s presence that saved them.
—Isaiah 63.9

An old year has died: 
a death we welcome.
Yet in all calamity, O God, 
you have been with us.
At the grave of the old year
we give our sorrows to you.

At the birth of the new year
our hope is in you:
not that someone will come along,
or that something will happen;
but that you are with us.

Into the uncertainty of what is to come
we walk with the certainty of your grace,
the mystery of your presence.
Trusting, we look to a new year
with hope and joy.

Dear Friends in Christ,

In the context of this “Third Isaiah,” the prophet is raging in frustration with the people of Israel. He projects his anger onto God, but here, clouds break and he pauses and rests in assurance of God’s presence no matter what.

The poet places the prophet’s faith in our context of beginning a new year. Both prophet and poet are charting a new path to follow. It is all about letting go and surrender. But surrender of what? The poet’s name for that to be surrendered is “sorrows.”

These would be disappointments, losses, set backs, deaths of loved ones, and endings of relationships among a host of possibilities.

Now, there is a new future. One for ancient Israel and one for all of us if only we allow it.

The poet centers hope in the Great Mystery, Source, Creator, Mother-Father God, and all those many other names that humans have used for the eternal transcendent Wholly Other.

He is not talking about God but to God: “You are with us.” Sweet relief if we hold onto it. No easy rescues: “…not that someone will come along.”

He closes with the reality that we now enter a time of uncertainty(has life ever  been not uncertain?). In trust is hope and joy. In stillness we carry the promise of Christmas: Emanuel, God With Us.

Yours in Christ,

—Richard