(part of the “Waiting on the World to Change” Advent Series)

Isaiah 2:1-5 (Advent 1A)

Notice the tenses in today’s reading.  The word “shall” is used (if I counted correctly) ten times.  The prophet is giving us a vision of what is to come, something that is not here yet but something that we can expect.  Expectations are important in this Waiting Season.  If our waiting is not accompanied by expectations, then we’re really just sort of hanging around until whatever comes next.  But that’s not what we’re called to do.  We’re called to Holy Expectation, to envisioning what the world around could be.  Because, you see, that’s the only way that it happens.  God gave us a vision so that we could expect it and work toward it.  God gave us a vision so that we could journey toward it all the while living as if it is already here.

I know it’s hard.  Our world is sometimes spinning so fast, throwing off things that we don’t even think we can survive.  How can we live as if God’s vision is here?  How can we expect that vision to survive what we’re going through now?  I must honestly confess that I feel like we’ve gone backwards a bit, that we’ve lost some ground in realizing the Peaceable Kingdom.  And it makes it really, really hard to live as if God’s vision is here.  I see a rise in racism and xenophobia.  I see an increased level of violence.  And I see a society and a world that is in many ways closing its eyes to what is going on.  We can’t do that.  We have to envision that Peaceable Kingdom.  We have to expect that change in the world around us.  We have to believe it will happen—because that’s what our faith tells us.

Think about when this was written.  The world was constantly at war. They were stupid wars over stupid things, arguments over who had what land and who had what resources. People did not trust each other. Societies and ethnicities pulled into themselves and began to shut out those who were different.  They no longer trusted the “other”, the immigrant, those who were living in their midst because they had no place else to go.  They fought against those who thought differently, who worshipped differently, who lived differently.  Their first priority was themselves.  Their first thought was those who were like them.  Their vision of the world had shrunk to only what they could see, to only what made them comfortable.

And the prophet comes along and tells them to expect something different, to expect a world where wars subside and people come together.  It was a Kingdom that was there for the taking, for the imagining.  It was a Kingdom that we should dare to expect will happen.  And then the prophet changes the tense of his writing.  Expect it.  And let us go—all of us, together—into the house of the Lord.

I salute you. I am your friend and my love for you goes deep. There is nothing I can give you which you have not got. But there is much, very much, that while I cannot give it, you can take. No heaven can come to us unless our hearts find rest in today. Take heaven! No peace lies in the future which is not hidden in this present little instance. Take peace! The gloom of the world is but a shadow. Behind it, yet within our reach, is joy. Take joy! Life is so full of meaning and purpose, so full of beauty . . . that you will find earth but cloaks your heaven. Courage then to claim it, that is all! . . . And so I greet you, with profound esteem and with the prayer that for you, now and forever, the day breaks and the shadows flee away. (From a letter by Fra Giovanni, 1513, as quoted in the introduction of “Take Joy”, by Tasha Tudor)

Lyrics:  “Do No Harm” (Carrie Newcomer)

John Roth had a heart like flame
He believed all souls were loved the same
He packed up his hopes and his family and moved to Ohio

There in the deep dark wilderness
With a newborn son he soon was blessed
Raised him up in the ways of the old prophets
Named him Isaiah Roth

Do no harm shed no blood the only law here is love
We can call the kingdom down here on earth
Beat your swords into plows don’t be afraid I’ll show you how
Lift your eyes to the skies all is holy here

The forest people soon came near his message to the red children clear
We can build the peaceable kingdom here in shadows of these trees

They planted oats and beans and maize
They planted their hearts in the dirt of that place
And they learned to speak of hope and grace
In the language of John Roth

Do no harm shed no blood the only law here is love
We can call the kingdom down here on earth
Beat your swords into plows don’t be afraid I’ll show you how
Lift your eyes to the skies all is holy here

When Isaiah Roth had just turned ten
He was working up in the loft again
He looked out and he saw eight white men
Come riding up that day
The men called out from the deepening glade
Saying y’all come on out an we can trade?

The forest people walked out unafraid with smiles and open hands
The white traders lifted up their guns
And shot them down each and every one
And the Eden that John Roth begun
Lay bleeding on the ground

Do no harm shed no blood the only law here is love
We can call the kingdom down here on earth
Beat your swords into plows don’t be afraid I’ll show you how
Lift your eyes to the skies all is holy here

Now the world has aged by fifty years
The Quakers came and settled near
Old Isaiah Roth still preaches here that the greatest law is love
Now some people say it’s all a scam just the ravings of some old man
But Isaiah Roth says he still can see Eden on the hill

Do no harm
Shed no blood
The only law here is love

Source: Musixmatch

Songwriters: Carrie Newcomer / Carrie Ann Newcomer

Grace and Peace,

Shelli