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.
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;
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.
Righteousness shall be the belt around his waist,
and faithfulness the belt around his loins.
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.
The cow and the bear shall graze,
their young shall lie down together;
and the lion shall eat straw like the ox.
The nursing child shall play over the hole of the asp,
and the weaned child shall put its hand on the adder’s den.
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.
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.
Romans 15:4-13
Whatever was written in former days was written for our instruction, so that by steadfastness and by the encouragement of the scriptures we might have hope. May the God of steadfastness and encouragement grant you to live in harmony with one another, in accordance with Christ Jesus, so that together you may with one voice glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Welcome one another, therefore, just as Christ has welcomed you, for the glory of God. For I tell you that Christ has become a servant of the circumcised on behalf of the truth of God in order that he might confirm the promises given to the patriarchs, and in order that the Gentiles might glorify God for his mercy. As it is written,
“Therefore I will confess you among the Gentiles,
and sing praises to your name”;
and again he says,
“Rejoice, O Gentiles, with his people”;
and again,
“Praise the Lord, all you Gentiles,
and let all the peoples praise him”;
and again Isaiah says,
“The root of Jesse shall come,
the one who rises to rule the Gentiles;
in him the Gentiles shall hope.”
May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that you may abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.
Matthew 3:1-12
In those days John the Baptist appeared in the wilderness of Judea, proclaiming, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near.” This is the one of whom the prophet Isaiah spoke when he said,
“The voice of one crying out in the wilderness:
‘Prepare the way of the Lord,
make his paths straight.’ ”
Now John wore clothing of camel’s hair with a leather belt around his waist, and his food was locusts and wild honey. Then the people of Jerusalem and all Judea were going out to him, and all the region along the Jordan, and they were baptized by him in the river Jordan, confessing their sins.
But when he saw many Pharisees and Sadducees coming for baptism, he said to them, “You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come? Bear fruit worthy of repentance. Do not presume to say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham as our ancestor’; for I tell you, God is able from these stones to raise up children to Abraham. Even now the ax is lying at the root of the trees; every tree therefore that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire.
“I baptize you with water for repentance, but one who is more powerful than I is coming after me; I am not worthy to carry his sandals. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire. His winnowing fork is in his hand, and he will clear his threshing floor and will gather his wheat into the granary; but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire.”
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There is a treasure that I uncover anew each Advent.
It’s a sneaky recording that Matt made six or so years ago, while my parents and sisters and I were gathered around the piano at Christmas, rehearsing an anthem that we would be singing together in church. Mind you, we are a family that sings. If we hadn’t been rehearsing for church, we might just as likely have been singing carols, or my dad’s latest Christmas song (he wrote one every year!).
On this particular recording, my mom takes one for the team, serving both as accompanist and makeshift tenor. The first simple chords roll, and then we sing:
Peace, peace, wonderful peace,
Peace to the world is given,
Hushed are the angels so still in the night,
Then in the East shown a heavenly light,
Join in the chorus, His praises sing!
Glory to God to the newly born King.
Peace, peace, wonderful peace,
Peace to the world is given.
Peace, peace. Wonderful peace.
How many of us wish that we could bask in Isaiah’s dream this morning? That picture of a word at peace, wonderful peace.
If the curse in the garden was that there might be enmity between humankind and between creation, then the rest of our story is our longing for peace to return.
Peace is what we would have wanted for Cain and Abel, what we would hope for Jacob and Esau, what we wished for Israel and Judah over against Assyria and Babylon. Peace is what we wanted established through the reign of Saul or Solomon or David.
Peace is what we yet long for when all of these crumble.
Peace is what the prophets sing about, to a people at war and under destruction and in exile.
Peace is the cry in the wilderness, to a people in need of renewed hearts and repentant lives.
Peace, peace. Wonderful peace.
Consider this: Our current generation of children do not know a time when we have not been at war.
And how many of us do not know a time when we have not been at war within ourselves or in conflict with one another?
And the raging of wildfires and typhoons across the globe in recent days shows us that our planet itself is not at peace.
We are weary. We long for peace.
We are weary. And perhaps we are so weary that peace seems too hard. Too impossible. Too much work for our exhausted bones.
