Advent II: GOD’S UNSTOPPABLE PURPOSE IS FAITHFUL

December 4th, 2005
Gary Harder

Texts:     Isaiah 40:1-11
Mark 1:1-8
Introduction
Like most of you, my heart and my prayers this week have been with the Christian Peacemaker Team members in Iraq who have been abducted by “Swords of the Righteous Brigade”. James Loney, Harmeet Singh Sooden, Norman Kember and Tom Fox knew the dangers and risks of making their peace witness in Iraq. Yet their commitment to peacemaking compelled them to be there anyway. Only a few weeks ago Doug Pritchard was in Iraq meeting with the team, raising the question whether they should leave or stay. In the end they made the decision to remain in Bagdad. Four people held captive are only one very small part of a much greater violence in Iraq and around the world. And yet they are the ones who hold our particular attention because they are a part of our program, Christian Peacemaker Teams, and many of us know at least Jim Loney, who comes from Toronto.

Our Advent text today, taken from Isaiah 40, speaks poignantly to their situation. Isaiah directs his original message to a people also held hostage, to a people taken captive and living in exile, longing desperately to be released.

Isaiah speaks to the exiles in Babylon these words of hope, made so familiar to us by Handel’s Messiah, “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. Then the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all people shall see it together…” God will do it. God will open a way for you to go back home to Jerusalem.

And God did. King Cyrus of Persia, otherwise a vicious, brutal conqueror, let them go. Isaiah’s vision and promise was fulfilled.

We don’t know whether our prayers, or the prayers of Muslims from around the world, will lead to the release of these four – and of others also held hostage. There are many paths to be straightened, many valleys to be filled, many mountains and hills to be made low, much that is crocked to be made straight in order for these captives to be released, and in order for the killing to end and peace restored in Iraq. There is, apparently, a Thursday date for their execution.

But there have already been some amazing things happening in this story. CPT’s message of rejection of war and an end to violence has been proclaimed around the world. The stories and motivations of the individual CPT’ers have become front page news. And Muslim leaders from around the world, especially from Iraq and Palestine, where they have witnessed first hand CPT’s work, are speaking up in support of the team and it’s peace making witness.

We don’t know what the final personal cost will be, but already it seems some valleys are being filled in, and some mountains made low.

Before I get back to the poetry of Isaiah, I want to digress to tell you a story which may give a bit of context to Isaiah 40.

Persepolis
I want to tell you a story from the Middle East, from Persia, now Iran. It may help shed some light on how totally improbably was the release of the exiles whom Isaiah wrote his message of hope to.

One of our amazing experiences on our trip to Iran five years ago on behalf of MCC, was to visit Persepolis. Persepolis is the site of the ancient capital of Persia, located some 500 kilometers south of Tehran. You may remember the names of some of the Persian kings who are mentioned in the Old Testament. The story of Daniel talks about King Darius (522-486 BC) We hear also about his son Xerxes. The story of Ezra in the Bible has to do with King Cyrus and then King Artaxerxes.

Persepolis is the site where these kings built their palaces and where their tombs are dug into the hills. There are almost no tourists around. Only a few Iranians, and one or two Japanese tourists, wander through the ruins of magnificent palaces and statues and carved lions and historical walls engraved with the stories, in pictures, of these great kings. There is even a fine relief of the Israelites bringing tribute to Persia.

I have long enjoyed that history, and these names, and was thrilled to take a whole leisurely morning wandering through the ruins with a very knowledgeable guide. In 333 BC Alexander the Great destroyed this capital. He burned what could be burnt and massacred the Persian army. And this was unlike Alexander the Great. Usually he preserved palaces and capitals and often incorporated defeated armies into his own army.

Why then this out of character bloodletting and destruction. Why then destroy this grand complex? Apparently for revenge. Several generations earlier the Persians had destroyed Greek armies and cities without pity. The Persian army was absolutely ruthless. That story burned in Greek memory and in Alexander the Great’s soul. And now he had his chance to avenge an ancient grievance. He visited an almost total destruction on this grand site of palaces.

Why do I tell this story?    

Because only two centuries before Alexander came on the scene these same Persians – these same cruel, ruthless, power mad Persians, let the people of Israel go free, and that with their blessing. It is incomprehensible. By this time the Persians had conquered the Babylonians. Cyrus was king in place of Nebuchadnezzer. He was master of the Israelite exiles.

“In the first year of King Cyrus of Persia, in order that the word of the Lord by the mouth of Jeremiah might be accomplished, the Lord stirred up the spirit of King Cyrus of Persia so that he sent a herald throughout all his kingdom, and also in a written edict declared:

‘Thus says King Cyrus of Persia: the Lord, the God of heaven, has given me all the kingdoms of the earth and he has charged me to build him a house at Jerusalem in Judah. Any of those among you who are of his people – may their God be with them – are now permitted to go up to Jerusalem in Judah, and rebuild the house of the Lord the God of Israel.’

This is the same king who proclaimed himself to be “king of the world, great king, legitimate king, king of Babylon, king of Sumer and Akkad,, king of the four rims of the earth, great king, king of a family which always exercised kingship, great king” (Interpreters Dictionary of the Bible, volume 1, p.755).

