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Our readings this week beckon us to ask ourselves what parts of our lives and our world are yet to be transformed by grace. What are the things that are not bearing fruit of repentance, which are still in darkness and have not hit the light?
Our Old Testament reading (Isaiah 11:1-10) reminds us of the nature of our God and what his rule and reign really might look like. Even a quick glance will reveal the ways that our ideas of “rule and reign” rarely measure up. It is God who can sniff out what is true and righteous. In God’s reign, the poor are uplifted. Lest we are to think that this regime change will be like a calm, soothing cup of chamomile tea, we are shaken awake by Isaiah’s images of God striking the earth and wiping out the wicked. Yet, God does not use the weapons of the world to bring about such change. It is his word and his breath. In his kingdom, everything is different and all of expectations are upended. Even the animals which we consider predators and prey will lie down together.
If this is really what God’s kingdom looks like, God’s people are called to live into it here and now. In our New Testament reading (Romans 15:4-13), Paul calls upon the church to live in harmony. This goes far beyond mere tolerance. It is a harmony centered on the risen Christ. Jews and Gentiles can live together because this has been God’s plan all along. A shoot has “sprung up” (resurrected?) from the stump of Jesse. New life has broken through that which had been devastated. Christ is risen from the dead.
Paul’s words challenge us today. Where have we allowed cultural differences, hostilities, prejudice to separate us from others in the church? Where have we been slow to forgive?
The good news is the king is coming! And this is the thread running through all the readings to our gospel reading (Matthew 3:1-12). John is the voice crying in the wilderness. Prepare the way of the Lord! Christ’s kingship is not just a simple add-on that we can tack on the end of our ordinary, American lives. To embrace the coming king requires repentance, a whole new political orientation, meaning a whole new way of seeing the world.
C.S. Lewis said, “Fallen man is not simply an imperfect creature who needs improvement: he is a rebel who must lay down his arms.”1 Today, God is calling us to give up. We give up our morality and the badges we think we wear for it. We give up our false idols, counterfeit gods, narratives which purport to tell us how the world works. The light is growing this Advent. The way is being prepared. The paths are straightening. May we greet with joy the coming of Jesus Christ our Redeemer.
C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity, (New York: HarperCollins, 1952), 56.