Second Sunday of Advent

Jan 13 2025

Seeing Differently, through God’s Eyes

When I was in forestry school in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, I recall skiing one winter morning through a birch grove as the sun rose. The white birch bark glowed pink in the snow, reflecting the sunrise. Around me, trees had fallen, some had been chopped up for firewood. Yet each of the ancient trees had stump sprouts rising from its base. (That is the nature of birch trees.) In three years, young trees had grown fifteen feet. How so tall? They didn’t have to start from scratch; the saplings were fed by the root systems of the older trees.

Our Christian faith is like a stump sprout that rises from our Jewish roots. We share a common vision: that peace will reign and justice will thrive. Isaiah envisions a king who will make creation flourish in solidarity: even a cobra will be so tame that a baby can handle it. Together we are rooted in God’s vision, a hope for a more glowing future.

At the same time, John the Baptist bursts in wielding an axe with rough words for the Pharisees—repent! Cut down every tree that does not bear good fruit! Yet he too sees a radiant vision: One who is coming after him who will baptize with the Holy Spirit and fire!

We are rooted in God’s vision of what can be. The courage of Advent is this faith in the future. We await Christmas. We await eternity. Earthly life will be cut down and pass away, yet we live on the brink of a blessed and infinite future. That mode of seeing can fill the way that we live our lives today. Like the fiery glow in the birch forest, as people of Advent we live within the sunrise of a new day.

Consider/Discuss

Isaiah tells us that a shoot shall sprout from the stump of Jesse. None of us start from scratch either. Our faith is rooted in the faith of those who have gone before us. Our faith is now supported by those who travel with us. We hope that our faith will bear fruit in those who arise from our roots. What do each of those roots look like—past, present, and future?
In this season of preparation for the coming of Jesus, as God sees into our hearts, what is one thing that we could chop off or prune in order to bear stronger fruit?

Living and Praying with the Word

God of the future, thank you for your vision. Open our eyes to see you as you surround and enfold us on this journey. Help us to see this sunrise in which we live. We want to walk with you more robustly. We give ourselves to you this day, for you are the source of our hope. Fill us with the fullness of your peace forever. Thank you and thank you again for your goodness to us.

Jan 13 2025

Scripture Study for

Israelite kings were to act as God’s representatives, ensuring justice by ruling wisely and fairly; they often failed in this regard. In Isaiah’s vision, God raises up an ideal Davidic king who will perfectly reflect the rule of the God he represents. Endowed with divine gifts, the king will bring down the “ruthless” and the “wicked” through right judgment (“the rod of his mouth”). Further, he will usher in an era in which all creaturely violence will end. “Natural enemies” will belong to the “peaceable kingdom” brought about by the royal icon of God. Such will be the magnificence and beneficence of the kingdom that other nations will be drawn to it.

Paul reminds his Roman readers that the story of Israel, in which the promises to the ancestors were fulfilled first in ancient times and then more completely in Christ, gives evidence of God’s trustworthiness. One aspect of those promises was that all the families of the earth would find blessing through Abraham’s descendants (Genesis 12:3). Thus, the fulfillment of those promises also included the extension of God’s mercy not just to Israel but ultimately, in Jesus Christ, to all the nations. God wishes to gather all peoples together in Christ—a divine intention that encourages the Romans to seek unity among themselves.

John the Baptist’s message of repentance (metanoia, change of mind and direction) draws large crowds, who are preparing for the coming of God’s kingdom. This kingdom is understood eschatologically, as a time of consummation and judgment. Foreshadowing what is to come, John has harsh words for the religious leaders, who do not possess a repentant disposition. Anticipating a claim that they have no need of repentance to prepare themselves, John assures them that God is sending One who will see, not one’s birth status, but one’s heart, and will judge accordingly, baptizing in fire and the Holy Spirit, which is to say, with the power and wisdom of God. John’s message highlights that this is a moment of decision for everyone.

Jan 13 2025

Visions and Prophecies

Last year I went to a Christmas concert to help get myself into the Christmas spirit. The concert was moving along at a comfortable and comforting pace, enjoy able but nothing out of the ordinary, when suddenly the choir came out and sang a piece that moved me to tears. I searched the program and found its name and composer: The Dream Isaiah Saw by Glenn Rudolph. I went home and found it online, a youth choir performing it.

