What’s the first thing that comes to your
mind when I say the word “wilderness”?
Perhaps for some of you, the wilderness is
a place of adventure and excitement, a place of escape, a place where you
experience communion with God as Creator.
I suspect that for others of us, wilderness
brings to mind images of isolation, of rugged terrain and wild animals, of
being at the mercy of the elements, of discomfort.
Back in the day, I spent several summers
working at Manitoba Pioneer Camp. MPC is located on an island on Shoal Lake,
just past Falcon Lake across the Ontario border. To reach the camp, you have to
turn off the Trans Canada Highway onto the gravel road that leads to Shoal Lake
First Nation Bands 39 and 40. From the dock, located on the land of band 39,
it’s a twenty-minute boat ride from the mainland to the island where the camp
is located.
Because the land around the camp is largely
undeveloped, being at camp is being
surrounded by wilderness. The fact that the only way in or out is by boat only
adds to the wilderness feel.
MPC has always had an emphasis on canoe
tripping—inviting staff and campers to go in small cabin groups out into the
wilderness together. The first time I was to lead such a canoe trip with a
group of 10-12 year-olds, I vividly recall waking up to hear the wind blowing
against the walls of the cabin and the sound of large waves crashing up against
the rocky shoreline. I have what I’d describe as a healthy fear of the
wilderness to begin with, and I had already been protesting that I wasn’t ready
to be the leader of the trip—so the sounds that the lake makes when under a
small craft warning were So. Not. Welcome. I believe my prayer that morning was
something along the lines of, “Dear Jesus, Please don’t make me do this.”
Mercifully, the weather was deemed
unsuitable for a canoe trip by a group of fairly inexperienced canoeists, and
instead we were sent hiking to a site at the other end of the island, along
something one might loosely describe as a trail through the woods—in reality,
in many places we were bushwhacking, following the shoreline to be sure that we
weren’t wandering around in circles.
The next morning, though, the winds had
died down and we hiked back to the main site to be sent off on our previously
scheduled canoe trip. The lake was calm, and we had an uneventful trip—until we
arrived at the island where we were to spend the night and got our tents set
up. Just as we finished getting the gear unloaded into the tents and a tarp set
up over the fire, the heavens opened up and the winds picked up, and a
torrential rainstorm started that wouldn’t stop until well into the night. It
took forever to cook our supper, because the only wood we had to keep the fire
going was wet, and when we had finally fed everyone, I went up to check on the
campsite only to find that two out of our three tents had flooded, with
everything in them floating on several inches of water. We spent that night
with thirteen people huddled together in a six-person tent, packed so tightly
that if one person rolled over, everyone had to roll over, and I couldn’t straighten
my legs lest I kick one of my campers in the face.
The point is, the wilderness is
unpredictable. It’s a place where we are very clearly not in control—for better
or for worse. In the wilderness, we find ourselves at the mercy of the
elements, far from home, stripped down to the bare essentials.
The wilderness is also very often the place
where God meets us.
For the people of Judah, their particular
wilderness was Babylon, where they had been living in exile. The holy city of
Jerusalem had been destroyed, its walls pulled down, the Temple burned, and the
Davidic lineage removed from the throne. Now they found themselves far from
home, stripped of their culture and their religious freedom, at the mercy of
foreign powers determined to strip them of their identity as a people.
Powerless and homesick, and faced with the fear that their current situation
was a reflection of God’s abandonment, of punishment for their sins as a
nation—this was a wilderness experience indeed!
Then, out of nowhere, into this wilderness,
amidst the fears and the tears of a people in exile, the prophet Isaiah spoke
these words—our Scripture reading for this second Sunday of Advent.
(Scripture Reading: Isaiah 40:1-11)
Can you imagine the impact these words must
have had on a people who had known such pain and despair? Comfort my people,
commands God. Speak tenderly to them, and tell them that their sin has been
paid for, that the hard times are over. Make way for the Lord—pave a highway
through the desert, fill in the valleys, level the mountains, smooth over the
rugged terrain, because I am coming to save my people. They’re about to see my
glory!
These words are words of Good News. These
words are what salvation sounds like. Into years of seeming abandonment by God,
into the void left by the destruction of the Temple and the struggle to
maintain their identity as God’s chosen people, comes this promise that God has
not forgotten God’s people, nor is God blind to their suffering. No, God has
seen, and things are about to change—comfort in place of tears, hope in place
of fears. God will not allow anything—not desert wasteland, nor deep valleys of
despair, nor the long, mountainous uphill battles—God will not allow anything
to stand between God and God’s people. All of these barriers are all to be
leveled, in order to hasten God’s return to rescue the people and restore them
to God’s presence once more.
