Comfort and Peace

December 10, 2023 homily on Isaiah 40:1-11 and Mark 1:1-8 for the 2nd Sunday of Advent by Pastor Galen

Comfort

In Isaiah chapter 40, verses 1 and 2, God speaks to the prophet Isaiah, saying, “Comfort…comfort my people…speak tenderly to Jerusalem.” For me, these verses create a mental image of a parent or caregiver comforting a child who has just fallen

I’m sure you’ve seen or experienced this. One moment a little child, who has just learned to walk, is cruising around the room, giggling and laughing, and then the next minute she trips and falls to the ground. She lays there for a moment, wide-eyed, trying to figure out what just happened. Then her lower lip starts to quiver, and she looks around to see if there is anyone who will take pity on her. Her eyes rest upon her parent or grandparent, or someone else she knows will console her, and she bursts into tears, knowing that they will scoop her up and hug her and make her feel all better. She doesn’t need stitches or a bandage. She just wants to be comforted. After she’s been held for a few minutes she’s all better, and she’s back to running around the next minute.

In truth, there are times when all of us just want to be comforted. The winter season, especially, is a time when many of us are grateful for things that bring us comfort. When the weather is cold, and the nights are long, many of us would like nothing more than to sit by a fireplace wrapped in a cozy blanket, perhaps wearing warm fuzzy socks, and drinking a hot beverage. I find comfort during this time of the year by reading a good book, and drinking warm turmeric ginger tea.

The Prophet’s Words of Peace

But the people of Israel, to whom God commanded the prophet Isaiah to speak these words of comfort and peace, were struggling with much more than a bruised knee or seasonal affective disorder. The people of Israel were living in exile, and had been for generations—separated from their homes, their loved ones, and everything that they held dear. Their parents or grandparents had been forcibly removed from Jerusalem, and taken almost a thousand miles to Babylon, where they awaited the time when they would finally be allowed to return home. They came to understand that the reason for their exile was that they had turned away from God. But no doubt many of them must have felt that God had forsaken them as well.

And so these words of comfort spoken by God through the prophet Isaiah must have surely brought much consolation to the people, for they meant that God had not abandoned them. God had indeed heard their cries. God saw their pain. And one day God would gather them up and comfort them, as a parent comforts a child, or as a shepherd comforts a sheep, as Isaiah proclaims in verse 11.

Isaiah says, “See, the Lord GOD comes with might, and his arm rules for him; his reward is with him, and his recompense before him. He will feed his flock like a shepherd; he will gather the lambs in his arms, and carry them in his bosom, and gently lead the mother sheep” (Isaiah 40:11). 

I love this image of God scooping up the little lamb and holding him in his arms, and then gently leading the mother sheep. This speaks not only to God’s care and concern for little ones, but also for those of us who are caregivers as well! God knows that sometimes we who care for others also need to be comforted.

The Kingdom of Peace

Isaiah’s prophecy was fulfilled in part when the Jewish people were allowed to return to Jerusalem. And yet for the next several hundred years, they still had this feeling that God was still distant from them, and that they had never truly been forgiven. They tried to regain God’s favor, but they never really had a sense that God was close to them.

Fast forward several hundred years, to when “John the baptizer appeared in the wilderness, proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins” (Mark 1:4). No wonder all of the people from the whole Judean countryside and all of the people of Jerusalem went out to hear what he had to say! Surely John’s words were a sign that God had indeed heard their cries, and that Isaiah’s prophecy would soon be fulfilled. God would not remain far off, but would come to them, and comfort them.

And indeed the prophecy was fulfilled, not in the coming of John the baptizer, but in the one about whom John foretold—the one who would come after him, who was more powerful than he. Jesus, the one who would baptize, not with water, but with the Holy Spirit. Jesus proclaimed himself to be the Good Shepherd, God made flesh. And he came to proclaim peace and forgiveness, not just to those who had been taken into exile, but to all who felt far away from God. 

