SPEAK TENDERLY

December 4, 2011
Advent 2
Isaiah 40:1-11
Mark 1:1-8

(prayer)

The Hebrew word for preacher is קֹהֶלֶת‎‎ (ko-he’-let). ‘Qoheleth’ is the title of one of the books of the Hebrew Bible: the Old Testament. We are more familiar with this book by its Greek-rooted name, ‘Ecclesiastes’ (which means ‘member of the assembly’). This preacher’s most familiar words from the book of Ecclesiastes remind us that: “For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven” (Eccl 3:1). The preacher goes on to list several examples of opposite, but common, life experiences, like:

• a time to be born, and a time to die;

• a time to plant, and a time to harvest;

• a time to weep, and a time to laugh;

• a time to keep silence, and a time to speak;

It is good to be reminded that different times have different needs and opportunities.

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Even though Isaiah, chapter one, verse one identifies the author as Isaiah, the son of Amoz, the full book of Isaiah is thought to actually be at least two books. Isaiah appears to have two maybe three authors: each writing in a different time into a different context of the lives of the people of Judah. The book as a whole must have been skillfully edited together later to give it a common flow and feeling.

The first half of Isaiah (chapters 1-39) comes from a prophet who lived in Judah, likely in Jerusalem: it was probably Isaiah, son of Amoz, as it says at the start of the book. This Isaiah is the same person who is named in the books of 2nd Kings and 2nd Chronicles as a trusted counsellor and advisor to King Hezekiah and three of his predecessors. The Isaiah of chapters 1-39, lived in the Southern Hebrew Kingdom of Judah in the time of the divided kingdom. He lived through the time when the Kingdom of Israel in the north was overrun by the Assyrian Empire. However, even if Isaiah served as a prophet to kings for 60-plus years as some scholars speculate, he would have died before the southern kingdom was invaded by the Babylonians, which led to most of the people of Judah being forced into exile.

So, we can call Isaiah a “pre-exilic” prophet.

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When we read on in the book of Isaiah, chapter 40 marks a distinct change in tone. Beginning with chapter 40, we are reading words written ‘during’ the Babylonian exile. We can see that as we look at the first eleven verses today. The imagery...is of Jerusalem imprisoned. The people are comforted by the prophet for their hardship and for the hardship of Jerusalem: the physical abode of their life and faith.

The prophet then describes what we could call a second exodus. While Moses of old led the people across the obstacle of the Red Sea, in this time and place, it was land - it was a wilderness - that stood between the people in exile and their home in Judah.

3A voice cries out: ‘In the wilderness prepare the way of the LORD, make straight in the desert a highway for our God. 4Every 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.

It is a beautiful passage. Imagine a rough and rugged wilderness being transformed so that it contained a straight level highway. I think the imagery of the trans-continental railways is comparable. Trains can handle a bit of grade-variance, but for the most part, if there is a valley, a bridge is needed; if there is a mountain, a tunnel is needed – to keep the tracks as level and straight as possible. The wilderness is transformed to make passage possible.

The physical barrier that existed for the exiled Judeans is not a barrier for God. Isaiah chapter 40 is the promise that the people will return home. That hope was needed to sustain the people during this time.

It was a time for hope.

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I’m actually feeling a bit behind the times. I was telling some ministry colleagues this week, that because I wasn’t leading church last week, I have to keep reminding myself that Advent has already begun. So, I don’t feel too badly for revisiting the theme of last week’s first advent candle: hope.

Isaiah 40 is all about hope and promise.

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But...it also speaks to today’s candle theme: peace. The people are comforted and invited to ‘speak tenderly’. That is the language of an active peace.

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To appreciate a need for tenderness is to appreciate the value in calmness, in a relaxed and safe environment. That is the essence of peace. The prophet knew that Jerusalem was under siege – that any remaining inhabitants were at the mercy of the Babylonians – it seemed the best they could hope for was to be sent into exile as well. The prophet does not use the language of rebellion, the prophet doesn’t even use that language of lament and sadness – the prophet speaks of tenderness.

There is a sense of active care in that word: tenderness.

“Peace” is most often defined by what it is not. On all of dictionary websites I looked at this week, the first definition offered for the noun peace was basically the same. Some of these said that peace is

• “The absence of war or other hostilities” (The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language)

• “the state existing during the absence of war” (Collins English Dictionary)

• “the normal, non-warring condition of a nation, group of nations, or the world” (dictionary.com)

The implication is that peace means nothing unless it has war/conflict to compare it to. War, by contrast, is definable in and of itself:

• “A state of open, armed, often prolonged conflict carried on between nations, states, or parties” (The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language)

• “(Military) open armed conflict between two or more parties, nations, or states” (Collins English Dictionary)

• “a conflict carried on by force of arms, as between nations or between parties within a nation; warfare, as by land, sea, or air” (dictionary.com)

I found this dictionary search a bit disheartening – because I know that ‘peace’ is more than the absence of what it is not. The Hebrew word translated as peace is שָׁלוֹם (shalom). But its biblical meaning is more complex: in shalom there is a sense of ‘wholeness’ and ‘completeness’. On a day-to-day, it is the common greeting of meeting and departing: ‘hello’, ‘goodbye’. In that way, shalom is a promise – we come together and we separate in peace.

