Surprised by God?

Second Week of Advent – Tuesday

Isaiah 40:1-11 / Psalm 96:1-2, 3 and 10ac, 11-12, 13 /Matthew 18:12-14

Surprised by God?

Today’s passage from Isaiah contains verses 6-8 which are omitted from the reading on the Second Sunday, so perhaps they deserve special attention.

These verses do not seem cheerful, hopeful, joyful – Advent-like: “All flesh is grass… and all the glory… withers… wilts… So then, the people is grass.”  Where is the good news and glad tidings of verses 9-11? Is Advent about our withering and wilting? Is it about paling in comparison with the constancy of God and God’s eternal word? The contrast is even more sharply drawn if we look back to verse 5: “Then the glory of the Lord shall be revealed” whole human glory withers and wilts at the breath of God.

Are we that fragile? Perhaps. Yet, as St. Therese of Liseuex testified, every flower is accounted for, and not only accounted for, but beheld, known and admired. 

The word of God stands forever. It is inflexible, stubborn, unchanging. How can we understand “forever” in a world where everything is constantly changing due to planned obsolescence? I received a DVD player as a Christmas present one year. With only sparse and gentle use, it ceased functioning before the next Christmas. God’s word is “a bit” more dependable, its richness never exhausted. 

As for the parable of the lost sheep: it sounds tender in our ears, but it would have seemed outlandish to Jesus’ listeners. They all knew that the moment a lone shepherd would leave ninety-nine sheep to seek one stray he’d end up with only one sheep if he managed to find the stray. Yet we presume that Jesus was trying to portray God as reasonable because we know the moral too well. 

The point of parables is to shock the listener into a new truth. God’s love for us is extreme – dependable in a radical way. Where others would consider this shepherd’s actions unreasonable, with God we’ve just come to expect. Are we capable of being surprised by God?

·        What is your opinion? Is God’s love foolish in your eyes? Are you capable of being surprised by God’s love? Or has it become a commonplace, taken-for-granted assumption for you? 

·        What can you do today to demonstrate God’s unreasonable love to someone?