Please Come for a Visit

Please Come for a Visit! Isaiah 64:1-9 For the last nine months and, unfortunately, for months to come, we have heard and will hear about persons, and whole families, who have contracted the Covid virus, some with minimal affliction, while for others it has led to their demise. One of the most painful circumstances of this virus is that hundreds of thousands of families have been separated from loved ones. Spouses are barred from being with each other; grandparents cannot see their newborn grandchildren; and when loved ones die, they too often die alone, and grieving families cannot even come together to visit. Let me share a story about Carol Willison. Her story leads us to Isaiah 64, where the prophet pleads with God to “tear open the heavens and come down.” In early May, 2020, Lillian, 87, died in an assisted-living facility in White Plains, New York. Lillian lived through WWII in China when she was a child, but later studied medicine in Taiwan. Then she moved to the United States to complete a medical internship. In her memoirs, she would say, “I knew I had to become educated so I could be totally independent.” In time, she became not only a doctor, but a geneticist in New York. Her research was published in such journals as the American Journal of Medical Genetics and The Journal of Pediatrics. She was often the only woman in her class, office or lab. She set up the first lab in New York City that performed amniocentesis, setting the international standard for prenatal diagnostic testing. When she died, none of her family members could be with her. They were able to chat with her via Zoom for a two-week period before she passed, thanks to the help of nurses and aides. At her burial, only 10 people were allowed, and they had to maintain “social distance.” Her daughter was unable to join other family members to grieve and share. She was in Shanghai. Her full name is Carol Wen-Jen Lin, but her friends just call her Carol. Carol teaches in the elementary school of a prominent international school there. Her husband, the Rev. John P. Willison, is the lead pastor of a large international congregation there. Carol was not with her mother before she died, and she was not at her mother’s funeral, although she desperately wanted to be. She might have been able to leave Shanghai to be with her mother and attend her funeral, but she would not have been able to return to Shanghai since, at that 2 time, China had barred entry to foreigners. She was stuck. Separated from her dying mother if she stays, separated from her husband if she goes, and risking the loss of her teaching position as well. Carol’s experience was not unlike thousands of others at the height of the pandemic that swept across the globe in the first half of 2020. Some spouses were separated in early February by quarantine rules, canceled flights, and entry rules and still are. Some spouses are still separated when one catches the virus and have to be isolated for the safety of other family members. We were stuck, too, under “stay at home” orders. No restaurants. No church. No school. No sporting activities. No anything. And now it’s even worse, so we may be stuck again. We missed Easter; don’t be surprised if we miss Christmas. We know the angst, the pain, the silent suffering, the fear and the loss of hope. We miss our friends and loved ones. If only the door would open and our husband, wife, child or parents would come bursting through! Yes, we can Zoom or FaceTime but we miss touching a face, hugging, laughing and crying together. We lost something and we want it back. We want a return, a restoration of relationships, for things to be like they used to be. This is the emotional, psychological and spiritual dimension Isaiah’s passage speaks to us about today. The glory of Israel had long faded. Hundreds of years earlier, the northern kingdom had disappeared. Now, the memory of life in Judea and temple worship was a faint memory. Carried into captivity, the ancient Hebrews have been exiles in a foreign land. Their recent history in their homeland had been scandalous:      They neglected religious observance. They lived in open rebellion against God. Their rulers had set up false idols and corruption. Disregard for the poor and disposed was rampant. They refused to listen to the prophets. So, it was a long time since they had experienced prosperity or enjoyed blessings from the hand of God. In fact, God for years had seemed far away, as though God had abandoned them: “You have hidden Your face from us, and have delivered us into the hand of our iniquity.” In captivity, in a strange land, the Hebrews now recalled the glory of their past. They remembered now how God had intervened on their behalf. They longed to know and experience the presence of God. So Isaiah begins with the anguished words: “O that You would tear open the heavens and come down.” God loves to visit. 3 Had these Hebrews forgotten that God loves to visit? God is a visiting God. The Bible begins with God not only bringing creation into being, but visiting our first parents in the Garden of Eden. In Genesis 3:9, the Lord came walking into the neighborhood where Adam and Eve were, saying, “Where are you?” That is the question, isn’t it? Where exactly are we? God wants to visit us, so what are we doing? The southern kingdom of Judah clearly was not paying attention to God. They had other things to do than to worship the Lord God. Yet God loves to visit us, such as when:       God visited Abraham in the guise of angels who sat down for a meal. God visited Jacob, wrestling with him in the night. God visited Moses in the burning bush, on Mount Sinai and elsewhere. God’s presence went with the Israelites through the wilderness in the form of fire and cloud. God visited Samuel as a boy, calling to him in his sleep. God visited Elijah in a still small voice. Now, the prophet cries, “O that You would tear open the heavens and come down.” The prophet knows that it is in God’s nature to visit us. He says, “When You did awesome deeds that we did not expect, You came down” (v. 3). The prophet says, in effect, “Hey, You used to visit us a lot. What gives? Why aren’t You coming around anymore? Please come for a visit — soon!” Yes, it is in God’s nature to visit and this is still true. Want a visit from God? God is surely willing and eager to visit, and even to stay a while! The prophet feels as though they’re in some sort of quarantine. They must be infected, or something. There must be some reason God is staying away. Knowing that God is a just God, he suspects that something is wrong: “You meet those who gladly do right,” he says (v. 5). He also knows that God works for those who “wait for Him” (v. 4). Recognizing that it has been a long time since they’ve had a visit from their “Father,” he complains that God has left them, committing His own people to an unwelcome quarantine. They have infected their relationship with their sin and idolatry. “You hid Yourself,” Isaiah says. Even though they attempt “to take hold of You … You have hidden Your face from us” (v. 7). Eventually some of the Hebrews return, but their homeland is in turmoil. They need the Lord to visit them. The temple needs to be rebuilt. The walls need to be erected for the safety of the people. The city of Jerusalem is in ruins. Will God visit again? “How lonely sits the city that once was full of people! How like a widow she has become, she that was great among the nations! She that was a princess among the provinces has become a vassal” (Lamentations 1:1). 4 This is the first Sunday of Advent. We know there’s going to be a reopening. We know God is coming for a visit! Matthew 1:23 reads, “Look, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall name Him Emmanuel which means, ‘God is with us.’” Paul in Philippians 2:6-7 says, yes, the heavens were torn open, “Though He was in the form of God, He did not regard equality with God as something to be exploited, but emptied Himself, taking the form of a slave, being born in human likeness, being found in human form.” What kind of visit will it be? How did we receive Him? How do we receive Him now? We are still a people estranged from God, in strange times, with the plague of a strange disease — exiles as it were. We long for Joy to the World, for “heaven and nature to sing.” We, too, would like a visit. And this is precisely the promise of Christmas: Immanuel! God is with us.     God is with us throughout shelter-in-place and stay-at-home orders. God is with us whether we worship in our church or in our homes. God is with us throughout quarantine. God is with us throughout social distancing — God is going to come close. Carol Willison mourns the passing of her mother, Lillian, and yet at the same time, she only recently welcomed into the world her first grandchild, a boy. In a sense, Lillian continues to live. There is a baby in the family now, and babies are such miracles of wonder and awe. There is no visitation quite like the arrival of a baby. Think of Mary and Joseph on that night long ago. We may not know the details of this divine visitation, but it was a wonderful event in which the heavens were opened, and God Himself, in the person of a small baby boy, paid humankind the most important visit of all. Because of this, God continues to visit us today through His Holy Spirit. May Advent be a time when we not only prepare for the visit, but experience the fullness of God’s presence every day!