This was the same king who destroyed Greek armies and cities wantonly, and against whom Alexander the Great finally wreaked such total revenge here at Persepolis.

Isaiah
Which brings us back to Isaiah, writing his poetry of hope before Cyrus issues his decree of release. Isaiah announces an incredible Jubilee. First Isaiah offers a tender word of hope to the exiles who have been slaves in Babylon for 70 years. “Comfort, O comfort my people, says your God. Speak tenderly to Jerusalem, and cry to her that she has served her term, that her penalty is paid, that she has received from the Lord’s hand double for all her sin.”

And then Isaiah proclaims that the captives, the exiles, will be released. The voice cries out – cries out to all people, Hebrew and Persian alike – “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. Then the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all people shall see it together, for the mouth of the Lord has spoken.”

A highway through the desert? Every mountain leveled? Every uneven piece of land leveled? All figurative language, of course, not literal. God will do it. God will remove every obstacle preventing the return of the exiles. The obstacles are overwhelming. 70 years of exile slavery. The Persians are ruthless. The Israelites are helpless. They have no army. The
y have no power. They hardly have hopes and dreams left. But God will build a straight highway on which the exiled people will walk home.

And incredibly King Cyrus says, “You can all go home. Your God wants you back in Judah. Here, I’ll help pay for the restoration of his temple in Jerusalem”. Incomprehensible.

There is an unimaginable Jubilee. The people will be able to start over, released from their captivity, and free from indebtedness.. They will reclaim their own land. There will be a redistribution of wealth. And all this happening while they were doing nothing, were in fact powerless to do anything. God would do it. God did it. God removed all the obstacles, lifting up every valley and making low every mountain so that the people could go home. And in that the glory of the Lord was revealed to all flesh. All people could see it and marvel.

Isaiah’s poetry continues, now on a very somber note. “A voice says, ‘Cry out!’. And I said, ‘What shall I cry?’ All people are grass, their constancy is like the flower of the field. The grass withers, the flower fades, when the breath of the Lord blows upon it; surely the people are grass. The grass withers, the flower fades; but the world of our God will stand forever.”

When I read the first part of Isaiah 40 I always hear Handel’s Messiah. When I read these verses I always hear Brahm’s Requiem. I hear the heavy, throbbing, almost endless funeral march. I feel my own mortality. I know I will walk a limited time span on this earth. And it is meant to be that way. And I need to accept that.

“But the word of our God will stand forever”. My time frame, and my outlook are so small, and the mountains before me so huge. God’s time frame and outlook are so huge, and sees the mountains before me as so small. And that does give me some comfort.

The poetry continues, with repeated cadences of Good News. Remember, this poetry is still directed to exiles before they are set free – exiles who are in despair and feeling hopeless and thinking maybe that the Babylonians gods are stronger than Yahweh God.

“Get you up to a high mountain, O Zion, herald of good tidings; lift up your voice with strength, O Jerusalem, herald of good tidings, lift it up, do not fear; say to the cities of Judah, ‘Here is your God!'”

The messenger is to run to report the tidings of the outcome of the great battle. Like the Greek runner running to Marathon to deliver news of victory. Run from the place of combat between Yahweh God and the gods of Babylon, and cry out news of Yahweh’s victory. “See, your God reigns. Your God has defeated the gods of Babylon. You will now be able to go home. You need no longer cringe and defer and obey the forces of Babylonian power – it’s culture, it’s religion. Your world is being turned toward freedom and well-being. You need no longer bow to the seduction of Babylonian values and gods. You are being liberated. The gods of the empire have been defeated. Yahweh reigns. Start living already toward that freedom even while you are still in Babylon.”

“See, the Lord God comes with might, and his arm rules for him…”

And then follows that exquisitely tender verse. This Yahweh God who is in battle defeating the Babylonian gods, and who comes with might, comes to the exiles with such tenderness.

“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”

The good news proclaimed by the messenger is both that Yahweh God has defeated the power of Babylonian empire and the god’s that sustain it’s hold on power, and that this God now comes in tenderness and compassion to gather the exiles, young and old, to lead them gently back home.

Conclusion
The poetry of Isaiah continues to speak it’s comforting, freeing message of Good News. Good news for all captives – for captives held hostage in Iraq by extremists, and for captives – any and all of us – held hostage by the false and shallow values of our world and our culture. An Isaiah voice is crying out in the wilderness of lostness and broken-ness and abuse and violence and selfishness and secularism that the Lord is coming. Valleys are being lifted up, mountains leveled off, crooked paths straightened out, rough patches smoothed out because the Messiah, Jesus, is coming and everyone will be able to see the salvation of God. God is coming to our home in a special way, incarnating his tenderness and love in Jesus. And this can set us all free.

Jesus
This Jesus will show us most clearly what God is like, and what God expects and wants from us. Jesus will show that God is an astoundingly loving, compassionate, forgiving God. Jesus will show us a God who gently invites us to heal our broken-ness, to realize that we do need God’s love and help in our lives. He will show us where home is and tell us, “follow me on that highway”. Jesus will demonstrate by his life and by his death and Resurrection that love and forgiveness is more powerful far than violence and revenge.

And we? We are invited to wait. Just wait. God will do it. God is faithful.

“Comfort, O comfort my people, says your God… The glory of the Lord shall be revealed…”