Friday • 12/16/2020 •

This morning’s Scriptures are: Psalm 40; Psalm 54; Isaiah 10:5–19 (and 10:20–27, from Saturday’s readings); 2 Peter 2:17–22 (and Jude 17–25, from Saturday’s readings); Matthew 11:2–15.  

This morning’s Canticles are: following the OT reading, Canticle 10 (“The Second Song of Isaiah,” Isaiah 55:6–11; BCP, p. 86); following the Epistle reading, Canticle 18 (“A Song to the Lamb,” Revelation 4:11; 5:9–10, 13, BCP, p. 93) 

Welcome to Daily Office Devotions, where every Monday through Friday we bring to our lives that day’s Scripture readings, as given in the Book of Common Prayer. I’m Reggie Kidd, and I’m grateful to be with you this Friday of the third week of Advent, as we begin a new year (Year 1) of the Daily Office Lectionary.   

Biblical faith is irrepressibly hopeful. In the middle of the night, it always prepares for day. Advent insists that darkness, disease, and death will not prevail, and that Christmas is just around the corner. And it’s not just that we can be confident that vaccines will suppress viruses, or that (at least in our system of government) checks and balances will eventually prevail over the feverish madness of authoritarians or libertines. No, really, Advent’s hope and Christmas’s promise is that a day will come when there will be no diseases to be protected from, nor bad rulers to be reined in. One day, death will be no more, and one righteous King will rule.  

Isaiah catches several glimpses of that hope over the course of his prophesying. In his tenth chapter (the readings for today and tomorrow), Isaiah raises his voice against the Assyrians who attack the northern kingdom of Israel, savaging its people and ravaging the countryside. Assyria has been Yahweh’s disciplining instrument against his covenant-violating people in Israel: “Ah, Assyria, the rod of my anger—the club in their hands is my fury!” (Isaiah 10:5). But in its overweening pride, Assyria thinks it is doing its own bidding, and presumes to come against the southern kingdom of Judah as well. Yahweh will have none of it: “When the Lord has finished all his work on Mount Zion and on Jerusalem, he will punish the arrogant boasting of the king of Assyria and his haughty pride” (10:12).  

Isaiah invokes the language of the centuries-past exodus from Egypt and conquest of the Land of Promise. Yahweh will act once again on his people’s behalf: “O my people, who live in Zion, do not be afraid of the Assyrians when they beat you with a rod and lift up their staff against you as the Egyptians did. For in a very little while my indignation will come to an end, and my anger will be directed to their destruction. The Lord of hosts will wield a whip against them, as when he struck Midian at the rock of Oreb; his staff will be over the sea, and he will lift it as he did in Egypt. On that day his burden will be removed from your shoulder, and his yoke will be destroyed from your neck” (Isaiah 10:24–27). Further on, Isaiah promises a forerunner who will prepare the way for that new exodus and conquest: “A voice is calling out: In the wilderness prepare the way for the Lord” (Isaiah 40:3). 

That forerunner is John the Baptist. When the imprisoned John the Baptist sought assurance about whether Jesus was the Messiah and inaugurator of the new exodus and conquest that God had been promising, Jesus answered John’s question with a resounding “Yes!” He instructed the Baptist’s messengers: “Go and tell John what you hear and see: the blind receive their sight, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the poor have good news brought to them” (Matthew 11:4–5). Those acts, prophesied by Isaiah 700 years earlier, are signs of the “breaking in” of God’s great deliverance: “Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf shall be unstopped…” (Isaiah 32:5).  

The most intriguing verse in today’s passage in Matthew is the twelfth verse, with its note of conquest. I’m pretty sure the translation of the Evangelical Heritage Version gets verse 12 right: “From the days of John the Baptist until now, the kingdom of heaven has been advancing forcefully (biazetai) and forceful people (biastai) are seizing it” (and see also the marginal note in the NRSV). The Greek verb biazetai is in the middle/passive voice, and therefore could be translated either with an active sense (“advancing forcefully”) or a passive sense (“suffering violence”). And the noun biastai denotes “forceful people,” but it could indicate literal force (“violent people”) or metaphorical force (“assertive people”).  

Most translators and commentators take the latter option for both words (i.e., that the Kingdom is “suffering violence” at the hands of “forceful people”) — these interpreters  think that in this verse Jesus is saying that ever since John began his ministry, the kingdom has faced resistance.  

While that is true enough, I don’t think it is what Jesus means here. In the previous chapter, Jesus says, “Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth; I have not come to bring peace, but a sword” (Matthew 10:34). And in Matthew 16, Jesus will insist that the gates of hell will not stand against the church that he himself will build (Matthew 16:18). Jesus’s ministry as a whole is one of carrying out God’s warfare against the evils of demon possession, of sickness and death, and of people’s subjugation to sin’s condemnation. In Jesus’s ministry, God’s kingdom is forcefully asserting itself against the kingdom of darkness. And with Matthew 11:12’s “forceful people are seizing it,” Jesus commends an assertive faith, a faith that resists the negativity of sin, death, and demonic influence. With his challenge, “Let anyone with ears listen!”, Jesus urges a faith that boldly takes hold of God’s kingdom promises.  

2 Peter and Jude on keeping hope alive. Before taking on the false teachers’ bogus teaching to the effect that the Lord is not returning (in 2 Peter 3), Peter fires one last salvo against their lethal combination of pretended profundity and ethical laxity: “They promise them freedom, but they themselves are slaves of corruption” (2 Peter 2:19). There’s a world of depth in this simple thought. It is worth long and slow pondering. Certain things that seem to offer liberation end up subjecting us to the most desperate and debilitating of life patterns.  

For help in keeping ourselves properly oriented to a vibrant hope during Advent, we give Peter’s spiritual twin Jude the last word (from tomorrow’s reading): “But you, beloved, build yourselves up on your most holy faith; pray in the Holy Spirit; keep yourselves in the love of God; look forward to the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ that leads to eternal life” (Jude 20–21).  

May your readings, your worship, and your meditation take you further into the glory and richness of our “most holy faith.” May the Holy Spirit deepen and enliven your prayers, especially that we may see Kingdom-come. May the love of God hold you tight. May the mercy of King Jesus await you at his return.  

Be blessed this day.  

Reggie Kidd+