So often, God meets us in the midst of the
wilderness—in the place where we feel most powerless, where we feel farthest
from home, in the place where we feel like we are at the mercy of elements
beyond our control. It’s in that very place of exile, of wilderness wandering,
that we spot the burning bush, or find ourselves following a star, or watch in
awe as Jesus commands the wind and the waves to be still—and they respond! Just
when we suspect that God has abandoned us, given up on us, turned God’s back on
us, we hear a voice beckoning, speaking unexpected words of comfort. We find
ourselves once again in the company of the Good Shepherd, who gathers his lambs
in his arms and carries them close to his heart, speaking tenderly to them and
reassuring them that his word endures forever.
The good news of the Lord’s coming is not
only for exiles in Babylon in 540 B.C. The beginning of the Good News about
Jesus also first emerges in the wilderness, in the person of wild-haired,
wild-eyed John the Baptist in his camel’s hair robe, munching on locusts and
wild honey. And it continues to be good news for those who find themselves in
the wilderness today: for the person who finds himself homeless and alone; for
the scared young woman faced with an unexpected, unplanned pregnancy; for the
family displaced by war; for the single mother who finds herself unemployed at
Christmas, unsure of how to provide any sort of festivities for her children;
and for the young man who finds himself cast out because his family cannot come
to terms with his sexuality. For each of these, and so many others, the gospel
comes as good news—words of comfort, hope, and tender embrace from the One who
longs to gather all of his flock into
his arms and cradle them next to his chest.
The good news is the same today as it was
in Babylon in 540 B.C., and as it was almost 600 years later when John the
Baptist showed up on the scene to prepare the way for the coming of Jesus the
Messiah. The good news of Advent is the reminder that God is coming to speak
comfort to people who feel lost in the wilderness, and to bring good news to
people longing for God’s coming. God has not forgotten any of God’s children;
and although we may have begun to wonder if God had forgotten us, rescue is on
the way!
The good news that God has not forgotten
us, that God is returning to set all things right, that the Kingdom of God has
already been inaugurated in the person of Jesus Christ, is needed just as much
this Advent as it ever has been. In the wilderness of the man facing his first
Christmas without his wife. In the hospital room where a family keeps vigil,
facing the uncertainty of a difficult diagnosis together. In the lineup at the
local food bank, where a sense of community has formed among the clients who
gather to collect some much-needed sustenance, both of food and fellowship. In
the room in the personal care home where a woman sits, surrounded by the ache
of loneliness, as one day blends into another. In the life of the dearly loved
child of God who struggles daily to hold onto faith when the anxiety and
depression and sense of God’s absence threaten to overwhelm.
The season of Advent invites us to open our
hearts, to pay attention, to be attentive to the promise that God wants to make
a road through the hills and valleys of our world to gather God’s people to
Godself once again.
For those of us who find ourselves even
this morning wearily trekking through the wilderness, we are promised that God
has not forgotten us. Even now, God longs to gather us into God’s arms. We are
not alone. Comfort and rescue are on the way. Jesus is coming!
But I think there’s more here, for those of
us who are followers of Christ—for those of us who have heard and received this
message of good news already. In this passage, there is also an invitation—a
call to proclaim even now, in anticipation of what God is about to do, that God
is on the way. To speak tenderly to wounded people longing to hear that they
aren’t alone. To bring words of comfort to people who may have forgotten, in
the midst of storms and struggles, that they are children of God. To prepare
the way for the Lord—leveling rough ground, filling in the valleys, tearing
down the mountains—in order to prepare for that day when God’s Kingdom will
come in full.
The interesting thing about Isaiah 40 is
that the word “comfort” in the first verse is not a noun, as I had always
assumed it was, but a verb in the plural imperative voice—It is a command:
“Comfort my people.” Listen to all of the verbs in this passage: Comfort. Speak
tenderly. Proclaim forgiveness. Prepare the way for the Lord. Make straight in
the desert a highway for our God. Cry out. Bring good news. Lift up your voice,
and say to the people, “Here is your God!”
What does this kind of startling comfort
look like in our world today? I suspect that it begins with a willingness to
commit to patient and attentive waiting—the discipline traditionally associated
with the Advent season. What if we were to pray for eyes to see the people
around us who are longing even now for a little good news? What if we were to
ask God to open our eyes to the places and situations where we might engage in
a little road work of our own—perhaps that means visiting a lonely senior, or
taking a meal to a young single mother and her children, or taking the time to
listen deeply to a hurting person and offering the gift of prayer and presence.
Road work can be hard work—it’s not easy to
build highways in the desert, to level mountains and fill in valleys—but
instead of letting the magnitude of the task overwhelm us, maybe we can begin
with moving just one stone. And then another. And see where it leads us.
For the glory of the Lord will be revealed,
and all people will see it together. And oh, what a day that will be!
Amen.
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