Isaiah 2:1-5
1 The word that Isaiah son of Amoz saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem. 2 In days to come the mountain of the Lord's house shall be established as the highest of the mountains, and shall be raised above the hills; all the nations shall stream to it. 3 Many peoples shall come and say, "Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob; that he may teach us his ways and that we may walk in his paths." For out of Zion shall go forth instruction, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem. 4 He shall judge between the nations, and shall arbitrate for many peoples; they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more. 5 O house of Jacob, come, let us walk in the light of the Lord!
One of my favorite movies is from 1997, an Italian movie written and directed by Roberto Benigni. It is a movie about a husband and wife who own a little book shop, and together they have a son. It is during their son’s birthday party that the story takes a dark turn: you see, it takes place in the early 1940s, during World War II, and this man (Guido), his uncle (Eliseo), his wife (Dora), and their son (Joshua) are Jews. Guido, Eliseo, and Joshua are arrested during Joshua’s birthday party and forced on a train bound for a concentration camp. When Dora hears of their capture, she volunteers to board a train headed for the same camp.
It isn’t long after their arrival that Guido’s uncle is sent to the gas chambers. The terrors of the camp are real, yet Guido does his best to protect his son from them, to give him hope amid such horror. So, he tells his son that they are a part of a great, complicated game, and in order to win the prize (his very own tank!) Joshua must do everything his father tells him to do. Guido uses his imagination and charm to convince his son to hide, to be quiet, to stay out of sight of guards and even other prisoners in the camp.
Eventually, news reaches the camp that the Allies have won and are on their way to liberate the camp. The Nazis begin to abandon the camp, burning records, corpses, and executing prisoners. The place is wild with the sounds of dogs barking, guns firing, and men and women screaming. Guido takes his son Joshua and convinces him to hide in a box, telling him that he has won the prize but he must do this final thing if he is to claim it. As Joshua hides in the box, Guido heads to the other side of the camp in an attempt to find his wife, Dora. He’s captured by a Nazi soldier. The soldier leads him in front of the box where Joshua is hiding. After making eye contact, Guido gives his son a wink and mockingly marches in front of the box. The soldier leads him around the corner and down an alley. We hear the rifle fire. It’s one of the most heartbreaking scenes in any movie. Yet, it’s also a powerful image of hope, because, you see, hope is most keenly felt by those who are broken, by those at the end of the line, by those who would otherwise have nothing left to call them on. Guido’s hope was for his son, a hope in what lies beyond the terror, a hope for what waits in the unforeseen future, a hope that is bigger than the present and even our very selves. It’s that kind of hope we celebrate on this first Sunday of Advent.
It’s the hope of which the prophet Isaiah speaks in our text this morning. Isaiah talks about what will happen “In days to come,” but at the time the prophet first spoke these words, “the days to come” seemed bleak. The nation was on the brink of destruction, and God was calling them out for their iniquities through the prophet: they had been greedy, absorbed in their own self-interest, those in power had been corrupted, and the religion of the day was little more than lip-service and habitual ritual[1] (I suppose it sounds a bit familiar…). The Lord had threatened to pour out his wrath on the people, to turn his hand against them. God was angry with the nation because it had forgotten its calling, overlooked the teachings of Torah to find power, wealth, and prominence among the nations. There was political tension in the atmosphere as the Syro-Ephraimitic war had been raging, catching the southern kingdom of Judah and its capital Jerusalem in its crossfire.[2] The “days to come” seems filled with fear, anxiety, and uncertainty as the Lord’s wrath seemed eminent and the world around them spun out of control, yet the prophet says, “In days to come the mountain of the Lord's house shall be established as the highest of the mountains, and shall be raised above the hills; all the nations shall stream to it.”
Here the world is falling apart and things seem terrible, but the prophet is talking about a future when the Lord’s house will be set on the highest mountain and every nation will flow to it like an ever-growing stream of living souls. Doesn’t he know what’s going on in the world?! Has Isaiah looked out the window, read a paper, turned on the news? It’s horrible out there! Markets are crashing. Wars are raging. People are rioting in the streets. It’s a mad world, but all he can say is “In the days to come the Lord’s house will be on the highest mountain and everybody is going to want to go there.” He’s daydreaming, got his head in the clouds. He’s preaching on and on about days unforeseen, a hope that is to come then, but what everybody wants to know is what about now?! That’s true, isn’t it? We all want to know about now. Oh sure, it’s nice to dream about the future, about the “sweet by and by,” but what are we supposed to do now?!
