ADVENT 2

May my words and my thoughts be acceptable to you, O Lord, my refuge and my redeemer. (Psalm 19:14)

: ADVENT 2
PROPER: A
PLACE: St. John's Parish, Kingsville
DATE: December 9, 2001
TEXT: Isaiah 11:1-10 – A shoot shall come out from the stump of Jesse, and a branch shall grow out of his roots. The Spirit of the Lord shall rest on him, the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge and the fear of the Lord. . . . . .The wolf shall live with the lamb, the leopard shall lie down with the kid, the calf and the lion and the fatling together, and a little child shall lead them.
ISSUE: The theme of this second Sunday in Advent deals with repentance. Repentance means an inner change of heart and direction, while many may think of it erroneously as having to do with being sorry. Coupled with the call for repentance is the call to be transformed and ready to enter into the image of Christ as a people of peace and love. There is hope in the coming of Christ as the change agent who brings the peace of love for which we year and need.
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The primary theme of this second Sunday in Advent is the call to repentance. In the Matthew lesson, old St. John the Baptist, or the John the dipper calls the people of his time to repentance. John is a prophetic character, dressed like a prophet in his camel’s hair and assuming the prophets diet of honey and wild locust. He is much like Elijah in his preaching and energetic vitality that calls a world to dramatic repentance. John anticipated and hoped for the coming of the messianic figure, who would bring in the Kingdom of God. He looks upon a world that was cruel, impersonal and insensitive to human need, and that had abandoned a personal responsible closeness for God, for simply old traditions and ancestral ties. John calls for repentance, which means change in the hearts of God’s people.
Many people today are inclined to think when they read or hear this Advent gospel story of John, that he was primarily calling people to confess their sins, and be sorry for them. Sorry is okay. But remember when you were a kid and you told your mother that you were sorry. She didn’t always buy that. “Sorry, I don’t care if you’re sorry, I want your bad behavior to change.” John’s call to repentance was just that, a change of heart that had an influence on activity. Pharisees and Sadducees were advised to stop relying on their ancestry as providing them privilege. Soldiers were taught to stop being bullies, and live on their wages. Tax collectors were to collect only taxes that were fair and stop their extortion. Repentance had little to do with being sorry; it had much more to do with making a dramatic change in a person’s life. Repentance was to be ready for a new age of transformation.
The concept of repentance being connected to a transformation is not peculiar to the Christian Scripture tradition, it is deeply rooted in the Hebrew Scriptures and in the prophetic teachings of Isaiah. Isaiah was a master at anticipating, hoping, and attending to the need for transformation among his people and the nation. Living and preaching in a time of significant wealth accumulated by the rich from the work of the poor, and living at a time when the people had abandoned a meaningful relationship with Yahweh for rituals and perfunctory religion, Isaiah saw a great need and hoped desperately, yearned for, a new age where God’s people would be truly repentant, changed, and the life of the nations dramatically transformed.
There are few passages from the Hebrew Scriptures that are quite so beautiful as Isaiah’s prophecy in Chapter 11. The golden age of King David is long gone. He anticipates new hope and a restoration of a new Kingdom of Judah and Israel that will once again be a kingdom that is truly God’s kingdom. Isaiah proclaims and anticipates that out of the stump, or trunk, of a degenerate kingdom there will come a new shoot, a new branch. It is a messianic hope that a savior and restorer will come to the nation that is enveloped by the Spirit of God, with wisdom and understanding, a wise counselor with the spirit and knowledge and fear, or better still an awe of God. He will restore the peasants and the poor to their rightful dignified status in the land. He will be intent upon what is right and just.
A popular theme in Christmas cards based on the Isaiah text is that of the lion and the lamb, the wolf and the lamb, the leopard and the kid goat, the calf, and fatling lying down with the lion in peace. The cow and the bear shall graze, their young shall like down together, and the lion shall eat straw with the ox. What’s more a nursing child will play over the nest of a poisonous snake without being harmed. The earth will be full of the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the sea.
