Think that you might be wrong: On listening and healing

Isaiah 6:1-13

“The holy seed is its stump.” Nobody knows what that last verse of Isaiah 6 means. Nobody. The commentaries, the online lectionary aides, Bible inserts and footnotes. Everybody says the same thing, “Meaning uncertain.” I mean, people have guesses. Of course people have guesses, but this is one of those phrases that just doesn’t seem to translate and, since ancient Hebrew is a dead language apart from what we have written of it, this is one of those meanings lost to history.

Of course, it should surprise none of you that I love this, because it’s deep and confusing and mysterious. I love that there are words and phrases that remain uncertain. I love that even the most legalistic Bible-reader cannot say for certain what everything means. I love this because it seems holy to me to have an ounce of humility about our faith. Jesus did say, “Blessed are the humble.”

I also love that this verse sits here at the end of chapter 6 when Isaiah’s message is about listening but not comprehending, looking but not understanding. The poetry here is beautiful—not only will you listen but not comprehend, you’ll do so right now. “The holy seed is its stump.” What on earth does that mean?

There’s also a part of me that must confess that I like that God tells people they won’t understand. I find people who are sure they know everything boring. Don’t you? Why would I have a discussion with you? You already know everything! I much prefer people who are always in wonder. They feel more honest to me, anyway. They also seem less fearful, less defensive. Those who have it all figured out feel dull, and I wonder if they aren’t already under the condemnation Isaiah speaks. I mean, how truly sad to live a life unwilling to listen and learn! It feels like its own punishment. That’s the first punishment God lays upon his people who have gone astray: He makes their minds dull; he stops them from using their senses—their eyes and ears. They don’t experience the wonder of God’s majesty, because they close their eyes and shut their ears.

Jesus quotes this passage in the Gospels. In fact, we read it at our Men’s Bible study on Tuesday morning, which was a complete coincidence and/or God-thing. Jesus was telling the disciples that the purpose of the parables is this: “That they may listen but never understand, look but not perceive” (Mt 13:14). Jesus revels in the mysteries of God’s kingdom. When people come to him and ask, “What is the kingdom like?” He responds, “The kingdom of God is like a mustard seed.” This is not clarity; it’s mysterious. It’s the kind of thing that takes reflection. It’s gray; not black or white.

We need more reflection in our lives, fewer knee-jerk reactions. We need to be people who listen and see. You notice that Isaiah didn’t say that the people wouldn’t be able to speak. They could still talk just fine; they just never listened and didn’t open their eyes.

You just can’t hear God if you’re always talking.

I had a Religion professor at Augustana by the name of Murray Haar. Dr. Haar grew up Jewish in New York, went to school at Concordia and became Lutheran, went to seminary and became a pastor, and, then after some time, left the ministry and went back to Judaism. He might be the religious poster-child for changing his mind. So, it’s maybe not surprising that the mantra he told all his students was: “Think that you might be wrong.” Keep using your eyes and your ears. Don’t shut them up and assume you have things figured out, because that’s right when you lose it. When that happens you will miss what God is doing in a place you assumed was godless.

Open your eyes, listen with your ears. But, more specifically, listen to voices you don’t understand. Isaiah is dismissed by his people because he brought them a message they didn’t like. He didn’t tell them what they wanted to hear. He didn’t say they would be prosperous and everything was going to be fine and dandy. It wasn’t. Things weren’t going to be fine, but that wasn’t really the problem. The problem was that the people weren’t willing to hear it. Prophets are like this. Jesus said that no prophet was welcomed in his hometown (Lk 4:24).

We need to be willing to listen to voices we don’t understand. Isaiah says that listening is the path to healing, and whenever the Bible talks about healing there are echoes of that great healing we know as “salvation.”

In the Bible, the problem is typically that people who have power forget about where that power comes from and they stop listening for God’s voice in their lives. All of us have some power and the question is not whether we will use our voice but whether we will listen first to those who are powerless. Listening requires giving up a little of our voice for those who have less.

Are we willing to listen to one another?

It’s easy to get angry and frustrated. It’s easy to turn to those we know will agree with us and gossip instead. Isaiah says our ears will be blocked, after all. It’s harder still when you feel like you’re not being heard in the first place. It’s incredibly difficult when you feel ignored or rejected to listen to others. We all hold so tight to the influence we have, the power we have, and every day and week and month, if we’re not careful, our grip gets tighter and tighter and tighter. The only solution, the only way forward, is to all let go. To see each other as the children of God we were created to be.

We have a lot of work to do. A lot of work to do. We have a lot of people who feel unheard. Neither the church nor the principalities and powers of this world seem to be listening to them. Some of these might be our Isaiahs, our John the Baptists, our voices crying out to prepare the way. We have to listen to one another, because we are made in the image of God. We are members of the same Christian body. All of us are in this together. Everybody. The one who feels rejected and the one who is rejected. The perpetrators and the victims. All of us.

            Ultimately, Isaiah’s words are a promise for judgment that brings us to the very precipice of despair before that final word, that final hopeful-sounding declaration that we can’t yet understand. Out of the darkness shines a light that we can’t see right now, blocked as we are by our closed eyes.

            Faith is opening our eyes. It’s an assurance that there is nothing I can see or hear that will change God’s love for me, but there are plenty of things to see and hear from others who are hurting that will change my heart for the better. We need faith that is active in love today more than ever. The church needs to listen for every voice, to love one another better, not only so that we can hear the judgment of one like Isaiah, but so that we need not get to the point of needing judgment at all. We need to hear the voices of the oppressed, the downtrodden, the rejected, the “other”—fill in the blank. We need to listen, to see, and to be open to change ourselves for the sake of others. We need our faith to mean something.

            I’m exhausted. Maybe some of you are, too. There are people here who are relieved and hopeful by the results of the election, and people who are worried and frightened. I know because I talked to both this week. I talked to people who were crying over it and people who wore giant grins when talking about it. And you’re sitting next to one another out there. You need to know that first. Then, you need to start listening to one another better, because whatever happens in the days ahead depends on you. This body is divided by a great many things. The goal of the church is not to be homogenous, but the promise we have in Christ Jesus is that in the kingdom of God there will be no such divisions. We will be of one mind in Christ Jesus (Phil 2:2). We are all saved in the same way; we all have the same resurrection-promise; but down here we are separated, we are distinct, we are even divided within ourselves. Isaiah reminds us that all this is temporary. Our destiny is not in this place. But in the meantime there is a way to live and a way not to live. Open your eyes, open your ears. Listen to one another. That’s the path to healing.