Stuff piles up! Unlike financial savings, unopened junk mail, e-mail spam, laundry, emotional baggage, distresses of life and bad news all seem to multiply without any special effort. The evening news spews the latest evidence of a culture going wild, a society writhing with dysfunctional systems and inadequate solutions. Murders and mayhem, robberies and riots, falsehoods and furies all pour through stoic news readers’ lips as high-definition video support the latest societal troubles, amassing in our thinking and dulling our spirits and suggest all is lost.
Pat and I, like many of you, are processing the "pile up" of unwanted news. A dear friend has esophageal cancer, another longtime friend recently passed away as a result of cancer, Pat’s father is battling cancer, other long time friends have two daughters receiving treatment for cancer and still another friend has been diagnosed with Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS), often referred to as "Lou Gehrig's Disease. Grim and gloom pile up without apparent help!
Some casually suggest that we are simply experiencing what happens to everyone as we age. That observation may have more than a little bit of truth in it, but how can we cope, what counsel can we share with those in the throes of sickness and sorrow? How do we keep our equilibrium? What words of comfort will ring true and go beyond shallow assurances?
Isaiah’s prophecy excites me! The descriptions of Isaiah’s world reported in the first seven chapters of the book are as menacing as the long list of piled-up troubles already mentioned. The Deliverer had freed their fathers from Egypt’s Pharaohs, had miraculously provided shelter and food in the dessert and had given the nation lien-free ownership of a land filled with "milk and honey." That Deliverer was being treated with contempt. Injustice, immorality, and ingratitude ruled the day. If one didn’t know better, he could mistake the circumstances in Jerusalem as that of any American city.
Isaiah was assigned the burden of announcing the destruction of the nation as Israel hurled headlong in arrogance and stubborn refusal to serve God. The first pages of Isaiah are filled with tension. God is good, but people are bad in return. God is patient, but the people are smug and unresponsive to overtures of forgiveness in return for loyalty. Prophets contemporary to Isaiah, Amos, Micah and Hosea reinforce how systemic and universal were the sins of the nation.
And then, in the deepest darkness a ray of brilliant hope emerges. A promise cuts through piled up despair of a society whipped into servitude by ungodly rulers. The promise is announced by the Spirit! "Then Isaiah said, ‘Hear now, you house of David! Is it not enough to try the patience of men? Will you try the patience of my God also? Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign: The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and will call him Immanuel.’" (7:13-14)
We often make the promise of Immanuel a seasonal emphasis. Immanuel, the "One with us" will appear miraculously, wondrously and powerfully. Today, He is Immanuel! He is everywhere present, residing with his people. He is the same as he always has been. He has promised to never leave us! Immanuel is the Name to remember when things are piling up, when the bad news seems to snuff out the light of all God’s good. Immanuel! God is with us at this Advent season and always!
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