God sent Jesus to pick us up, to comfort us, to restore our relationship with God, and to lead us and guide us in the way we should go. Jesus is the tender expression of God’s love, and there is nothing and no one in the world that can bring lasting peace like Jesus can. The peace that Jesus gives is like nothing else in this world. There is no substitute, nothing that can take the place of the peace of Christ.

In the Eye of The Storm

Of, course this does not mean that everything will be smooth sailing, or that everything will go our way. Indeed, we will face challenges and difficulties in this life.  And yet Jesus brings peace in the midst of the storm. It’s sort of like being in the eye of a hurricane. Often we experience storms in this life. The winds and stormy weather are swirling all around us. But Jesus can bring an inner sense of peace right where we are, right in the middle of the storm. The peace that Jesus brings is a peace that surpasses all understanding. 

The inner peace that Jesus brings to us in this life is just a foretaste of the Kingdom of Peace that Jesus will usher in when he returns. On that day, there will be no more wars, no fighting, no arguing and fighting. In fact, there will be no more cause for disputes, because Jesus will reign in justice and righteousness. As we read in our Call to Worship this morning from Psalm 85, “Steadfast love and faithfulness will meet. Righteousness and peace will embrace. Faithfulness will spring up from the ground, and righteousness will look down from the sky.” What a beautiful image of what we have to look forward to when Christ returns!

And even here and now, we are called to be people who proclaim God’s peace through word and deed. We advocate for peaceful resolutions between individuals and between nations. We proclaim God’s peace to one another by working through conflict as it arises, and by extending forgiveness to one another. We seek to be at peace with ourselves, with others, and with the natural world. As we do this, we provide the world with just a glimpse of the Kingdom of Peace that is to come.

Heralds of Peace

Many people in our world do not know God’s peace. Many have been hurt, or abused. They’ve suffered loss or violence. And they feel that God has abandoned them.

As Christians, we so often act like it is our job to condemn everything that is wrong with the world. To highlight all the sin and suffering and injustice in the world, and to point out just how far the world has strayed. 

But many people in our world know that there are a lot of things wrong in the world. They know heartache and pain. They’ve experienced suffering and injustice firsthand. What many people don’t know is that God cares about them. That God is closer to us than the air we breathe. That God is there, waiting to pick us up when we fall. That God longs to wrap us up in God’s arms, and to set us back on the way we should go.

Our job, then, as people of Christ’s peace, who have been forgiven and restored by Jesus, is to proclaim God’s peace to others. The image that Isaiah uses here is that of a herald. Heralds were official messengers, who would run ahead of the king or queen’s entourage to announce the monarch’s impending arrival. Isaiah says to the people, “Get you up to a high mountain, O Zion, herald of good tidings; lift up your voice with strength, O Jerusalem, herald of good tidings, lift it up, do not fear; say to the cities of Judah, ‘Here is your God!’” (Isaiah 40:9). This is our job: to point others towards God, to be heralds of the Kingdom of Peace.

Like the prophet Isaiah, we are called to speak tenderly to those who are hurting, to proclaim peace and comfort to those who are grieving. And, like Isaiah, and like John the Baptizer who prepared the way for Christ’s arrival, we too are called to prepare the way of the Lord, so that all may see the salvation of our God.

Sometimes we do this through words, through educating and instructing others about God and God’s love. Often we do this through our “ministry of presence”—simply sitting with someone in their time of sorrow or grief. Other times we do this through meeting people’s physical needs. We provide a warm blanket or a cup of cold water to someone who is in need, as a tangible expression of God’s love. We don’t judge them, or ask how they got into the situation they are in. We simply provide comfort to them, as an extension of God’s love, as people of God’s peace.

May we experience the inner peace that Jesus brings, even in the middle of the storm. And may God use us to be instruments of God’s peace, preparing the way so that all may see and experience the true peace that only Jesus can bring.

Amen!