"The Real New World Order"
Looking to God for a path through the wilderness
Sermon Preached by
The Rev. Dr. Andrew Stirling
Sunday, May 24, 2009
Text: John 6:25-35
Today Marial and I were on a bus on our way from the town of Eilat on the Gulf of Aqaba up to the famous mountain of Masada. As we were driving along, we went through the Negev desert, along by the Judean desert, right in between, when all of a sudden something eerie happened. The bus shook; a strong wind came up and lashed against the windows. The bus driver informed us that we were in the middle of a sandstorm. Being on a road going through the heart of the Negev desert, we were in danger, for you couldn't see the road ahead. So we prepared ourselves for any eventuality.
We had no idea what was going on. Everything became very dark and foreboding and one had no idea where one was. Fortunately, we were just three miles from the town of Arad. This was a town that was not very well-known, and before the formation of the new nation of Israel, it was hardly settled. It was originally Tel-Arad, a Canaanite town, but with the formation of Israel it became the planned community where Ashkenazi Jews and other people from the Diaspora settled. It was new and it was growing.
The bus driver did not know the town very well and had to phone ahead to find out if there would be a place for those on the tour to stay. Fortunately, one hotel had some rooms. Through the maze of sand and wind the driver, incredibly, found the hotel. We were relieved to get out. There was sand in our eyes and in our ears and our hair and grit in our shoes - sand gets everywhere! We walked into the hotel, only to be told that the power was out and there would be no food or running water. So what do you do? You go and have a nap.
We lay down and had a nap in our room. The wind was howling, night was coming down, and the sound was getting worse, and worse and worse. As we slept, there was this thumping at the window. We had no idea what it was, so Marial got up and looked out of the window and said, “Andrew, a member of your family is here!” I got up immediately, went to the window and there was a donkey up against it trying to find protection from the wind. We didn't speak to each other for four days after that - or maybe it was four hours, but it felt longer - but as I looked out, indeed all the animals from around had come close to the building to find protection and safety.
We slept through the night and when we got up in the morning, we couldn't believe what we saw. Rather than being in a dust-bowl in the middle of the desert as we had been at nine at night, we were in this beautiful green area. The donkey was now back in the field along with little ponies and other animals. Everything was green and beautiful. The road that had been obscured by the wind and sand was now clear - a normal highway. It seemed that everything was normal: The wind had finished blowing, it had done its work, and everything was now clear again.
When I read that wonderful passage from Isaiah, I can't help but think that Isaiah had exactly the same experience in mind when he talked about the wilderness and the hope of the people of Israel in being able to find a highway through it. It seems that the people of Israel, no matter where they lived or at any stage in their history, had to encounter the wilderness and the desert. In the Exodus from Egypt, crossing over the sea, they had to go through Sinai, and spent 40 years in the wilderness. Even on the way to the new land, the Promised Land of Canaan, they had to go through the wilderness and the desert to get there. Whether it was to return from Exile, after they were forced to live in Philistia, or whether they were in Babylonia, their return to the Promised Land was a journey through the desert; a coming home through the wilderness. To get to Jerusalem, to Mount Zion, they had to often go, particularly if they were coming from the east or the south, through the desert and through the Judean hills, which were dangerous. They had windstorms, dangerous animals and robbers. No wonder the writer of Psalm 121, who was himself a pilgrim on his way to Zion, said, “Mine eyes look to the hills from whence cometh my aid. My aid comes from the Lord.” In other words, he had to look to the hills because he knew how dangerous it was in the valley and in the wilderness.
You see, these were a people who had come to know and appreciate the power of nature. They lived on the edge; they lived in the wilderness. Whether it was the Bedouins who lived there or an attempt to come home to Zion, the wilderness played a role in their lives. It is no wonder, then, that in this passage Isaiah talks about the people returning with joy and singing for having found a way through the morass of the wilderness, and hoping that creation itself will be kind to them.
But there is more to this. Some have suggested that this passage was written before the exilic period as a foretaste of things to come. Others have said it was written during the exile, when they wanted to return home from Babylon. Others have suggested it was written after the exile as a sign of God's work in bringing the people back home. It really doesn't matter when it was written, because it looks ahead to the future. It is looks to a time when God will lead the people of Israel back to the Promised Land. It is a passage of hope, victory and expectation.
It is amazing that in that time period right before the arrival of Jesus, there were some, particularly in the Qumran community, who also saw this passage having meaning for them. The fourth Qumrani document of the messianic apocalypse uses the phrase, “the lame will walk, and the blind will see, and the poor will hear good news, and those who have been in the wilderness will return to Zion.” More especially, it is contained in the gospels. In Luke, Chapter 7, Jesus himself quotes this passage from Isaiah almost word for word, but he is pointing to himself: The blind will see, and the lame will walk, and the sick will be healed, and the dead will be raised to life because of his ministry and in the wilderness, the people will find their God. Whether it is in the documents from right before the arrival of Jesus or in Jesus himself, they see the fulfillment of the promise of God bringing the people of Israel safely through the wilderness and back to Zion, the promised kingdom. What a great passage!