That is the same goal we try to express each Sunday, when we spend part of our worship time greeting each other – we call it sharing the peace. Its place in the liturgies of the church dating back hundreds and hundreds of years is that, in Christ, we are whole and we are to see each other with compassion and care – even if that is not how we are feeling.

That kind of peace is an inner attitude – where we come to terms with the need to express and live out a holy tenderness.

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It was less than a month ago that, within our Canadian cultural context, we pause in remembrance of those who lived through war.

So seldom do wars end in a peace based on tenderness. The peace at the end of war is a forced peace usually; the conflict ends because someone is forced to give up the fight. In that way, the dictionary definitions apply – peace is simply the state of things when we are not at war. That kind of peace has a level of sadness to it, especially for the vanquished, but for everyone who had to live in that time – for there is loss on every side of war.

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When we lit that second candle today, I hope that it means more than that. I will hold stubbornly to the promise that Peace is more than the absence of war – peace involves caring about the impact of the current situation: to simply care about “what is”.

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As the television system in Canada went ‘digital’ this past year, our cable provider told us that we needed a digital box to be able to continue to get the channels we have been watching. The advantage is that we are now able to watch some digital channels we couldn’t see before we had the box. The other day I was watching KTLA, a local station out of Los Angeles, and caught live coverage of the police moving in to break up the Occupy LA encampment. It was such a contrast in images – people sitting in circles, chanting, singing, as the riot gear-clad police closed their circle tighter. One by one, protesters were forced to their feet and had their hands bound with those plastic, zip-style handcuffs. A few fought back, but it was striking how many simply went along peacefully (so to speak). Of course the footage that found the airplay on the news programs was of those few who resisted arrest.

This occupy movement has been hard for much of our society to understand. Passive confrontation is hard to figure out. Angry violent demonstrations are easy to oppose and to justify moving in with batons and handcuffs. But we are witnessing a situation where the violence doesn’t exist until the batons are brought in. I suspect that most of us have seen the images from the University of California – Davis where the peaceful protesters were simply sitting on the sidewalk [slide] and the riot-geared campus police officer went back and forth down the line emptying the pepper spray bottle.

// At its heart, the Occupy movement is an expression that the status quo is frustratingly broken and unfair. There are any number of reasons why the occupiers believe things are this way, so the Occupy movement is disjointed in the details of its message.

But, in all honesty, amongst the occupiers there is a belief that things can really change. There is enough cynicism to see there is a problem with fairness in our systems, but not so much cynicism that stops the belief that change is possible.

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Keeping the peace in the midst of change is extremely hard, because change is always about ‘loss’ and people will often fight to avoid losing. And so it is not surprising to see the violent fight in relation to the occupy movement does not come from the occupiers.

Peace is more than the absence of violence – it is an attitude that tenderness should be the normative state of the way we relate to each other. This is counter-cultural. The wider society has trouble with ‘tenderness’ – it is seen as a weak or defeated attitude.

But if we are able to hold onto tenderness in a time of change, even loss, we may very well be living in the light of this second candle. The Judeans living in exile, knew change to a much greater extent that we do that’s for sure – and the message to them was one of tenderness. Live out the change in peace and hope.

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Change was the message of John the Baptist. His key word was ‘repent’, which means change direction, turn back to God, he was saying to the crowds by the river. The gospel writers borrowed the comforting exilic language from Isaiah to bring meaning to John’s call to change – what was literally a desert highway to the people of six centuries earlier, now a highway of the heart, where people could walk straight to God. That is the message John wants the people to hear, before they get to experience that reality in an experience of Jesus.

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I suppose the challenge is still before us in our time and place, will we hear the call to tender living – a path of safety and security, light a highway with all of the obstacles and dangers removed.

Living in peace and hope may be counter cultural, but that is our calling. Jesus’ brought a new way of seeing people with compassion and care. Even his disciples were shocked at how much tenderness Jesus showed. In the end he would tell them to love one another as he had loved them.

And here at the beginning of Jesus’ life and ministry, John invites people to be on that path as well and be ready for a spirit that will change them.

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Let us be people of comfort, of tenderness, of peace – even in the midst of change.

Let us pray...

In the midst of chaos, O God, we seek a patience to wait, to listen and to act with all compassion and tenderness. As followers of Jesus, we will live his shalom. Amen.



**Offering**