On Joy

Sunday, December 14th, 2003
3rd of Advent
Jerusalem Baptist Church, Emmerton VA
Isaiah 35

1 The wilderness and the dry land shall be glad, the desert shall rejoice and blossom; like the crocus 2 it shall blossom abundantly, and rejoice with joy and singing. The glory of Lebanon shall be given to it, the majesty of Carmel and Sharon. They shall see the glory of the Lord, the majesty of our God. 3 Strengthen the weak hands, and make firm the feeble knees. 4 Say to those who are of a fearful heart, "Be strong, do not fear! Here is your God. He will come with vengeance, with terrible recompense. He will come and save you."
5 Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf unstopped; 6 then the lame shall leap like a deer, and the tongue of the speechless sing for joy. For waters shall break forth in the wilderness, and streams in the desert; 7 the burning sand shall become a pool, and the thirsty ground springs of water; the haunt of jackals shall become a swamp, the grass shall become reeds and rushes. 8 A highway shall be there, and it shall be called the Holy Way; the unclean shall not travel on it, but it shall be for God's people; no traveler, not even fools, shall go astray. 9 No lion shall be there, nor shall any ravenous beast come up on it; they shall not be found there, but the redeemed shall walk there. 10 And the ransomed of the Lord shall return, and come to Zion with singing; everlasting joy shall be upon their heads; they shall obtain joy and gladness, and sorrow and sighing shall flee away.

“I think Christmas is a sad time.”

It was almost a passing comment. Had it not been made in the context of talking about preparations for Christmas and what the kids were getting for presents, it probably wouldn’t have stood out so starkly in contrast to the rest of the conversation.

I stopped and asked, ‘How so?’

The conversation that followed was in some ways a baptism by fire into what it REALLY means to bear one another’s burdens.

One of the most humbling things about being in ministry is the readiness with which I am taken into confidence by some people. That is something that, although I’d experienced it before I was ordained, it usually came after a period of getting to know the other person. Though there is still a getting-to-know you period it is much, sometimes MCUH shorter. There is, with most people, a predisposition TO trust. I see it almost every week in my rotation at the hospital. That is not only humbling, but it challenges me to uphold that trust, to keep that confidence, and to entrust a lot more, a WHOLE lot more, to the care and ministry of the Holy Spirit.

What became evident in the conversation was that there was very little reason for the person I was speaking to to feel or see much if any reason to rejoice – not just going into the Christmas season, but anytime of year.

Isaiah is addressing a similar condition with the people of Israel. As we’ve noted over the last two Sundays, the prophets Jeremiah and Isaiah were writing to and for a people who are in turmoil or in exile, far from home, across one of the most barren deserts in the world, with no immediate hope of returning to their home.

What have the prophets told them? They’ve told them to make the best of where they are - that there is Hope in that. They have drawn for them a picture of peace where the wolf will live with the lamb, the Lion and the calf shall lie next to each other, and children will play around snake’s dens … a promise that though what they are going through may seem to be nothing but hopeless and anything but peaceful, they are still going to see the fulfillment of both their hopes AND their yearning for peace.

In today’s text, we find the writer continuing in the same vein. He is intent on encouraging the people of Israel during a time when they could very easily have become despondent. Their King has been taken into exile and has died there. Their temple, the core of their identity as the people of Israel, has been destroyed. They are hundreds of miles from home. Where can they go? To whom can they turn?

The songs we sing at Christmas and the stories we tell DO seemingly emphasize the joy and happiness that accompanies the coming of the Christ child, for the most part. There are a precious few that nod their heads to the grief that is patently clear in the birth story we read in Matthew, chapter 2:

16 When Herod saw that he had been tricked by the wise men, he was infuriated, and he sent and killed all the children in and around Bethlehem who were two years old or under, according to the time that he had learned from the wise men. 17 Then was fulfilled what had been spoken through the prophet Jeremiah: 18 "A voice was heard in Ramah, wailing and loud lamentation, Rachel weeping for her children; she refused to be consoled, because they are no more."

