the sound of a new thing

“Remember not the former things,nor consider the things of old. Behold, I am doing a new thing; now it springs forth, do you not perceive it?

Isaiah 43:18-19

I have not felt particularly creative lately as evident by my lack of posting on this blog. Last week however, I had the opportunity to preach on the Scripture noted above and it really got me thinking about newness, the former things and the new thing that God promises to do among us.

The community of faith that invited me to preach is nearly 150 years old with a tradition as rich as their years are long. They worship in a lovingly maintained 85 year old building that is nestled into the countryside. This holy place sits in the middle of the parish cemetery where the saints that came together to give this community life have been laid to rest in the structure’s shadow, or rather, in its luminance.

I love the former things, being a history buff and all. But the challenge of this scripture is to look not at the former things, beautiful, grand, and reflective of God’s presence and work among us. Instead, in this text, we are challenged to strain our eyes, ears, and senses to perceive the new thing that God is doing among us. So often I think, we put God in the box of things done in the past. A box concerned with that which has been done and that which we can remember and cherish from the past. This is not a new phenomenon. It is reflected in this text from Isaiah. The people of Israel are sitting in exile, in bondage in a foreign land and have little to hold on to except God’s redeeming and salvific action in the past. What have we done to deserve this they ask? But the word of the Lord comes to them through the prophet who says, ‘Look for the new things I am doing. Don’t keep looking back. I am still working among you. A new thing springs forth. Seek it. Seek me.’

I was walking around Lake Harriet last week on a warm and gentle Minnesota spring day. As I rounded a turn in the path I began to hear a noise I had never heard before. At first, it was barely audible, but as I continued to walk it became louder and more definite. There was just a breath of a breeze so the waves that were rolling in toward shore were small. But as these insignificant little rises in the water neared the shore, they brought energy to the small pieces of ice that had collected near the shore. The tinkling of those ice crystals as they jostled together created one of the most beautiful sounds that I have ever heard. I won’t even try to explain it because I could never do it justice, but it stopped me in my tracks with its depth and beauty. It was like being a child again, resting in the wonder of the newness of creation.

I can’t remember the last time I heard a noise that I could not just dismiss because I had figured it out, processed it, and categorized it almost before the sound even hit my ear drum. Music, the honk of a horn, the buzz of the refrigerator, the creaking of a cold house on a winter’s eve, the voice of my children, the refrain of a hymn, even the sound that comes from my own mouth. Former things.

Sometimes I think we do the very same thing with our spiritual hearing. We fail to strain our ears and adjust the posture of our collective head to listen for the new thing that God is doing. It is safer, more comfortable, and less threatening to allow God to speak through the former things. For the most part, we can agree on where God has acted in the past so there is not a whole lot of conflict. Acknowledging the former things is enough isn’t it?

Behold, I am doing a new thing;now it springs forth, do you not perceive it?

The words challenge our comfortable life and spirituality and at the same time give hope amidst an existence that may at some time feel exilic and lacking God’s presence. And maybe this is exactly the point of being a community of faith that confesses a God that continually does something new in our midst. As communities of faith, we are participants in a tradition that continues to call us (generation after generation, saints following saints) out of the safe and comfortable former things, and into the beautiful messiness of the new thing that God does in seasons of transition. And as we answer this call, our words and actions create a new sound that is as old as creation, a sound rooted in God’s ongoing activity among and through us.