Isaiah 6
We
live in, relative to most of history, a pain free world. For many of us pain is an occasional,
unwelcomed guest that makes a short visit until we take the appropriate
medication. We have in our medicine
cabinets compounds and potions that would have 200 years ago been considered
miracle drugs. Naproxen Sodium,
Acetaminophen, Ibuprofen not to mention the humble Aspirin are all so common
place we don’t even think about them until we have a twinge of a pain. But they would have been worth a king’s
ransom in the days of Queen Elizabeth. If
our pain goes beyond the effects of OTC medications we enjoy the options of
prescriptions that can work wonders. For
the most part and for most of our lives we live pain free. This is a good thing in that most of us avoid
pain because, well, it hurts.
But
ancient people were more accustomed to pain as a factor of daily life. Pain was the reality of life before the
medical revolution of the 19th century. For the most part pain was endured until it
went away. This mindset of awareness of
pain might have given them insights that we miss. Pain is not a factor in our thinking, so we
might miss something they caught. In
Isaiah 6 we have one of the most amazing visions of the Bible. There is so much to see and notice, to learn
and hear, to contemplate and consider that we, because we don’t think of pain
much, might overlook something. In
verses 6-7 we read:
Then one of the
seraphim flew to me with a burning coal in his hand, which he had taken from
the altar with tongs. He touched my mouth with it and
said, “Behold, this has touched your lips; and your iniquity is taken away
and your sin is forgiven.”
There
is so much here to process but one thing I have never heard anyone ask is, “How
did that feel, Isaiah?” It is worth
noting Isaiah didn’t ask for help in his purification. He never prays, “Lord, give me pure lips.” The admission of guilt prompts the angel to
apply a burning coal to his lips. We see
the symbolisms in the vision and we understand the bigger picture. But there is a moment when the burning coal
touches some of the most sensitive skin on Isaiah. In a world where potions and pills do not
expunge pain, early readers might have seen the agony that is often the process
of holiness. Fire is often a picture of
purification in Scripture, but I don’t recall any promise that it will not
hurt.
I
have worked with those recovering from addictions and heard them describe the
pain that is part of not relapsing. I
know from my own personal experience that the path toward righteousness is more
often marked by pain than pleasure. In
almost every journey of holiness there is pain.
C.S. Lewis once said, “Pain insists upon being attended to. God whispers
to us in our pleasures, speaks in our consciences, but shouts in our pains. It
is his megaphone to rouse a deaf world.” Pain not only awakens us to our need, it is
also often the byproduct and part of the process of our purification.
I
am neither masochist nor sadist but we need to embrace the reality of
pain. We do no favor to our world nor
the disciples we would teach if we present pain as an avoidable
aberration. The abundant life is not a
life that is completely free of pain but rather it is the life that comes on
the other side of pain. It is the life
beyond taking up our cross and dying. For
the joy set Him before Jesus endured the cross.
There was no short cut for Him; there is none for us. As we teach what it means to follow Christ we
must not present a life free from pain.
Rather a life in which pain works for us and is part of the extraction
of evil so that we can live out being a disciple.
So
the next time you think about Isaiah being approached by the angel, let’s lose
the image of a euphoric man being approached by a lover holding what maybe a
strawberry. Let’s use an image more
like, a man who can’t take anesthetics but is having a root canal or molar
extraction preformed. So painful but so
worth it.
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