It is the temptation, isn’t it, to resign ourselves to a world of division and discord. To feel dissatisfied with a conflicted world, but to feel powerless to change it. Wonderful peace sounds wonderful. It also sounds like a dream too lofty to every hope to attain. The world is simply too wild to be tamed.
Here is where Isaiah and John have something to teach us.
For them, the wilderness of the world is precisely the place where peace can be cultivated. In in the wildest of spaces, peace can be found and learned. The wilderness is a place of possibility and hope, and not a place of resignation and despair.
As I read Isaiah and John, my mind brings me back to the beautiful Wendell Berry poem, "The Peace of Wild Things:"
When despair for the world grows in me
and I wake in the night at the least sound
in fear of what my life and my children’s lives may be,
I go and lie down where the wood drake
rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.
I come into the peace of wild things
who do not tax their lives with forethought
of grief. I come into the presence of still water.
And I feel above me the day-blind stars
waiting with their light. For a time
I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.
Isaiah and John call us back to the orders of creation, to the beauty of God’s handiwork, to the unhindered freedom of nature: the grace of the world that sets us free; the grace of the world leads us to peace.
Isaiah and John (and Wendell Berry!) teach us that that peace is not an insurmountable monolith of a task, but instead, that the seeds of peace are already sown all around us, in small graces and in measured moments of beauty.
Peace looks like creatures at rest. Peace looks like level ground and straight paths and creation free to bloom again.
Peace looks like a star in the night sky and an angel chorus singing “glory to God in the highest and on earth peace.”
Peace sounds like the cry of a newborn child who will one day say, “My peace I give to you, but this peace is unlike anything this world can give; do not let your hearts be troubled. Do not let them be afraid.”
Peace, peace. Wonderful peace.
The wings of peace are stirring, dear ones. They are calling us. They are stirring up hope in our hearts, and they are flying around us with reckless abandon to inspire us, to encourage us, to empower us. To remind us that in every moment of our lives, God is working peace in our hearts and God is working peace through our deeds and the peaceable kingdom of which we dream begins with many small acts of peace, each of us, creating peace as we are able, as the opportunity arises.
“Let there be peace on earth,” a different song goes, “and let it begin with me.”
Peace begins with a walk in the wilderness. Peace begins when we leave behind our constraints and our expectations, even just for a moment, when we step away from what makes us feel secure and step into a place where we can be soft and vulnerable.
Peace begins when we stand beside the loud splashing of a moving river that drowns out all other sound; when we cannot hear the old voices in our heads that prompt us toward arrogance or anxiety, but are forced to listen, in silence, to the world rushing around us.
Peace begins when we sit down beside one another, even if we are still on the path toward reconciliation. Peace begins when we feed each other and play with one another and remain in the same room with one another even when we do not agree with or understand one another.
Peace does not mean a lack of accountability - John makes sure we know this, what with that whole “brood of vipers” thing and all. But peace means that we remember that repentance is always on the table, for ourselves and for others. Peace means that we can work on our hearts and we can work on our differences and we can grow and change. And we can let others grow and change, too. And on this path of repentance, we can choose to coexist instead of trying to expose and embarrass one another or hold onto old grudges, old resentment.
Peace begins when our wildest, truest selves make space for the wildest, truest selves of others; when we open ourselves to embracing one another, singing and spinning with our arms outstretched, not trampling creation but dancing with it; not trying to tame the world but instead seeking to live in harmony with it.
As Paul says, “May the God of steadfastness and encouragement grant you to live in harmony with one another - at peace with one another - in accordance with Christ Jesus.”
Peace, peace. Wonderful peace.
Peace is our hope and it is our prayer. It is the gift of the Christ-child in the manger. It is our gift to the world. It is the song of the angels and the benediction of Christ and the blessing begun among us for the sake of all creation.
And so we close together as we began; with singing. Singing our hope and singing God’s light. Singing the peaceable kingdom into being.
For lo! The days are hastening on, by prophets seen of old,
when with the ever circling years shall come the time foretold,
when peace shall over all the earth its ancient splendors fling,
and all the world give back the song which now the angels sing. (It Came Upon the Midnight Clear, verse 4)
This day and all days,
May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that you may abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.
Amen.