Where can we find peace?
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Let’s back up a bit
Let’s back up a bit
You know the expression, “One step forward, two steps back.” That’s kind of where we’re at this morning. We’re getting closer to Christmas — further along in Advent — hopefully a bit more prepared for the birth of Jesus; and yet, we’re headed backwards in the scriptures. We go from Jeremiah last week, to about a generation before to Isaiah for today’s reading.
Last week we heard of God’s promise to bring peace to Jerusalem, and now we’re further back in the time of the lack of peace.
Isaiah, Babylon has captured Judah. Eventually Babylon will fall to Persia, who will fall to Greece, who will fall to Rome, … and that’s where we pick up the story of Christmas … but let’s not get ahead of ourselves. We need to stay in the fallen time with Babylon.
And I said: “Woe is me! I am lost, for I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips; yet my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts!”
Back in Isaiah 6, we hear that God’s people are not clean — well at least their lips aren’t. For that, and probably a multitude of other sins, they are punished. The prophet asks God how long the punishment will last.
Then I said, “How long, O Lord?” And he said:
“Until cities lie waste
without inhabitant,
and houses without people,
and the land is utterly desolate;
until the Lord sends everyone far away,
and vast is the emptiness in the midst of the land.
There isn’t much hope there. Cities in waste, no people, no houses, desolation of the land … the punishment is harsh.
And right before today’s reading, is written:
Then Isaiah said to Hezekiah, “Hear the word of the Lord of hosts: Days are coming when all that is in your house, and that which your ancestors have stored up until this day, shall be carried to Babylon; nothing shall be left, says the Lord. Some of your own sons who are born to you shall be taken away; they shall be eunuchs in the palace of the king of Babylon.”
I don’t know about you, but this doesn’t sound much like peace to me. Everything that has been built up will be handed over to someone else. A whole nation, a whole people, will be under the rule of someone else — even children will be taken away.
Honestly, that part, sounds like part of the history of this land — not thousands of years ago, not even hundreds of years ago — but decades ago (far too close in history for us to think it could never happen like that now) children being taken away, nations and peoples disappearing from the map.
Imagine how you’d want to speak words of comfort to our indigenous sisters, and brothers, and siblings. Imagine how hollow that comfort could sound. Imagine the hurt.
God knows comfort is needed
God knows comfort is needed
It is at this point that we have today’s reading.
Harper’s Bible Commentary 40:1–11 God Decrees Salvation For Exiled Israel
The voices in 40:1–5 are those of the heavenly courtiers implementing the decree. In vv. 6–8, one of them speaks to the prophet, who, like his master, Isaiah of Jerusalem, is told to announce what he has seen and heard to the people of God. Jerusalem, personified as a mother and queen, is told to go up to a high mountain and announce the coming of Yahweh to the cities of Judah.
++The period of punishment is over
++God’s people can return home
++The prophet is commissioned to share the news
++Jerusalem announces God is coming
But how is this comfort?
But how is this comfort?
A voice says, “Cry out!”
And I said, “What shall I cry?”
All people are grass,
their constancy is like the flower of the field.
The grass withers, the flower fades,
when the breath of the Lord blows upon it;
surely the people are grass.
While God’s people wouldn’t have had the mowers we have now, to cut down grass quickly, we should understand about grass withering — when we have watering restrictions, when there isn’t enough rainfall, when the winter comes and the darkness lengthens, and the world gets colder.
To know that we are but grass, is hardly comforting.
It is the next part that is meant to bring the comfort.
The grass withers, the flower fades;
but the word of our God will stand forever.
We may wither and fade, but God’s word doesn’t. I don’t know about you, but there are days (more than I want to admit at times) that I wither and fade — and the only thing that gets me through it is God’s word.
What will peace look like?
What will peace look like?
If all this is to bring comfort to God’s people, one can assume that God’s people will find peace, once they find comfort from God.
Isn’t that true — we can find peace in situations that we don’t like; we can find peace in the midst of turmoil; we can find peace in times of trouble.
For God’s people, peace / comfort will look like this:
He will feed his flock like a shepherd;
he will gather the lambs in his arms,
and carry them in his bosom,
and gently lead the mother sheep.
We’ll find peace when we’re fed, when we’re carried, when we’re led to the next stop on our journey.
For us, those things can all come from the scriptures. These words from Isaiah, repeated by John the Baptist, in preparation for the coming of Jesus:
A voice cries out:
“In the wilderness prepare the way of the Lord,
make straight in the desert a highway for our God.
Every valley shall be lifted up,
and every mountain and hill be made low;
the uneven ground shall become level,
and the rough places a plain.
Let’s make a smooth path for people to get to see Jesus this Christmas. Even if they don’t see him here in worship — may they see Jesus in us, in our lives, in our hearts, in our stories — for then we (and they) will have found peace.