Look at all these crooked roads!

Look at all these crooked roads!
The season of Advent is about preparation…We are preparing for the birth of Jesus, the baby who would become a king, the savior, the messiah….Advent is the time when we prepare for that…It’s four weeks of preparation….And it’s more than the preparations that we make for our homes and celebrations—sure we have baking, decorating, shopping, wrapping and other things to do in order to get ready for celebrations of Christmas with friends and families….But it’s also about preparing our lives for the birth of Jesus…For the next 2 weeks we’ll be looking at what it means to make those preparations and some of the words of those who came before Jesus…Those who helped to prepare the way…
We have passages this morning from Isaiah and about John…The two are separated by thousands of years and may seem to have very little in common…If we look at just these two passages from Isaiah and Matthew, the two almost seem like polar opposites! But, that’s just the surface, because these two are more alike than one would think.
Isaiah is promising a vision of hope and a new ruler…The new ruler will be wise, righteous, the Spirit of Lord will be upon him…in contrast to most of the rulers that Israel had in the last few years…They were used to having kings and rulers who were corrupt and not following what God wanted. Isaiah paints a picture of the future…Not just the future of Israel, but God’s future.
And more than Isaiah talking about the future and what maybe, could be, someday, but the future that the people of Israel were to live into…In this future there are beautiful pictures of reconciliation painted in Isaiah’s words. Isaiah paints pictures of animals that wouldn’t normally be seen together as getting along and in peace with one another…The wolf shall dwell with the lamb, the cow and the bear, the lion will eat straw like the fox…Beautiful imagery that Isaiah is using about the reconciliation that is to be in the future…Reconciliation that doesn’t happen overnight, but comes with work. It comes by being intentional about reaching out to all people…To not keep anyone away…
Now of course, with any passage of Scripture, there was an audience intended to hear it…In this case, the people of Israel…But, it’s not just the people of Israel that need to hear this message. That’s what makes Scripture a living document…It speaks not only to the times then, but to us now…
As Isaiah talks about reconciliation, we can think of our own world…Surely there are places in the world that are experiencing times where there are troubles and times of hardship, where there is no reconciliation. Places like the Sudan, Congo, and Uganda where thousands of people are being killed…It feels like there is no concept of reconciliation for the world…And reconciliation doesn’t happen at tables and chairs with leaders talking about what’s best…It happens in the actions. In South Africa going back to the 1940’s, apartheid was the norm. Apartheid was a government sponsored racism…The black Africans were treated as lower class compared to the white Africans. It was an unjust system that people lived in…Homes were taken from black Africans because a white African wanted it…People were put into prison, murdered, and many other things happened because of apartheid. When apartheid was overturned, one of the ways to help with healing of the country was to have times of reconciliation…One person who may have wronged another had the opportunity to apologize and ask forgiveness and it would be granted as a way to help in reconciliation…The system has worked fairly well, there is still a lot of pain and hurt from 50 years that doesn’t go away with an apology, but it is a step in working towards reconciliation…When the wolf shall dwell with the lamb, the lion shall eat straw…
And while this passage from Isaiah points to the world and places that need reconciliation in the world…It’s also for us as individuals and for us as a community, the Church. Where are we pushing for the wolf to dwell with the lamb…Where are we inviting someone that we wouldn’t normally to join in the fellowship of Christ…Where are we inviting the wolf to dwell with the lamb and the lion to eat straw? Where are we being invited for the wolf to dwell with the lamb and the lion to eat straw? Because the vision of God’s future starts now and is something that we are working to build up and to live into…Living into God’s future…
John almost picks up where some may have misinterpreted Isaiah’s message…Because Isaiah’s message of God’s vision for the future could be interpreted as something that will happen, not something that we take part in…Something that requires something of us…That’s what John is telling people in his sermon…That there is something that we need to do and that we do play a part in the vision for the future—we are living into the future.
But when we’re invited into the future, we have to give up ourselves in the meantime…It’s not our plans for the future, but it’s God’s plan…It’s not what we want to happen, but it’s what God wants to happen. When we join with God, we give up ourselves…We can’t do what God is about to do, but we are invited to join in and in doing so, we give up ourselves. And that’s not easy to do, nor is it something that our society advocates…
What does it mean to give up ourselves? Well that’s a big question and it does mean different things at different times in life…At least specifically…It means putting ourselves aside in order for God to work…It may mean saying, “I don’t like the music, but I know God works through it to reach people.” It may mean saying, “I don’t like the way you’re doing things, but I know God is working through that to reach people.” It may mean saying, “That makes me uncomfortable, but I know that God is working through it.” It means putting yourself aside in order for God to work.
The irony of that is that it is through God that we are able to put ourselves aside…Yes, it is something that we have to choose to do, but it’s something that we can do through God and asking God for strength, wisdom, and help in putting ourselves aside.
John is not saying these things just to say them or for them to be associated with Isaiah or any other prophet for that matter…It doesn’t hurt that messages fit together, but John is proclaiming the One who is coming who is more powerful than he is—who is coming after him…He’s talking about his cousin, Jesus…The baby that was born, whose birth we celebrate on Christmas…The baby who we are preparing for in this season of Advent. The baby who would grow into the man we recognize as the Messiah…
The One who challenged the structures, who brought about reconciliation, who called people out of their comfort zones to work for God…The One who still calls to us today to bring about reconciliation, to get out of our comfort zones to work for God…We have all been called to follow this One…This One who is called Jesus…Where will you put yourself aside? Where will you work for reconciliation? How are you preparing for the celebration of Christmas? Beyond the ribbons and bows and cookies and trees, prepare your hearts for Advent; join in the work of God happening…