There is no outside evidence of the massacre of the boys of Bethlehem. There were probably no more than a dozen babies and toddlers who suffered at Herod’s order. Bethlehem wasn’t much more than a hamlet. The historical record would hardly have made note of such an event in such a violent period.

That is perhaps why ‘It Came Upon a Midnight Clear’ is so dear to me. Verse 3 –
And ye, beneath life’s crushing load
Whose forms are bending low,
Who toil along the climbing way
With painful steps and slow,
Look now! For glad and golden hours come swiftly on the wing;
O rest beside the weary road, and hear the angels sing!

It is not all garlands and lights, laughter and making merry, this season we are in. There is most definitely a shadowside to this celebration.

We turn to the text:

1 The wilderness and the dry land shall be glad, the desert shall rejoice and blossom; like the crocus 2 it shall blossom abundantly, and rejoice with joy and singing … 5 Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf unstopped; 6 then the lame shall leap like a deer, and the tongue of the speechless sing for joy. For waters shall break forth in the wilderness, and streams in the desert; 7 the burning sand shall become a pool, and the thirsty ground springs of water; the haunt of jackals shall become a swamp, the grass shall become reeds and rushes.

What is the writer trying to tell us? What does this mean for Jerusalem Church? How do we approach Christmas? What can we, as a congregation, say and do in the face of a world that has made the observance of the most momentous event in human history a commercial wasteland, devoid for the most part of any true recognition of what it is exactly that made us call it Christ’s mass to begin with … One of the writers has given us directions full of hope, while the other has given us what would otherwise be called a fanciful, to not say rose-colored vision of what a truly peaceable world might be like one day.

Christ quoted this passage at the beginning of his public ministry, when his cousin John sent some of HIS disciples to ask him if he was the true Messiah. We find it in Luke chapter 7, beginning with verse 22. If we look at what he did over the next three years, it would seem that he meant the part about the eyes of the blind and the ears of the deaf and the lame leaping like deer and the tongue of the speechless singing for joy literally and physically.
Not to chase a rabbit, but I cannot, in good faith, state that miraculous healings no longer occur. There is too much that is unknown and unexplainable, too much that happens for no apparent reason that turns out to have an indelible impact on the lives of the people involved for GOOD – and towards God.

But back to the question of application: how does this relate to Jerusalem Church?

Like this:

We celebrate, and we rejoice, and we have parties and share gifts and meals and give toys and bake cakes and cookies, and send cards, but we never lose sight of the fact that we are surrounded by ‘this world of sin’, by that shadowside that is inconsolably weeping for her children – “for they are no more.”

We bear each other’s burdens, we lend a sympathetic ear, or a shoulder to cry on, we visit, and together we reach for the joy that is found in the knowledge that God so loved the world that God himself came to us in human form, in the person of Jesus Christ, to live among us, to share our pain and sorrow, and our celebrations as well.

This afternoon, at 2:30, we will be hosting a bereavement service here in the sanctuary. This is an opportunity to recognize the pain that can be caused by a mindless pursuit of enjoyment … a denial of the fullness of our emotions that can make for more heartache and tears than for laughter.

It is a chance to be in a community and in a place where together we can struggle to come to grips with a world that WE KNOW is broken, but which has, for reasons individual to each of us, come to be MORE broken through loss. It may be through the most evident form of loss, the death of a loved one. It may be at less-obvious losses, though no less painful – the loss of a job, the loss of a relationship, the loss of a sense of peace, or belonging, that may have been there before. It could be the loss of health, where the accompanying awareness of mortality can be overwhelming. Grief can come in many forms, through many doors, and it can last for a long time. There’s no time limit to the event that might have caused your grief, it might have been last week, or it might have been a decade ago. We would welcome you regardless.

Let’s pray.

