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.
This week, I came across an article from The Washington Post with these words comprising the first paragraph: “BANI SAIFAN, Yemen — The family of Osama Hassan faced a wrenching choice as his tiny body wasted away. Should they use the little money they had, in a time of war, to take the 2-year-old to a hospital? Or should they buy food to feed their other children? His family chose food.”[1]
The article includes pictures of hopeless parents holding the skeletal bodies of their young children (some just days before their deaths), a picture of an 18-year-old girl who looks like a woman entering her second century of life, and the haunting images of hospital beds with tiny, twig-like legs sticking out of white sheets and stacked rocks on the scratched ground, marking where the bodies of at least a dozen children lay. Was there some sort of widespread disease taking the lives of these children? No. Was there some deep drought that had struck the crops and the livestock so that food was scarce and the children couldn’t eat? No. Were their parents too lazy to work, too busy trying to make money to feed their families that they overlooked the needs of the very children they were working so hard to feed? No. Then why are they dying? Why are their already tiny bodies wasting away to skin, bones, and bloated bellies? One word: war.
On Friday, November 18, in the Syrian city of Aleppo, nurses and medical staff rushed to evacuate patients from a local hospital, even grabbing babies from incubators (some of them undernourished and at least one with medical tubes still attached). The hospital had been badly damaged and those babies and other patients needed to be relocated in order to receive adequate medical attention and to keep themselves safe.[2] What happened to that hospital? Had there been an earthquake? No. A terrible storm? No. Had there been some kind of freak accident that caused the power to go out and some of the walls to come crashing down? No. There had been an air raid on the city, and bombs were being dropped, even on the hospital. What caused sick babies to be snatched from their incubators and already sick and suffering patients to flee from a hospital? One word: war.
In the African country of Nigeria at least 400,000 children are at risk of starvation, 2.6 million people have been driven from their homes and displaced, and at least 6.3 million are dealing with hunger and potential starvation.[3] Has the economy crashed? Is there no food coming in? No. The country has been under the oppression of the terrorist group Boko Haram for seven years. It’s not a natural disaster, not an economic crisis driven by poor investments and greedy lenders. It’s one word: war.
Of course, it’s not just in far-away lands where the effects of war are felt. I remember living in Waco, Texas, a city that houses a VA hospital, a city where patients from that hospital would walk out its front doors and down the streets of the city. They’d walk down the highways and service roads along Interstate 35. I’d see some of them standing in the medians of busy intersections, waving wildly at the cars that passed. I’d see some of them digging through the trash cans at gas stations, sitting on the curbs of streets right off an exit, holding a cardboard sign. I had friends who told me stories about large groups of them living together in the “hobo jungles” in the park, in torn tents and half-rotted furniture. Once, they were young men and women with hopes and dreams about futures filled with families. Now, their memories keep them up at night, drive them to irrational behavior, force them to seek sanity in cheap, glass bottles or tiny pills they trade among themselves. What happened? Poor life decisions? Bad upbringing? No. It’s that same word again: war.
It’s not supposed to be like this, you know? This world, it isn’t supposed to be like this. We humans were not created for conflict, for fighting, for war. Creation wasn’t meant for this, and it shows. We’ve not only scarred each other, but we’ve scarred the very earth with our fighting. Why, there are even some places left uninhabitable on this world because of our wars, and the very thing that drives so many nations to fight is warping the weather patterns of our only planetary home in such a way that looks frightening to many. The world isn’t supposed to be like this. I suppose, however, if there is to be any consolation, any slight solace to be found in the seemingly unending conflicts of our present age, it is to be found in the reality that humankind has been this way for centuries, that such turmoil and war have not entered this world in the last few generations, but seem to have been around as long as there were at least two (groups of) people with varying ideas and an unwillingness to compromise.
The effects of war we see today were just as prevalent in the times of the first prophet Isaiah, somewhere towards the end of the eighth century B.C. Isaiah had heard of the devastation caused by the Assyrians, how they had conquered the Northern Kingdom of Israel, how they were laying waste to nations across the region, how they were turning their aggression towards the Southern Kingdom of Judah. Isaiah prophesied in the wake of Uzziah’s death of God’s coming judgement on Judah for the ways the nation was beginning to follow in the same paths of negligence, greed, and idolatry that had ensnared the Northern Kingdom. The prophet spoke of God’s coming judgement, yet he foretold of a remnant that would survive, a small number who would live to see a new day dawn for the people. It’s in that spirit of optimism that Isaiah speaks the poetic words we’ve heard this morning.
