Tuesday of the First Week of Advent
Are you ready for the coming of complete justice, for an end to domination and violence? It’s something we all agree will be great, but in the meantime we’re waiting around from someone else to make it happen. This is what our first reading promises with such beautiful, allegorical language. A shoot from the root of Jesse. In other words, someone is coming in the line of the legendary, successful King David. Today, we believe this is Jesus. In the season of Advent, we celebrate Jesus as Emmanuel, but also Jesus’s second coming in ultimate fulfillment of his saving mission to humanity. Darnit, in the meantime, we still have to put up with lions and bears and snakes.
So what’s the point of readings like this? Isaiah was written over 2500 years ago, and we are still waiting for the complete fulfillment of this prophesy. Why do we read it over and over again? We were hoping this would be accomplished the first time Jesus came. I believe the reason is that it matters how we believe the world is supposed to operate. If we accept that ‘might makes right,’ that violence and wealth are the legitimate paths to power, and that it’s okay to ‘feed’ off of the weak and the poor, then we are more likely to live in sinful conformity with that system. We will participate, contribute, and attempt to climb the ladder by stepping on those below us.
According to the prophet, that is NOT the world we were made to live in. The present world is passing away, so we shouldn’t ‘invest’ in it. If we do, we will lose everything. That’s the great secret that Jesus is talking about in the Gospel. We have inside information. We know that the political and economic and social realities of today are going to crash, and that in their place, true justice will arise. If this statement causes us anxiety instead of hope, we’re probably living on the wrong side of salvation history. As the “Great Pause” continues into the holy season of Advent, may we take time to reflect on how our belief about the nature of our world is pushing us toward sin or toward holiness. Spirit, convince hard hearts to act in joyful expectation of the world as will be, and not just as it is today.
-Chris Nieport