The text for this sermon is Isaiah 35:1-10. Pastor Jim Kniseley
presented this sermon at Resurrection on December 12, 2010, the 3rd
Sunday of Advent.
Grace,
mercy and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
Amen.
My sermon today is for
folks who need a dose of grace and hope in their lives. Most of us here know something about being
cast into situations in our lives that seem utterly hopeless and we wonder if
anything good can come out of our distress.
The Old Testament prophet Isaiah is a good one to turn to today. He is the one that we quote so often in the
Season of Advent. Isaiah prophesied 700
years before Christ and it is amazing how accurate he is in describing Jesus as
God’s Promised Messiah.
Isaiah’s job as
prophet is to continually call the people to trust and faithfulness to God in
their lives. There is an added dimension
of imminent danger in Isaiah’s day. The
Assyrian empire was expanding and soon would obliterate the northern kingdom of
Israel. Isaiah prophesied to Judah, the
southern kingdom, that someday they too would face a terrible defeat. Many of their people would be carried off
into slavery in Babylon. Isaiah said
that would be their punishment for idolatry, worshipping other gods and not
putting their trust in Yahweh God. He
said this 100 years
before it actually happened.
But happen it did, in the year 586 B.C.
Someone has pointed
out that the structure of the Book of Isaiah is like a miniature Bible. The Bible has 39 books in the Old Testament
and 27 books in the New Testament. The
first 39 chapters depict judgment and condemnation upon an immoral and
idolatrous people. The last 27 books
declare a message of comfort and hope, for the Messiah is coming as King and
Savior.
People of
Resurrection, where do dwell in your religious faith these days? Do you live in the first 39 chapters of
Isaiah or the last 27 chapters of Isaiah?
Is your outlook on life governed by fear and expectation of
punishment? Or, are you dwelling in the
hope of God’s mercy and salvation?
People have all sorts
of opinions about pastors and I ran into an unexpected opinion when I showed up
for jury some years ago in San Diego. My
number was called and I was en-paneled for a murder trial. A seventeen-year-old male was accused of
killing another male in a fight outside a 7-ll convenience store. The defense lawyer asked a few question and
declared I was acceptable for the jury.
The prosecution lawyer asked me fewer questions and declared I was unacceptable
for the jury and I was dismissed. I
asked an attorney friend about that since I was willing to serve. He told me that I was probably dismissed by
the prosecution because “pastors are expected to be merciful.”
I thought about that
statement last year when we were having hot and heavy discussions about the
ELCA Decisions. Someone yelled at me,
“What about repentance!” I wanted to
yell back “What about God’s grace!” I
plead guilty. I rely more on God’s grace
than I do on God’s punishment.
God’s grace is
presented abundantly in Isaiah through the numerous messianic prophecies. The book unveils God “the Holy One of Israel”
who punishes his rebellious people, yes, but ends up redeeming them. In case anyone misses it, the very name
Isaiah means in Hebrew “The Lord saves.”
The particular reading
we have today from Isaiah concerns his vision of what will happen when the
people of Israel are released from their bondage and are sent home. The images are wonderful and we can read into
them our ultimate experience of going to heaven and even our experience here on
earth when times of distress are lifted.
In Isaiah’s mind, he
is describing leaving Babylon and walking through the wilderness on their way
back to Jerusalem and Judah. The parched
desert sand shall become fertile soil and the plants will grow and blossom and
there will be flowers. The land and the
plants and the flowers all will sing.
All fear will be gone. The glory
of the Lord will be revealed.
Here’s the tie to
Jesus in this messianic prophecy by Isaiah:
“Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf
unstopped; then the lame shall leap like a deer, and
the tongue of the speechless sing for joy…”
Do you remember that Jesus went into the synagogue at Nazareth and read
similar words from the 61st chapter of the prophet Isaiah, and then
declared that all this was happening now. In other words, he was declaring that he was
the fulfillment of this prophecy; he was the Lord’s anointed Messiah. Further, in our gospel reading today, John
the Baptist’s disciples ask Jesus if he really is the Messiah and Jesus tells
them, “Go and tell John what you hear and see: the blind receive their sight,
the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and
the poor have good news brought to them.”
Isaiah said that these would be signs of the messianic kingdom, the
restored kingdom of Judah. We Christians
understand a broader message that Jesus is God’s Messiah and all these things
take place because of Jesus.
There is an image of
the Messiah and his people that I want us to look at today. In chapters 42 through 53, the Lord calls his
Messiah “my servant.” We can understand
this being applied to one person, but the idea is applied to Israel as a nation. It is through the suffering servant that
salvation in its fullest sense is achieved.
How does this apply to us today?
There are going to be times in our lives as Christians, as the Body of
Christ, as Resurrection People, that we will called
upon to suffer for the sake of the gospel of Christ. We must not be tempted to avoid suffering at all
costs or to see that suffering is only a bad thing. Dietrich Bonheoffer, the Lutheran pastor put
to death by the Nazis, wrote that “we cheapen the cross of Christ when we look
only at the rewards and not the cost.”
Martin Luther prayed that all followers of Jesus would understand the
difference between the theology of glory and the theology of the cross. So many in our world and in
our churches understand that church life is all about worldly success, with
growing budgets and growing attendance and wonderful buildings and the
adoration of the culture. The
theology of the cross calls for following Christ wherever that leads and often
means failure in the eyes of the world and suffering for the sake of Christ.
Resurrection People,
look for signs of God’s grace and hope.
We don’t have to wait until the end of our lives and heaven for such
evidence. Here in this congregation, you
represent God’s grace and hope for the future.
Your faithfulness in the face of adversity is a sign of grace and hope. Our children, and the numbers are growing
around here, are signs of God’s grace and hope.
Those here who stand up for the marginalized and outcast of our society
are signs of God’s grace and hope.
Finally the capacity to reach out with the good news of Jesus Christ is
being enlarged around here these days, and that too is a sign of God’s grace
and hope.
May God grant all of us grace and hope
to prepare our hearts and minds for receiving him again at Christmas.
Amen.