Advent 2, Year B
Comfort, O comfort my people, says your God.
I will listen to what the Lord God is saying, for he is speaking peace to his faithful people and to those who turn their hearts to him. (Psalm 85: 8)
One of my favorite movies of all times is “Trip to Bountiful.” One of the reasons is the star who is one of my favorite actresses, Geraldine Page, but it also takes me to a special place—a place of “home-ness.” It reminds me of my growing up in Texas and of my extraordinary Grandmother. It is a story of Mama Watts who because of her age and declining health has been brought to live with her son and daughter-in-law in Houston, Texas. As any who have cared for an aging family member knows that when it comes time to move them from their home, the time is fraught with grief and disorientation.
Mrs. Watts longs to visit her home in the rolling hills of Bountiful one more time. But her son is busy and her daughter-in-law is stereotypically put out, so she makes a get away plan. She packs one small suitcase, gathers her hat and pocketbook and stealthily waits by the mailbox for her Social Security check to arrive. She collects her check and heads for the bus station. But there she finds that buses no longer go to Bountiful. After much bewilderment and negotiation, she buys a ticket for a nearby town, certain she can find someone who will come and pick her up and take her to where her heart longs to be.
There is much to this beautiful story of missed opportunity, dashed dreams, opening up to strangers and discovering deep connections. But the central theme is of being an exile in a land that is not your own and longing for home.
In our reading this morning from Isaiah, no one can listen to these words without hearing in our mind the beautiful tenor voice from the Oratorio Messiah composed by George Friderick Handel with the text compiled by Charles Jennens from the words of the King James version of Scripture and the Psalms from the Book of Common Prayer. These words fill our heart with longing as we hear,
“Comfort, O comfort my people says your God.
Speak tenderly to Jerusalem,”
These words are written in a time when the people of Judah have been living in exile in Babylon for more than 150 years. Following the destruction of Jerusalem in 587 BCE by the Babylonian army led by Nebuchadnezzar the Great, most of the inhabitants were seized as prisoners of war and led away into to the home of their conquerors.
Now after several generations, these people know their home only through the longing in their hearts and the long ago stories they have received of their beloved temple and of their freedom as God’s people. The prophet Isaiah comes to these exiles far away from the Promised Land. They have settled in, but while they may have found ease, they are not free. How could they sing the Lord’s song in a strange land? the Psalmist asked. (Psalm 137:4)
One question that must have loomed large for them was that since they had failed to be God’s people, what was their future? Who were they? Would God again work in their midst, or had they been abandoned? In this crisis of faith, God speaks through the messages of Isaiah.
“In the wilderness prepare the way of the Lord, make straight in the desert a highway for our God.
We, too can feel like exiles. Watching the news and hearing about one more shooting of an unarmed person by law enforcement personnel who are trained and pledged to protect our communities, fearing that this pattern will continue on and on without any possibility of reconciliation, can leave us feeling like exiles. Hearing elected leaders blame the poor for wanting to feed their children and learning that churches in Pittsfield are feeding up to 500 hungry families a week can make us feel like exiles far from a longed for place of justice and mercy. Seeing thousands of men, women, and children being driven by endless warfare from their homes into barren deserted spaces, we can feel like exiles far from that world of peace for which we long.
We can feel like we are exiles when the chances and changes of our own lives or the lives of those we love overwhelm us and cause us to wonder if God will ever act again. We can feel like exiles when we beat ourselves up for failing to accomplish all that we set out to do, when again and again we fail to live up to all we hope to be, when we see ourselves as constantly falling short as children of God. We are exiles in more ways than we can count. And so we are in great need of hearing these words of Isaiah that reminds us of God’s unbreakable love and his unflagging resolve to be present in and with us. We long to be reunited with the One who can truly comfort us and gently lead us home.
Frederick Buechner says, “No matter how much the world shatters us to pieces, we carry inside us a vision of wholeness that we sense is our true home and that beckons us.”
This poetry of Isaiah helps to restore among the exiles a vision of wholeness—a wholeness that means freedom, peacefulness, and being at home.
God speaking through Isaiah says to create in the wilderness a highway– not a small path, or a winding road. A highway for God to come to God’s people. A highway where every valley shall be lifted up and every mountain and hill made low. God will change earth to be with us, to redeem us. And God comes to us in our deserts, where humans and other living creatures struggle to live and sometimes even to survive. God comes offering comfort—speaking tenderly—seeking us as a shepherd searches for every last sheep. Knowing that when God finds us he will carry us in his arms, close to his breast where we can be filled with God’s loving heartbeat.
In this poem in the book of Isaiah we hear the good news that the life of the people Judah has been decisively changed for good. The world is changed by God who, in great might, cares for us as a shepherd cares for his flock. And in this way, Isaiah wants the people to shout from the top of the high mountain the good news, that we are not to fear, that God loves us, that God wants us all to live in freedom, certain that “Here God is with us.
Isaiah emphasizes that God works anew to come to his people in exile. Exile will not be the last word. Our actions in the past, either for good or bad do not determine God’s actions in our lives. God is free and always doing something new and surprising. God’s word is eternal and sure and so it can break the despair we may feel. It calls us surely into a new future.
Today we hear the words of Isaiah alongside those of Mark. The writer of Mark’s Gospel understands that a new journey is beginning for God’s people. It is announced by John the Baptizer who comes from the wilderness proclaiming the arrival of the Savior of the World. The voice of Isaiah is echoed in the words of John who calls people to “prepare the way of the Lord.” John declares a “baptism of repentance”—a time of purifying our heart, an opening up, a clearing away, making a space so that the One who is coming in love can be welcomed.
When Mama Watts finally arrives in Bountiful in the car of a benevolent sheriff, she finds little left of the beautiful home that called her to journey so far. But in this place she remembers a love that gave her life. In coming to this place, she is an exile no longer. She has come home to the place where she was known and loved and this she will carry always in her heart. The grass withers, the flower fades, but the love of our God will stand forever.
On this second Sunday of Advent as we walk the journey, waiting for the coming of God in the person of the baby Jesus, we hear the words of God through the writer of Isaiah who calls us to wrap ourselves in the love of God who comforts us and tenderly carries us as a shepherd, gently leading us out of our exile. We remember these things in Advent, not so that we put them away with our decorations as soon as Christmas is past, but so that we continue to remember and journey toward our home that can only be found in the One who in the past, present, and future continues to come to us. God comes to us and comforts us so that we may become what God has wanted from the beginning, that we would accept God’s love and be empowered to share this love with the world. So let us open our hearts, let us give our faith to this love so that we can be God’s children in a world eager to return home.