This imagery or vision is a vision of a transformed world and nature. The use of animals, lambs and lions lying down together is, of course, symbolic. Animals in Scripture were often mascots for a nation, in the same way the Eagle is American symbol and the Bear is a Russian Symbol. Wolves are seen as treacherous and cunning. The lamb is a symbol of meekness. Isaiah presents and image of transformed world, transformed nations, and transformed people who will live together in peace, and treat one another with justice and what is right.
Out of the roots of a spiritually impoverished nation, will come a messianic leader who in his relationship with God will lead the way into a world that is not just sorry, but transformed into the Garden of Eden, into the Kingdom of God. Old enmities will be forgotten. The Mighty will live peaceably with the weak. Exploitive types of people and nations will change their relationship with the poor and needy. It shall be an age when people will be full of the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the sea.
Isaiah’s image and vision may seem too strong for us, or just too hopeful for our world. There is just so much pain and suffering in our own world today. The stealthy wolves, the lions, and bears seem to have such an advantage over the lambs. It’s not much fun living in a world at war, or in a world of fear for travelers, and for our children. It’s not much fun fearing what disease the postman may deliver. It’s hard to see young men and women brought home in body bags. It’s every bit as difficult to see small children in nations like Afghanistan orphaned and living in inadequate orphanages. The mix of wealth, luxury, and power mixed with hatred, war, suspicion, fear, and anxious uncertainty for the future creates a pall of darkness and greatly limits our hope and joy. The events of recent months have had a serious effect on the outlook and the psychological well being of so many of us. When I was Christmas shopping one evening, a lady with her market basket comment as she passed by, “You know, I’m just not into this, this year.” Cruelty, terrorism, prejudice, and anxiety about the future have surely had their effect on all of us, I am sure. We as God’s people are indeed needful of a transformation. Maybe we need to make some changes, some kind of turn around. Maybe we need turn back to a reclamation of the God of love and hope, to look for the savior, for God to come to us, and renew us in our hopes for his Kingdom.
For the Christian Community there is no way back to God, except through Jesus Christ. He is our savior and our hope. Indeed, he is the one with the Spirit of God in him. He is the one who brought to the world a renewed spirit of wisdom based on love and forgiveness. He is the one who wears the belt of justice and righteousness around his waist, and complete trust, loyalty, and faith in God. After all, he lived a life himself that dealt with human cruelty from his birth until his death, in argument and threat, and death, but who remained so assured of the mercy, love, and compassion of God that he was raised up to fullness of eternal life. Where else would we turn except to the saving grace that comes in human despair and darkness from Jesus Christ? For out the darkness from Christ come the light and the hope for the world.
This past week I spent a day at a conference with two Muslim clergy. Their presentation was a great hope for a far greater understanding between Christianity and Islam. We share so many things that are alike. We do not need to be so suspicious, and when we change, repent, discipline ourselves to be more aware of the world around us, we may find pockets and places where hope grows and appears like shoots out of stumps or new branches out of old trees. Our advent prayer is one that needs to include our ability to change directions and be open to the renewing spirit of God to bring us the hope and the comfort we need.
I commented to someone last week at the coffee hour, (Pankaj Malik) that so much of what we see on the TV news is the harsh forbidding land of Afghanistan with its soldiers and the devastation going on there. He remarked having been there, he knew that it was in fact a beautiful country where some of the very best pomegranates and grapes of the world grow. It is not all devastation. It is not all dust and desert, but there is beauty and goodness and hope there as well.
Maybe it is time to try to let go of some of our busyness and doing Christmas the way we always do it, and seek to let God enable us to become transformed. Maybe we need to simplify and reduce the demands, change, repent from our fear and hopelessness, and turn back to God and anticipation of a renewed coming of Jesus Christ our Lord and Savior into our lives. Advent is the Christian’s New Year, the time of rethinking our lives and their directions. What are the issues deep down we need to change and deal with? A closer relationship with God through Jesus Christ may eventually lead us all into the light and transformed into people of love and hope.