Its refrain brought together the passage of Isaiah we heard today and the event that we will celebrate in a few weeks. It does this very simply with several variations for the final line: “Little child whose bed is straw, take new lodgings in my heart, Bring the dream Isaiah saw: a) life redeemed from fang and claw; b) justice purifying law; c) knowledge, wisdom, worship, awe.”

Advent is a season that sets before us visionaries and prophets like Isaiah, the missionary Paul, and the herald John. Each offers us a vision of things coming together. For Isaiah, it is all creation—animal and human; for Paul, it is Jews and Gentiles; for John, it is the One who is coming to gather the wheat into his barn, God’s harvest, those baptized in the Spirit.

We are brought together each Sunday to think, live, and sing in harmony to the gracious God who has come to us in Jesus Christ, the One who came filled with the spirit of the Lord, to draw us more deeply into the life so generously offered by God.

Consider/Discuss

Does the dream of Isaiah with its pairing of opposites offer hope in our own day, when there is so much division in the world, in government, and even in the Church?
What would arouse John the Baptist’s wrath today? What in our lives can be considered as worthy wheat and as chaff to be swept up and tossed into the fire?

Responding to the Word

We pray this season that we may come to “think in harmony with one another, in keeping with Christ Jesus, that with one accord [we] may with one voice glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ” (Romans 15:5–6).

Dec 13 2024

Dressing Up

Getting “dressed up” does not seem to happen so much these days. No matter where you go, garb tends to be casual—funerals and weddings excepted (usually!). Jeans have replaced the suit, T-shirts and crew necks stand in for the traditional shirt and tie, and sneakers sub for dress shoes. Gone are most occasions when getting dressed up was de rigueur.

Today’s readings are as much a “dress-up” call as a wake-up call. Baruch calls on Jerusalem to dress up, replacing her robe of mourning and misery and putting on the splendor of glory: the cloak of justice and the headgear of glory. Her children are returning from exile, “borne aloft in glory on royal thrones.” God will see to arranging the rest of creation: mountains made low, gorges filled in, fragrant trees filling the air with their scent.

And John the Baptist is calling on the children of Israel to dress up their inner selves by undergoing a baptism of repentance, receiving God’s forgiveness of their sins, and thereby providing God a highway into their hearts, a straight path with no obstacles impeding God’s entry in glory. Then, God will dress them with salvation and fullness of life.

Paul’s words bring it home. Advent is a time to prepare for the great feast of God’s incarnate love. God, made visible in Jesus Christ, at work in us since the day we were baptized in Christ, continues to come today, bringing God’s work one step closer to completion.

Consider/Discuss

How will you “dress up” for the coming feast? What needs to be taken off? What needs to be put on?
What are you doing this Advent that invites the Lord to come in splendor? What needs to be filled in? What needs to be straightened?

Responding to the Word

God who comes, help us hear your call to prepare for you to come into our lives. May this holy season set our hearts afire with the desire to put on the garments of truth and loving kindness so your light and love may come more fully into our world.

Dec 13 2024

Scripture Study for

Jerusalem is portrayed as a grieving mother. Her sorrow is for her children carried off and scattered both east and west. Since this meant the loss of any future, Jerusalem faced extinction. This is why she is clothed in the traditional garments of mourning. The prophet directs the city to “Take off your robe of mourning and misery!” Transformed by the glory of God, Jerusalem is told to stand on the heights and witness a reversal of fortune: the captives will return rejoicing; led away on foot, they will be carried back on royal thrones. The splendor that God bestows upon Jerusalem will be revealed to all the earth.

The affection that Paul has for the Philippians flows from his appreciation of their faithfulness to the righteousness that God is accomplishing in them. Although Paul brought the good news of the gospel to these people, he acknowledges that it was really God who made it take root in their hearts, and it is God who will oversee its maturation until it is brought to completion at the day of Christ Jesus. Paul prays that their mutual love will increase, and that they will be pure and blameless for the coming day of Christ.

John the Baptist is a most fascinating figure. He comes from a priestly family (see Luke 1:5), yet he is found in the desert, a place that calls to mind the wandering of the people in the wilderness as they moved out of Egyptian bondage. His activity occurred in the region of the Jordan, the gateway to the Promised Land, the very river crossed by the people as they entered the land. Thus crossing became a symbol of their entrance into a new life. All of this somehow marks John as an agent of momentous transformation. Just as both the Exodus and the return from exile involved a desert crossing, so the end-times renewal proclaimed by John begins in the desert.