Memories form the basis for how we understand the present. Our past experiences are the foundation upon which we learn what to expect from the world around us. The way that we interpret the world is shaped by our experiences. Bishop Jack Tuell preached a sermon recently in which he claimed that although God’s given us Scripture, reason, tradition and experience to understand matters of faith, it all really starts with experience. The bible is the recorded experiences of people of faith. The bible is a documentation of human experience of God’s presence in the world. The bible informs our faith, but first came experience. Our reasoning minds are shaped as we mature by life experiences that teach us what’s rational. Our ability to reason develops from years and years of trial and error, teaching us experientially what makes sense. Our reasoning minds inform our faith, but first came experience. The church tradition is nothing more than the cumulative experiences of the saints over the centuries. In the writings of church founders, in the history of our faith we have nothing more than the accumulated wisdom of our predecessors as they experienced the inspiration of God. Tradition informs our faith, too, but first came experience. Bishop Tuell has argued that all four resources of faith that John Wesley pointed to are crucial: Scripture, tradition, reason and experience. But they’re all rooted first in experience. Perhaps that’s why the words of Isaiah in today’s reading are a little shocking. “Don’t remember the former things, or consider the things of old,” Isaiah instructed the people on behalf of God. Forget about the past. The people of Israel were especially tied to their experiences of the saving presence of God in their history. The Jewish people still today remember when God led them out of slavery in Egypt over three thousand years ago. They remember when God led their ancestor Abraham out of the desert into the land that God had promised. History, memories, and experiences of God are central to the Jewish identity, just as they’re central to our identity as Christians. We’re tied to the stories of this book. We’re defined by those moments in history when God was embodied in the human form of Jesus. We tell the stories of Jesus as our own stories, building our faith upon our communal experiences. I once was lost, but now am found. I once was blind, but now I see. Experiences of God’s amazing grace are the foundation upon which our faith is built. So how much more stunning are the words of the prophet Isaiah when God says, “Forget the past.” For the Jews to whom Isaiah first wrote, this would be like saying, “Forget who you are.” For Christians today, it’s like saying, “Stop paying attention to what God did in Galilee two thousand years ago.” It’s a scandalous passage, when you think about it. “Thus says the Lord… do not remember the former things, or consider the things of old.”

Our experiences frame the edges of what we see as possible in the world. Our imaginations are limited by past performance. We tend to see things as impossible if we’ve never experienced anything like them before. As much as Jesus had foretold that he would rise from the dead, Thomas still wouldn’t believe it. He’d heard the words, but he thought it was impossible. He demanded the experience of touching Jesus’ wounds before he would believe. When Jesus showed Thomas his wounds, he said, “Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe.” Blessed are those who can leave open possibilities that they can’t even imagine. Blessed are those who refuse to allow past experience to limit their vision of what God can do in the future. I’ve talked with a lot people who’ve been to previous sessions of General Conference. They’ve all cautioned me to set low expectations for my time at General Conference next month. Folks who’ve been to several General Conferences have told me not to expect much progressive change to happen. They’ve learned from experience that such changes seldom happen, and when they do they happen painfully slowly. It’s been helpful to hear these words of experience. I’m grateful for their wisdom born of hard knocks and disappointment. But does our faith call us to set our expectations low enough not to risk disappointment? Does our faith inspire us to believe in fatalism? Do we place our faith in the words of Ecclesiastes, where it says, “All things are wearisome; more than one can express; the eye is not satisfied with seeing, or the ear filled with hearing. What has been is what will be, and what has been done is what will be done; there is nothing new under the sun.” Those words of faith come from a place of despair. Those are the sorts of words that would tell us to set our expectations low. Experience often teaches us what isn’t possible, what can’t be done, and the folly of hoping for more than what has already been revealed.

But the words of Isaiah tell us that God’s about to do a new thing. Set aside what you think you know is possible, the prophet says, and leave room for God to take us all completely by surprise. God says, “I’m about to do a new thing; now it springs forth, do you not perceive it?” In the face of a world full of disappointment and fear and violence and brokenness, we may find it hard to expect anything else. But the prophet promises us that God is about to do a new thing. I’m sure I’m all alone in this, but there are some people that deeply annoy me. Even when I agree with them, I just can’t work with them. I’ve tried. They don’t follow through, or our personalities clash or we just can’t get on the same page. Past experience teaches me that there are some people that I just can’t get along with, so I might as well stop trying. But God keeps tugging at my certainty, telling me that I shouldn’t let the past limit my future. God promises, “I’m about to do a new thing.” Some wise people say that it’s impossible for the Israelis and Palestinians to make peace. Assassinations and suicide bombers are recent evidence of an endless cycle of violence. It seems like all we’ve seen from them for the past fifty years has been killing, so the only end in sight is that they’ll kill each other off. Past experience tells us that peace in Palestine and Israel is too much to hope for. God says, “Forget past experience. I’m about to do a new thing.” We all know people who’ve turned away from organized religion because of the failures and faults of the church. The heritage of the Christian faith takes us through violence and oppression, racism and sexism, imperialism and homophobia. Past experience tells us that the church is deeply flawed, and more often an instrument of oppression than an agent of justice. “Forget past experience,” God tells us. “I’m about to do a new thing!” We must set aside our certainty that we know what’s possible and what’s impossible. We need to leave space for God to stretch out of the box we would seek to place around divine will. We must remind ourselves over and over again, in the face of disappointment and fear that God is about to do a new thing.

What we think we know can sometimes get in the way of what we have yet to learn. Of course we can’t ignore the past. We can’t turn our backs on the lessons that took hard work and struggle and sacrifice to learn. But perhaps there’s a difference between remembering the lessons of the past and allowing the past to control us. Perhaps there’s a difference between learning from history and defending our historical mistakes. We’ve got to be open to recognizing that God’s doing something new. We’ve got to let go of our desire to know and control and bind God by past performance, and instead leave room in our lives for God to do a new thing. Whenever we feel like there’s nothing new under the sun, whenever we’re tempted to believe that all that has been is all that will ever be, remember that God is about to do a new thing. It’s about to spring forth. Can you see it yet? It’s almost here! Amen.