Pictures of Peace

Sunday, December 7, 2003
Second of Advent (Peace)
Jerusalem Baptist Church, Emmerton VA
Isaiah 11:1-10

1 A shoot shall come out from the stump of Jesse, and a branch shall grow out of his roots. 2 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. 3 His delight shall be in the fear of the Lord. He shall not judge by what his eyes see, or decide by what his ears hear; 4 but with righteousness he shall judge the poor, and decide with equity for the meek of the earth; he shall strike the earth with the rod of his mouth, and with the breath of his lips he shall kill the wicked. 5 Righteousness shall be the belt around his waist, and faithfulness the belt around his loins. 6 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. 7 The cow and the bear shall graze, their young shall lie down together; and the lion shall eat straw like the ox. 8 The nursing child shall play over the hole of the asp, and the weaned child shall put its hand on the adder's den. 9 They will not hurt or destroy on all my holy mountain; for the earth will be full of the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the sea.
10 On that day the root of Jesse shall stand as a signal to the peoples; the nations shall inquire of him, and his dwelling shall be glorious.

It was one of those images that remains burned in my mind’s eye.

It was, if memory serves, the fall of 1985. The news story on Spanish Television was on unrest in the Philippines, specifically, Manila. President Ferdinand Marcos was attempting to maintain control of a population that was finally, finally ready and willing to do what was necessary to make him leave. There had been widespread calls for his resignation, and massive street demonstrations had been going on for several weeks.

Marcos had, in response, called out the military to break up the demonstrations and consolidate his power. The problem was, not all the military commanders were in agreement that Marcos SHOULD remain in power, not at the top levels of command, and much less at the rank and file level.

The video footage was of a soldier, brandishing his automatic rifle, walking towards a small group of anti-Marcos demonstrators. Though some in the group did start to break off and walk away, one of them, an older man, did not. He turned and, spreading out his hands, he began walking towards the soldier, who could not have been past his early 20’s, if that. As he drew nearer to the soldier, you could tell that the man was talking to him, imploring.

The soldier once began to raise the weapon, but then, as the man kept talking to him, the point of the rifle faltered, then dropped to level, then dropped down altogether, and as the man spread his arms and walked up to the soldier, the soldier broke down, and he ended up with his arms around the older man, crying.

There was no audio of the conversation that took place, since the camera that was recording it was a block or more distant from the event, but I can just imagine what the man might have been saying to the soldier.

Israel was, in a way, dealing with similar national dynamics.

Let’s review for a moment the history of Israel. The very term “Israel” can be confusing because it applies both to the one united kingdom and to the northern kingdom. Only David and Solomon ruled over the united kingdom. After Solomon’s reign the kingdom split into two.

Solomon, for all his wisdom, had created dissent through strenuous taxation and enforced labor among the tribes. When his son Rehoboam succeeded him, the northern tribes rebelled, leaving only Judah and Benjamin, which had already been absorbed by Judah. The northern kingdom became known as Israel and the southern kingdom as Judah. The two kingdoms never reunited. Israel lasted a little over two hundred years before being conquered by Assyria in 722 BC and, through mass deportations, ceased to exist as a nation. Judah continued for about another 150 years before the destruction of Jerusalem in 586 BC, when much of the population was exiled to Babylon.

David’s lineage, then, continued only on the throne of Judah. Israel’s history is of one king after another being overthrown. But though these two kingdoms went their own ways, and the house of David never again ruled the northern kingdom of Israel, there was always the understanding that both were under God, and that someday they would reunite under God’s anointed king who would be from David. Out of the remnant remaining from the two kingdoms, he would resurrect the one kingdom of Israel, establishing it as God’s great kingdom forever.

In our passage Isaiah foresees the destruction of both kingdoms. Israel has been deported and Judah conquered, the last king from David’s line taken to exile to Babylon where he dies. Only a remnant of the people remains. A stump is all that is left of Jesse’s tree of kings.

But wait. A shoot appears out of the stump of Jesse. There is still life in that lineage; a king from the same stock will arise. Note that the stump is described as being of Jesse. That is actually an unusual description of the royal line. Only here and in verse 10 is the royal line referred to in the context of Jesse. Jeremiah’s prophecy of the Messiah addresses him in terms of being of David. "The days are coming," declares the Lord, "when I will raise up to David a righteous Branch (23:5)." The royal line is always in connection with David. David is the first king, and all other kings derive their authority through him. But this shoot rises out of Jesse. Isaiah seems to be teaching that, though the Messiah is a descendant of David, he should be seen as another David himself. All the kings descended from David were measured by the standard he set. Far from having to live up to David’s standard for a king, he will set a whole new standard.

