Introduction

"Comfort, O Comfort my people…speak tenderly…tell them that this is over…enough suffering for the mistakes…the consequences themselves have provided the penance…this is the day when it starts to get better."  Obviously, I have paraphrased the familiar words of Isaiah’s 40th chapter.  These words are comforting even if we don’t stop to explore their meaning.  Their familiarity alone has power to comfort.

The church waits at Advent for a decisive action from God.  We wait for God to come into the world and begin to make it right.  And so we wait as those who are feeling the strain of all that is not right.  Apart from its poetic imagery and beautiful rhythm as spoken word, there are within this text, rich resources to be teased out of the images and phrases.  There is, within these familiar words, the Word that comes to comfort us.

And so today, on the second Sunday of Advent, I invite us to consider, first, that we all, from time to time, have need of comfort in our own very personal and unique lives.  Secondly, as the church, we have something to say to one another about God, the comforter, who comes to us.

Our Own Need for Comfort

Every good story, and therefore, every good movie has a turning point.  It’s the scene when the music swells, the lighting changes, the cinematographer frames the scene more tightly, and the dialogue is crisp and clear.  It is the moment when the plot turns toward resolution.  The opening verses of Isaiah 40 are just such a moment.  These are the opening verses of the third section of Isaiah.  It is a new voice that speaks, and it speaks of a new day for the people of Israel.  Neatly tying up the loose ends of the plot, these verses turn Israel toward a hopeful future.

Our human situation is such that we live amid sin.  Sometimes we are the sinners.  Sometimes we are the victims of the sin of others.  Systems and structures in which we must participate are less than just, always short of perfect, and create winners and losers, victims and perpetrators in ways that have little to do with personal choice.  Often, we are mired in a complex web of sin with enough blame and consequences to go around for everyone.  It is the great human tragedy that we can never prevent our involvement, nor fully extricate ourselves from the consequences of human sin.

The prophet acknowledges that it has been Israel’s unfaithfulness to the covenant that has caused the destruction and brokenness of the exile.

Humans are pretty good at breaking things.  Relationships.  Hearts.  Dreams.  Promises.  We disappoint others and ourselves.  Sometimes we deny it.  Psychologists can tell us the defense mechanisms we use to deflect responsibility.  But a good deal of the time, we know it.  We are in pain.  And others are in pain.  And there is a deep chasm between us and them which seems unbridgeable.

As Isaiah reminds us, we are broken by the experience of living in the world, for reasons that have nothing to do without own choices.  We live in a world where people are like grass…we are in this world for too, too brief a time.  I know that for several in our own congregation, this awareness has been very, very real in these recent days.

Suffering from consequences that cannot be avoided; struggling with situations that seem as though they can never be resolved, unable to undo what has been done, we are in danger of losing hope.  Every story of suffering, personal, corporate and cosmic, cries out for a turning point.

Israel and God stand at such a turning point.  Israel is in a relationship with one who reaches from beyond, who is not bound by the circumstances of this world, who is free to create anew, and who stands ready to let bygones be bygones; to let the past be past; to forgo any further punishment.

Advent is a stage on our spiritual journey through which we pass, liturgically, once a year.  Some years, more than others, we arrive at this place in the liturgical year at exactly the moment when we need a turning point in our own lives.

Is there anybody who is at that place?  Is there somebody who is ready for this kind of turning point…who wants to see hope through the fog of grief, who wants to see healing beyond the hurt, who wants the difficulty they’re in the middle of to be over, who wants the past to be the past and the darkness to give way to the light, who is ready to let go of anger and resentment and find peace?  Anybody?

There is a way … God makes this way.  Isaiah, and much later, echoing Isaiah’s words, John the Baptizer, announce that the way is unfolding.

"In the wilderness prepare the way of the Lord, make straight in the desert a highway for our God.  Every valley shall be lifted up, and every mountain and hill be made low; the uneven ground shall become level, and the rough places a plain."

Like every meaningful journey, it is a way that has its hazards to meet, its obstacles to overcome.  There are crooked places to be navigated; high places to be scaled; low places to be crossed.  Moving across this journey from the broken places to the joyful places is a cooperative effort.  If it is God who makes possible the turning point, but it is God’s people who must do the turning, take to the highway, and make the journey from where we now find ourselves to the promised land of salvation, redemption, second chances, and new beginnings.

Every journey, as we well know, begins with a first step.

First, we must accept that the consequences are…they cannot be changed.  Neither do they have to continue to cause pain to us or to others.

Repentance means turning.  We must turn away from self protection, and turn towards the one or the ones with whom we have broken trust in humble apology, and in honest sorrow for what we have done.

And then we must work to rebuild relationships.  We must make the extra effort to make the rough places smooth, to make the difficult places negotiable, to make the low places bearable.  The troubles that we’ve caused and the situations that have caused us trouble do not just disappear.  There is a highway.  With valleys and mountains.  Through the wilderness.  We must travel our own journey.

Isaiah has news for those who are ready to make this journey.  Help is coming.

See, the Lord God comes with might, and his arm rules for him; his reward is with him, and his recompense before him.  He will feed his flock like a shepherd; he will gather the lambs in his arms, and carry them in his bosom, and gently lead the mother sheep.

Our God is both strong and tender.  Our God is both mighty and gentle.

God needs to judge us, and discipline us – because we are broken human beings.

But God longs to lead us, to shape us, to redeem us- because we are God’s beloved broken ones.

The great human story turns on this movement of the plot.  We are not alone in history, or in time, or in this world.  No thing that is broken is beyond the reach of our God.  And Isaiah comes to turn us toward Bethlehem, just at this time, just when we need to know that there is hope.

In the birth, life and death of Jesus, called by the church the Christ, we discover that there is no place too dark or terrible or hopeless or broken where God will not go with us and for us.

When Christmas comes, and there is just this:  love creating a new life, those who have turned toward Bethlehem will surely be able to cry, “Here is your God!”

Clearly, undeniably, as sure as breath comes to a newborn, as surely as grain gives life to bread, as surely as the fruit of the vine flows into a cup… here is your God with you.

Every invitation to Holy Communion is a potential turning point in my life and in yours; it is a potential turning point for the world.  Here is bread offered to all.  Here is juice, poured into a common cup for all.

Here is a chance to let God feed your soul, soothe your sorrow, tenderly call you and set your feet on the path toward the joy and light and hope and life that comes when the desert has been crossed, the mountain has been scaled, the valleys have been traversed and all that cries out for healing has been made whole.

What Shall we Way About our God?

The cry of the church is this:  “Here is your God, come to save you.”  Amen and Amen.