Verses three and four tell of a renewed covenant with David. This is the only reference in Isaiah of Babylon to this Davidic covenant. David is my witness to the people, a leader and commander for the people. Because of my love for David, I also love you, says the Lord.

Verse five says that Judah will call nations that they do not know and nations that do not know them to this new covenant. God is your Lord, the Holy One of Israel, and he has glorified you.

Verses six and seven constituted a call to repentance: "Seek the Lord while he may be found, call upon him while he is near. Let the wicked forsake his way and the unrighteous man his thoughts. Let them return to the Lord, that he may have mercy on you, and to your God, for he will abundantly pardon." George Buttrick (Sermons, p. 177) remind us that in Hebrew this means, "God will be great in pardon." "God tears up our IOU's," said Buttrick. "He turns the very memory of our sins into a memory of his mercy."

Verses eight and nine remind us that humankind is not wise enough, not prudent enough to understand the purposes of God. But no matter: God's saving purposes are still in effect. Salvation does not depend upon our understanding. It depends upon God's action. God saved Israel from Egypt. God restored Judah from Babylon. God raised Jesus from the dead. Do we understand that? No. "My thoughts are not your thoughts, and my ways are not your ways. As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts higher than your thoughts." Are we impacted by this? Yes. Salvation is nearer at hand than we had first thought.

PSALM 63:1-8: "My soul thirsts for thee, . . . My soul is feasted as with marrow and fat, . . . my soul clings to thee." My soul - my life, my strength, my vitality (all these are meant by the word nephesh) - thirsts and hungers for the living God. Thirsting and hungering are the greatest needs of human life. We can live for a few days without water, a few weeks without food. But, says the psalmist, we cannot live a single moment without the living God. "My soul clings to thee."

When I go through life as if I was a thirsty man in the desert, said the psalmist, I go to the sanctuary of God and look upon thy power and glory. "Because thy steadfast love is better than life, my lips will praise thee. I will bless thee as long as I live, I will lift up my hands and call on thy name."

The key word in the above is that which is translated "steadfast love." This profound word does not reduce itself to a single word in English. It is so difficult to translate that it was the last word left when the translators of the Revised Standard Version made their translation of the Old Testament. As near as I can describe it, it means the faithfulness of God toward those peoples with which God has entered into covenant. God loves these people with an everlasting love, a love that is the full expression of God's faithfulness to those with whom he has chosen. Faithfulness, loyalty, love: all these concepts are poured into this single word which we translate "lovingkindness, steadfast love."

I am hungry, but God feeds my soul with marrow and fat - in other words, with meat. Meat was not part of the daily diet of the Israelite or Judahite. It was eaten only on special occasions like the passover or on the day that a sacrifice was made in the temple - then the marrow and the fat of the bone was placed on one's plate. When God satisfies my hunger with meat, then I will praise the Lord.

I am drawn to the closing words of this lection: "When I think of thee upon my bed and meditate upon thee in the watches of the night, . . . in the shadow of thy wings I sing for joy." Many is the night that I lay awake pondering life, my life, those I love. Most of those times I am driven to God. I finally ask that I can trust my issues, my problems, my loved ones to God, who alone is faithful and who alone can deal with the concerns that concern me. Only then can the overpowering night turn, as the psalmist says, into "the shadow of thy wings." Only when I have done this can I sing for joy and return to sleep again. "I think of God as I lie on my bed and meditate upon God in the watches of the night. . . . In the shadow of thy wings, I sing for joy."

FIRST CORINTHIANS 10:1-13: Paul insisted that all people had sinned and fallen short of the glory of God (Romans 3:23). But Paul also knew that despite this God treats us with grace.

A large part of the reasoning that led Paul to this conclusion came from his reading of the Hebrew Bible. First Corinthians 10 is an example of this. Paul read of what happened to the Hebrew people in the wilderness. Four miraculous events had been enjoyed by the Israelites at the time of the exodus: God led them by means of a cloud, God took them across the Red Sea, God supplied manna from heaven and water from the rock. All the people were distinguished by the special attention given to them by God. And all the people sinned and fell short of the glory of God. They ate and danced before an idol, they indulged in immorality, they put God to the test, and they complained vigorously about needing food and water. "With most of them God was not pleased. They were overthrown in the wilderness."

But of course this did not end the story. After God had disciplined them, God led them into the Promised Land. They had sinned, but God had loved them before their sin and God loved them after.

"What happened to them," said Paul, "should be a warning to us, not to desire evil as they did." If we think we stand, we might fall. No temptation will happen to one of us that is not common to all of us. But God is faithful. This is the good news of the passage. God is faithful, and because of that two things will occur. One, God will never let us be tempted beyond our strength. Two, with the temptation God will provide a way of escape. Whatever the temptation that comes upon us, said Paul, we will be able to endure it because God is faithful.

This is our hope. God loves us before we love God. Even when we attempt to break the bonds of God's love, God loves us still. When we are tempted to sin, know that God does not tempt us beyond our strength. Know also that God has provided a way out of the temptation at the same moment that the temptation comes upon us. We may not be always faithful to God, Paul concluded, but God is always faithful to us.

LUKE 13:1-9: Three events of contemporary interest are reported in this short narrative.

A report came to Jesus that Pilate had mingled the blood of a party of Galilean pilgrims with the blood of the sacrifices they were making at the Temple. There is no contemporary account of this, other than the New Testament story itself. Report or no, Pilate was perfectly capable of doing such an act. Josephus recorded numerous accounts of Pilate's confrontations with the Jews. Pilate's troops killed a group of Samaritans climbing Mt. Gerizim. Pilate introduced Roman effigies into Jerusalem, causing a riot and a march on Caesarea. Pilate seized Temple treasury funds in order to build an aqueduct. Jesus used this weighty moment as a call to repentance. "Were these Galileans worse sinners than all other Galileans because they suffered thus?" The people would think that, because they had been taught to believe that such acts of random violence laid on persons were punishment for past sins. Jesus refuted that position. "No, I tell you," he said, "but unless you repent you shall all likewise perish." Repent or perish is the alternative Jesus gives them.

Jesus then reported a story of his own. The tower of Siloam, on the southern wall of the city of Jerusalem, had collapsed. Eighteen people were killed in the accident. Jesus asked, "Do you think that they were worse offenders than all the others who dwelt in Jerusalem?" The people would think that, because to them any natural disaster was punishment of God for sins. Jesus said, "No, I tell you, but unless you repent you will all likewise perish." Jesus viewed natural disasters like this one, and acts of violence like these, as one more call by God to the people to repent.

He then told his own story. A man had a fig tree planted in his vineyard. He came seeking fruit and found none. He told the vinedresser to cut it down. "I've come three years seeking fruit from that tree, and it has not produced. Why should it use up my space?" But the vinedresser said, "Let it go one more year. I will cultivate it more intensely than I have done before. If at the end of next year it has no fruit, I will cut it down." Such is the mercy of God. "Repent now," said Jesus. "If you do not, God may provide you with a little more time to do so. Then, if you do not bear fruit worthy of repentance, God will lay the ax to the foot of the tree." The message of John the Baptist which Jesus had heard so clearly becomes Jesus' message as he implored the people: "Repent."