The images beginning in verse 6 in the text are familiar. “The wolf shall live with the lamb, the leopard shall lie with the kid, the calf and the lion and the fatling together, and a little child shall lead them”. We’re familiar with them if we’ve spent any time listening to messages about peace, and biblical images of what that peace might look like.

We can imagine that, but is that all that we’re supposed to do?

I was picking Hannah and Caleb up from school on Friday, and was looking around the gym at Richmond County Elementary as I was waiting for them to get out of class. There were several banners hanging up on the wall above the doors that lead into the gym from the hallway to the school – one stood out. I’d seen it before, and you’ll probably recognize it – it said

“If your mind can imagine it, you can achieve it.”

I’ve always thought of that as a basic, self-help, pump-you-up kind of bumper sticker phrase. In its best sense, it encourages you to work towards goals – hopefully realistic goals- that will then give you a sense of fulfillment and accomplishment that you can’t find anywhere but in yourself.

What does that mean for Jerusalem Baptist Church in Emmerton, VA?

Being a people of faith, we have the added benefit, no, the DISTINCT advantage, of not being solely dependent on ourselves for the outcome of our efforts. We can count on among others, the support and encouragement of our brothers and sisters in the faith – not only here at Jerusalem, but across our Rappahannock Association. We can count on support and guidance and encouragement from the staff and resources of the Virginia Baptist Mission Board. We can also count on the support of friends and family in our community who are fellow Christians who happen to belong to other traditions, but share our goals.

Oh, and we also have the Lord God Almighty, Creator of Heaven and Earth, telling us that our responsibility is to help usher in the Kingdom that Isaiah is describing. Guess it would be good to not let that one go by without mentioning.

Wolves and lambs, lions and calves, toddlers playing around a snake’s den, those are all good images, but let’s look for some images that are a little more immediate.

What is a picture of peace for you?

Here’s one: a committee meeting that is remembered not for the disagreements that were expressed, but for the fact that, in spite of those disagreements, the overriding memory was that the members in attendance cared deeply for each other, and didn’t let disagreements stop that care and love from being expressed.

Here’s another: after years of silence, and if not silence, tension, a long-estranged friend is warmly and kindly welcomed on a return visit to a sister congregation. Whatever issue had initially separated the two, though still ‘there’, stopped getting in the way of sharing Christ’s love and peace in the utterance of a kind word of appreciation and welcome.

Today we celebrate the second Sunday of Advent – the Sunday of Peace.

We’ve moved from the Hope of the coming of a Savior to the expression of the fulfillment of that hope – in the form of peace. I read somewhere that in the last 2,500 years of recorded history, as a whole the planet has enjoyed a total of 286 years of peace. That is, if you put the periods of time when there haven’t been wars of one sort or another raging or simmering end to end, that amount of time adds up to 286 years. Something tells me that those numbers may be off – that it has been longer than 2500 years, and that there have been LESS than 286 years of peace.

Where does peace begin? Outside us? Does peace come about because of the absence of weapons? I think I can safely say that humankind is inventive enough to be able to make a weapon out of just about anything. After all, we already use something as … harmless … as words, tone, and inflection to tear gaping wounds in each others’ souls, what more can we come up with?

Peace begins at home – and I don’t ONLY mean in your dwelling place – but I mean your dwelling place the one that goes everywhere YOU go – peace begins inside your own skin, your own head, your own heart – and we are getting closer and closer to welcoming the Prince of PEACE – that very peace we all long for, strive for, crave, and can every so often, get a taste of.

May we, in our reaching for and drawing in the Kingdom of God, become purveyors of that same peace – that peace that passes all understanding, that calms all fears, that stills all dissatisfaction, and draws us - in one sweeping motion – into the presence of the Loving, living God, who calls us and challenges us to be HIS peacemakers.

Let’s pray.