The River of Resistance

 

The River of Resistance

Homily by Lisa Wiens Heinsohn for St. John’s Episcopal Church

The Fifth Sunday after Epiphany, February 8, 2026: Matthew 5:13-20; Isaiah 58:1-12

 

A.J. Muste was a pastor who was a pacifist during the Viet Nam War. It is said that every day, rain or shine, he would go to the White House by himself and hold a candle there until it burned itself out. Legend has it that one day a journalist asked what he thought he was accomplishing doing this, whether he thought by himself with his quiet candle he would change the administration or the war. He said that he was not doing this to change them, but to made sure the Viet Nam War and the administration did not change him.

 

Now why does that really matter? Is that the best use of this pastor’s time? Now in point of fact this pastor did do many other things besides hold a daily candle at the White House. But why does it matter so much that he did this one, small, seemingly insignificant thing whose purpose was to himself remain untainted? It matters because we need the vision of what normal is. In times like this, we need to know in our bones, to remember in our very cells, what healthy relationship with God, one another and with the earth looks like. When the world is going mad, when oppression holds sway, when democracy itself is on the line, we need to remember who we really are.

 

In today’s gospel reading Jesus tells us not to hide our light but to put it on a candlestick so that it gives light to everyone in the house. Not only that but Jesus says to his disciples, you are the light of the world. He does not say that he is the light of the world. He says you are the light of the world. Within each one of us is what the Quakers call the Inner Light, like an undying flame that cannot be put out, a divine radiance that is the essence of what it is to be human and made in the image of God. We have choice about what to do with it. We can cover it. We can deny it, hide or disbelieve it. That doesn’t actually snuff it out. That’s impossible.

 

The day Alex Pretti was killed, we had a vigil here at St. John’s to mourn and pray and grieve. And there were countless vigils all over the cities: people standing on their street corners holding candles. They were at their street corners because ICE was using tear gas at the site of Alex Pretti’s murder so people couldn’t gather there. So they gathered where they were. One person who attended our vigil drove home afterward, grieving and so sad. He lives ten minutes from St. John’s. But as he was driving, seeing all these candles lit to honor Alex Pretti, they were giving him hope, so he decided to keep driving, following the candles, until they ran out. He drove for an hour. The whole city was lit, held up on a lampstand and not hid under a bushel basket. You see Minneapolis-St. Paul has been caught up into resistance against the reign of terror being wreaked on us by the federal government. But here is what Michelle Alexander said in 2018. We are not the resistance.[1] The resistance is a river that has existed since the beginning of time. It is the justice that rolls down like an ever-flowing stream as the prophet Amos describes and Martin Luther King envisioned. This river of resistance holds the memory of what healthy, normal communal living looks like.

 

The people of Minneapolis are incredible. They have jumped in the river and are immersed in the waters of resistance. But we have not dreamed big enough yet.

 

Our scriptures describe a river whose streams make glad the city of God. The prophets describe the tree of life in the center of the city on either side of the river, whose leaves are for the healing of the nations. Our system is truly broken. It goes way past the tyranny and racism of the current administration and even of our nation’s history. Our culture has forgotten how to live in right relation with one another, with the land, with our ancestors, with the unseen world, with God. But the memory of how to do that can be recovered. It can be found. It lives in our scriptures, in the person of Jesus. It lives too in the web of life, in the ecosystems of nature which show us what living in balance looks like, where everyone takes just enough, where everyone has a role.

 

How do we tend the inner light of God that burns within each one of us? How can we set our light on a lampstand instead of hiding it under a bushel basket? We return to living in right relation with God, one another, and the earth.

 

Listen to the words of the prophet Isaiah from today:

 

Shout out, do not hold back!
Lift up your voice like a trumpet!

Announce to my people their rebellion,
to the house of Jacob their sins.

…day after day they seek me
and delight to know my ways,

as if they were a nation that practiced righteousness
and did not forsake the ordinance of their God;

they ask of me righteous judgments,
they delight to draw near to God.

“Why do we fast, but you do not see?
Why humble ourselves, but you do not notice?”

Look, you serve your own interest on your fast day,
and oppress all your workers.

Look, you fast only to quarrel and to fight
and to strike with a wicked fist.

Such fasting as you do today
will not make your voice heard on high.

Is such the fast that I choose,
a day to humble oneself?

Is it to bow down the head like a bulrush,
and to lie in sackcloth and ashes?

Will you call this a fast,
a day acceptable to the Lord?

 

Is not this the fast that I choose:
to loose the bonds of injustice,
to undo the thongs of the yoke,

to let the oppressed go free,
and to break every yoke?

Is it not to share your bread with the hungry,
and bring the homeless poor into your house;

when you see the naked, to cover them,
and not to hide yourself from your own kin?

Then your light shall break forth like the dawn,
and your healing shall spring up quickly;

your vindicator shall go before you,
the glory of the Lord shall be your rear guard.

Then you shall call, and the Lord will answer;
you shall cry for help, and God will say, Here I am.

 

If you remove the yoke from among you,
the pointing of the finger, the speaking of evil,

if you offer your food to the hungry
and satisfy the needs of the afflicted,

then your light shall rise in the darkness
and your gloom be like the noonday.

The Lord will guide you continually,
and satisfy your needs in parched places,
and make your bones strong;

and you shall be like a watered garden,
like a spring of water,
whose waters never fail.

Your ancient ruins shall be rebuilt;
you shall raise up the foundations of many generations;

you shall be called the repairer of the breach,
the restorer of streets to live in.

 

My friends. Let each of us take only that which we need. Let us share the rest with those who have nothing, who are living in fear because of the cruelty of our government. Let us all immerse ourselves in the water of resistance, in the justice that rolls down like a stream that will never run dry. Let us remember the water of our baptismal covenants, especially as we are about to baptize a beautiful little girl named Isla. In our baptisms we promise to seek and serve Christ in all persons, loving our neighbors as ourselves. We promise to persevere in resisting evil, and whenever we fall into sin, to repent and return to God. We promise to strive for justice and peace among all people, and to respect the dignity of every human being. We have our marching orders, we have our blueprint for following Jesus’ Way of Love.

 

And resistance, following Jesus’ Way of Love, can take a million forms. Each of us has a unique genius, and different capacities, gifts, and availability. This is perfect and just as it should be. Some of us can drive groceries to people in need. Some of us can pray deeply for a spirit of love and not hate to infuse everything we do. Some of us can tell stories at art shanties and make living messages on the lakes around our city. Some of us can simply embody kindness and mercy. Joy itself is resistance. The important thing is that we all do our part, that we all do what we can do, and to trust that in the vast economy of the love of God that grows the more you share it, what you do will be enough.

 

Dream bigger. Remember more deeply. Trust that we can recover the truth of how to live in right relation with the earth, with our neighbors, with all our relations. Let your light expand and grow and shine and join the lights of others. Trust that even those we are most angry with also have the light within them and they may yet recover their ability to see what is true, they may yet be freed from the terrible spell that has our nation in its grip.

 

Then we will be called repairers of the breach. We will rebuild the ancient ruins. We will be restorers of streets to live in. We will join God’s project to heal the world with love, in the city which needs no sun or moon because God dwells in the city and is its light, and God dwells with us and wipes every tear from our eyes. Amen.

[1] See Michelle Alexander, “We are Not the Resistance,” September 21, 2018, in The New York Times.

10am Service