To be honest, though, these words seem a bit…well…crazy. I mean, the prophet speaks about shoots growing out of dead stumps, about a coming king who will judge by “righteousness” and “faithfulness”—not by what he sees and hears (you know, the senses most folks in positions of authority tend to use to make decisions and pass judgement). The prophet speaks about wolves lying down with lambs, leopards taking naps with baby goats, calves, lions, and fat baby sheep snuggling together while a little child rounds them up like a shepherd. He talks about cows and bears grazing in the same field while their babies play together. He speaks of a coming day filled with vegetarian lions and poisonous snakes so timid children can play with them! What is all this? What had the prophet eaten (or drunk) before he gave this prophecy? Wolves don’t live with lambs—they eat them! Cows and bears can’t graze in the same field; bears have been known to like beef! And I don’t know about you, but I’m not going to let Kohl down on the same ground if I even hear there’s a snake nearby! It just doesn’t make sense! Green shoots growing out of stumps, no hurting or destroying taking place on the “holy mountain”—I’m sorry, but I don’t pay real close attention to the news and even I know there’s hurting, killing, bombing, fighting, and all sorts of conflicts happening on that same mountain, and much of it is because so many people believe that mountain to be holy!
It all just seems crazy—impossible. It seems impossible to think that such peace, such tranquility, could ever exist in this world. It seems impossible to stop people from bombing one another over disagreements about imaginary lines. A future where no child will go hungry on account of war, famine, greed, or even natural disaster seems impossible. A time when people will cease hating one another because of where they live on this planet, or the color of their skin, or which book they call holy, or how much oil, money, or gold they have, it just seems impossible. To imagine a world where peace—the sort of peace we hope for when we light the second candle of Advent—reigns and the thought of raising arms against another human being is recognized for the sin it is…well, that just seems impossible, as if all of creation is turned upside down. Well, maybe it is.
Maybe that’s the point of all of this. Maybe that’s the point of this season and our need to wait, to hope, for peace. Maybe creation is upside down. Maybe this world is so messed up, so irreversibly, impossibly soaked with sin that to fix it, to put it back right, is impossible. Maybe it is impossible for sheep, wolves, bears, cows, snakes, and children to all live together without one biting the other. Maybe it is impossible for hurting, destroying, fighting, and conflict to cease on the “holy mountain” or anywhere in this world for that matter. Perhaps the peace we long for, the peace for which we’ve lit this candle today, perhaps such peace is truly impossible. Perhaps it is as impossible as a new, green shoot sprouting from a cut, dead stump. Maybe it’s as impossible as a nine-month-pregnant virgin. Maybe it’s as impossible as the Creator of the universe, the One who set the stars on fire, being born to a teenage girl and her soon-to-be husband in some barn about behind a motel. Perhaps it is as impossible as angels singing to shepherds and Magi following a star to worship a toddler with expensive gifts. Perhaps peace is as impossible as the death of God upon a cross or his resurrection three days later. Maybe…Maybe it is that impossible to turn creation right-side up, and if it is…well…thanks be to God, for a shoot will grow from a stump, a wolf will shack up with a lamb, a lion will eat hat from the bail, a baby will play with a snake, violence will meet its end, and the Babe of Bethlehem, the incarnate God, the crucified Christ, the resurrected Savior, the Prince of Peace will reign. Hallelujah! Amen.
[1] From the article “In Yemen’s war, trapped families ask: Which child should we save?” on The Washington Post’s website (accessed 12/2/2016): https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/middle_east/in-yemens-war-trapped-families-ask-which-child-should-we-save/2016/11/30/c2240cf4-7d60-4132-989f-2128b077efbb_story.html?hpid=hp_hp-top-table-main_yemenhunger-735pm%3Ahomepage%2Fstory&utm_term=.969b84453e85#comments
[2] From Al-Jazeera: “Syria war: Air raid hits children's hospital in Aleppo.” (accessed 12/3/2016): http://www.aljazeera.com/news/2016/11/air-strike-hits-children-hospital-syria-aleppo-161118163200380.html
[3] From The Zimbabwe Star: “Boko Haram: 400,000 children at risk of starvation in Nigeria.” (accessed 12/3/2016): http://www.zimbabwestar.com/index.php/sid/249896065
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