December 1, 2019 - Advent 1

That's true of this stream from Isaiah. I don't know if you've heard of this fellow Raphael Samuel. He's actually got a fake beard on there. And you know, why in a moment is suing his parents is a member of us called the antinatalist society has a thing and it's actually a fairly popular thing. And these are people strongly suggest no children ever be born again. They are pushing for human Humanity self extinction because we're destroying the planet. And they have a point. This man Raphael Samuel made the news because he is suing his parents because they did not give his consent to be born.

As parents are two lawyers, so they can understand play the ground of the suits and actually has mother tweeted out that she's very proud of him for taking cussed and but once once he proves to her how she could have gotten his consent before he was born. He wins his case. Muzzy argues that this thing called life because of suffering is not worth living.

And that all these children who did not choose to be born and have to uninjure going to school. and heartbreak And all the Thousand shocks, that flesh is heir to.

Didn't deserve this and didn't ask for it.

Life is pointless. He says. And it would have been better. if he had never been born

I don't know and I hope that that isn't really his belief at the depth of his being.

For if you're wondering if your life has a point is in the midst of all the suffering and in the midst of all the ills and struggles we face. from dementia to the struggles of making it through each and every work day. And may you know that your life has a point? There is a dream given by this. Hope of God, which says you are a beloved child. And you are destined for life and for love. I didn't have insurance you are called to participate in that life and love and that participation will cost suffering. Because this is the world that knows a great deal about suffering. And when God came in this little infants born in a manger God entered into our suffering and just the same way. To tell us there is a point. And this point is the love for which you were born and for which you are intended. Calls us to pound our Spears into pruning Hooks and our swords into plowshares and you know this famous statue that stands outside the United Nations in New York City interesting lie enough. It was given to the United Nations by the officially atheist Soviet Union in 1959.

And yet even they are part of all those Nation streaming to the wisdom of this God. I calls us to lay down our swords. The song is entered into our popular vernacular. Maybe you can sing this one too for me going to lay down my sword and shield Down by the Riverside Down by the Riverside Down by the Riverside going to lay down my sword and shield Down by the Riverside and I ain't going to study war no more.

It happens. In this world where we cower so much behind our swords. and our Spears it happens. This is an artist whose name is Pedro Reyes and he comes from Mexico claim to fame is that it has more gun deaths than any other city in Mexico, and that's saying quite a lot. I was an expression of his Arts Pedro decided to collect guns.

He invited everyone to turn in their weapons and for those who needed encouragement, he would give them food coupons or coupons to buy Electronics with. And he collected 1527 guns. They laid them all outside on a flat sand Road bed and they were run over by a steamroller and then melted down. And those 1527 guns were turned into 1527 shovels.

And they planted 1527 trees.

Gave those shovels to schools and to art institutes actually some of them made their way to Vancouver, Canada.

It happens.

When one is grass by this hope when one we have done or accomplished in our fears and in our anxieties, but one grassless hope of God, which is given to us freely this assurance of our future of God's presence.

swords get beaten into plowshares and we learn to live those community.

The hard thing when you becomes a find buy some hopeless act and your past.

And I don't know if they were followed the news yesterday of the attack on London Bridge.

And there are some citizens roundly praised for tackling the attacker and wrestling him to the ground defending those. He had killed two people injured three others, but they Without regard for their own safety, even though he was wearing for abscess suicide vest tackled him down and tried to take the knives from his hands.

Letter of London's mini since we saw that day on London Bridge the worst of humanity and the best of humanity.

A little did they know at that time that one of those who had tackled him was I convicted murderer? Name is James Ford. 2004 he strangled Amanda champion. 21 year old girl she had

Developmental delay I gave her the emotional intelligence of a 15 year old.

Yeah, no reason for doing that. She was just in the wrong place at the wrong time.

And when it became known that James Ford was among those who wrestled that terrorist to the grounds. They contacted Amanda's family.

They asked them what they thought of him.

They said that he is no hero.

He was there that day because he's on day release coming to the end of his mandatory fifteen years sentence and he was part of the lecture on Rehabilitation that was going on at ended by that man with the knives and I'm not going to use his name.

And where he made his first attacks?

Amanda's family said they tried to stop his parole. They did not want him out ever again and you can understand their anger and their home.

Yeah, there he was he was one of the first to go to the aid of a woman who had been stabbed and tried to save her life. And then they pursued the attacker.

James Ford is not a hero.

What is a human being?

And I hope none of us human beings are going to be defined by one incidents in our lives. No matter how horrendous that incident might be.

I hope you had for every one of us and in every place in this world there might yet be a hope of something different and something new. I hope not found in ourselves or our criminal records or our records as human beings, but I hope when we might Embrace that truth of God, which caused us to live in a new instruction. to live with a different wisdom

I'm hoping James Ford reacted out of a new hope to be difference in his life.

On this day. May you Climb Every Mountain that seeks to get in your way from such a hope. But that hope is freely given to you that mountain of the Lord is rising for you and Kate can you up with it? So that every stream and every Valley and everything that will get in your way has no rights to our future.

Let's see if the color of Isaiah through the season of Advent evokes than us the imagination and the power of God's presence with us.

She singing the last verse here.

She's calling us all in that way. That's she finishes in The Sound of Music and hits that high note. Jeff is going to try and get it. Up where he is.

I couldn't hit that note.

But you can find that dream. A dream that God has for us all.

almond

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