I can remember times when I was kid, waking up some nights and walking into the kitchen. My mom and step-dad sitting at the table; one of them would have the checkbook, while the other one sorted through the envelopes on the table. It was a regular sort of ritual in our house growing up. I can remember a few times, when some of those envelopes were pink or stamped with red ink, and they would look worried, maybe overwhelmed, and I’d ask my mom, “Is everything alright?” Momma would say to me every single time, “Everything is going to be alright.” It’s “going to be alright,” not “it is alright,” but “it’s going to be alright.” She spoke about an unforeseen future, days to come when paying the bills would be easier, when the envelopes wouldn’t stack up, when decisions would be made about which pair of shoes to by rather than which bill to pay. It was as if she said, “It’s not alright now, but it will be one day.”
That’s how I imagine these words from Isaiah. After all, they’re pretty far-fetched notions when they are weighed on the scales of present reality. The prophet speaks about a day when “Many peoples shall come and say, ‘Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob; that he may teach us his ways and that we may walk in his paths.’" A day when people will want to go to house of God—and learn?! People who call themselves religious hardly have the time or want to take the time these days to get out of bed and go learn about their faith, their God, but Isaiah, you’re telling me there’s coming a day when many people will want to go and learn (from God, God’s self no less)?
Isaiah also says that God will be the ultimate judge between the nations. Now, before too many of you get all Left Behind excited about that notion, understand that when Isaiah says, “[God] shall judge between the nations, and shall arbitrate for many peoples,” what the prophet means is that God will be the one who dissolves disputes, cancels conflicts, and wipes out the need for war. This isn’t the apocalyptic judge we’ve painted in our imagination, wielding a gavel in one hand and a thunderbolt in the other, waiting to send all “those people” to hell so the rest of “us” can go on enjoying the hereafter. This is a God who acts as judge in order to bring peace! I mean, just look at the result of such judgement from God according to the prophet: “they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more.”
Nations will stop spending trillions of dollars on weapons and war and will instead spend such resources on those things which help rather than harm? You mean to tell me, when God judges the nations, armies are going to put down their weapons, convert them into farming implements, and folks who once fought each other, soldiers who once studied the strategies and tactics of warfare will now seek to live in peace with one another while learning to walk in the path of God from God God’s self?! You mean to tell me that young men and women will no longer be used to fight the wars of the wealthy, that religion will no longer be warped as a justification for bloodshed and violence, that young children will no longer have to live in fear of bombs falling on them in hospitals, that the hunger for oil will no longer drive the will to fight, and the boundaries we so foolishly fight over will one day be erased?
And here I thought my momma was being naïve when she used to tell me everything is going to be alright.
How in the world can the prophet Isaiah speak about such wide-eyed, foolhardy notions when his world was crumbling? How can we read such words in worship in such a world where the news in our papers, on our televisions, and in our social media reminds us daily of just how messed up it all is, of just how upside-down this world we live in really is? How can we sit here in November of 2016 and decorate a room with green garland, purple paraments, candles, magi, shepherds, Mary, Joseph…? How? Well, because we have hope.
We have a hope that is greater than any single one of us, a hope that is greater than anything in this whole universe (or multi-verse[3]). We have an eternal hope, a hope that says, “It’s going to be alright,” not because we’re unsure of what the future holds, but because (as the old song says) we know who holds the future! We have the kind of hope that makes us want to decorate a tall tree with red flowers and hand wreaths in the windows. We have the kind of hope that we want to tell on the mountain, the kind of hope that calls us to love others even though they may be our enemies, the kind of hope that says the kindness we show today makes ripples on in to eternity, the kind of hope that calls us to that great mountain of God, a mountain higher than all mountains, where all the nations will flow like an ever-growing stream of souls to learn the ways of the Lord and walk in God’s path.
So, friends, as the prophet calls to the house of Jacob with such words of hope, I call to you, “come, let us walk in the light of the Lord!” Let us look forward not only to the arrival of the Christ-child at Christmas, but to those days to come, when our hope will be realized, when many will say, “Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob; that he may teach us his ways and that we may walk in his paths,” when the Lord “shall judge between the nations, and shall arbitrate for many peoples,” when the great militaries of this world “shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks,” when nation shall not lift up sword against nation,” when they “shall they learn war [no] more.” O Church, “come, let us walk in the light of the Lord,” and let us have hope! Amen!
[1] Tisdale, Leonora Tubbs. "First Sunday of Advent." In Preaching God's Transformative Justice: A Lectionary Commentary, Year A, edited by Dawn Ottoni-Wilhelm, Ronald J. Allen, & Dale P. Andrews. Louisville: Westminster/John Knox Press, 2013 (p.1).
[2] Birch, Bruce C. "First Sunday of Advent: Isaiah 2:1-5 (Exegetical Perspective)." In Feasting on the Word: Year A, Volume 1 (Advent through Transfiguration), edited by David L. Bartlett, & Barbara Brown Taylor. Loisville: Westminster/John Knox Press, 2010 (p3.).
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