What difference does this make to you and me - especially for those joining our church today, the new members - what does this say to us? Well, I think that there is a sense here of the transformation of the wilderness. Look at the language that is used by Isaiah. He talks about the fact that the flowers will burst into life, that there will be streams of living water even in the midst of the desert and that the wild animals will no longer be a source of danger. The whole of creation is going to burst forth with the joy, wonder and splendour of God.
What Isaiah is hoping for is that God will transform the wilderness experience of his people. That if they feel they are in the dry and the barren lands, there will be this moment of hope when the whole of creation will resound with the glory and the splendour of God. I actually realized the power of this many years ago. I have shared this in Bible studies here.
A number of years ago, I took a tour through the Kalahari Desert in a Land Cruiser with some friends of mine. In the middle of the night we had to pitch our tent 35 miles north of Keetmanshoop, and it was about forty degrees Celsius. It was blindingly hot! It was so hot that every stone you touched, every pebble, every grain of sand seemed to be on fire. We pitched our tent and, at first, the heat kept us awake. Then night came down and throughout it, there was a strange sound - a cracking, clacking and banging. I thought it was something loose on the tent or maybe an animal was walking by, but the temperature outside was now minus four degrees Celsius, and the stones were cracking from the contraction and the expansion. It was frightening!
In the morning I got up and was astounded by what I saw. At night I had gone to bed in a desert, in a wilderness with rocks, and stones and sand, but when I woke in the morning, around all these stones, there were flowers blooming in the middle of the desert. As far as the eye could see, there were these beautiful red and pink flowers. The dew that had come from the cool of the night had given the flowers life.
Is this not what Isaiah had in mind when he talked about the bursting forth of life in the desert? That in the wilderness there would be this incredible experience of renewal and transformation? I think it was. Anyone who has spent time in the desert knows that it can be transformed so quickly, so suddenly, just by the shift of a wind, just by the coming of the dew, just by the change of temperature. It is amazing!
Isaiah saw God as the source of this renewal. It wasn't just the renewal of creation or of the physical area in which they found themselves; it was the transformation of the whole of the human experience. He goes on to say, “The lame will walk, the blind will see, the deaf will hear, the sick will be healed, good news will be preached to the poor.” It is not just the transformation of nature; it is the transformation of human life. God, by coming into the midst of this, will change the way that we live.
I know that now we see through a glass darkly and that it is in the final consummation of God's kingdom that all of this is completely fulfilled. But in the arrival of Jesus, in the ministry of Jesus, people saw the fulfilment of what Isaiah hoped for: That the coming One, God himself, would break forth into the midst of this world and transform it, renew it and bring it back to life. My friends, Isaiah has a message of transformation in the wilderness.
There is more. Not only is the wilderness transformed, but there is also a sense in which a highway appears through the desert. He calls this the Highway of Holiness, and says that through this Highway of Holiness, the people of Israel will return home. The past will open up and they will be able to return to Zion singing and praising God and giving God “Alleluias” from their lips and from their lives.
So often, my friends, we have that wilderness experience ourselves. The danger in the wilderness is that we no longer see the path. Just like that windstorm that came up in Arad, so you could not find your way, so very often the winds of life blow and we lose our way. Many of you have been talking this past week about the recent events on Parliament Hill. Many people have spoken to me about them in so many different places.
I think that sometimes people just lose the way; they lose the path. If you stay in a house for too long and you don't get out enough, sometimes you forget about the path. You become so consumed by what is going on internally that you don't see the path that is there before you. I think that people have lost the vision, lost the way - right across the spectrum.
My friends, should we be too harsh? Do we not lose our own way? Do we not sometimes lose our own path in our marriages or in our businesses? Do we not, in various ways, pass the true path in our dealings with other human beings? Do we not morally, at times, lose the path and forget the way? Do we not, in terms of our faith and our relationship with God, lose the path? We do. The question isn't whether we are going to lose the path. It is whether we are going to try to seek our way back to it. What the prophets kept saying to the people of Israel is, “Look to God who is the way, look to God who is the path, and look to God who will prepare the way for you through the wilderness.” Many people are having a wilderness experience today. The world is in need of a path through it - a path of justice; a path of truth, righteousness and peace.
We see a world that's vision often obscured in such a way that it doesn't see the path God has for it. There is the need to find that path again! In too many places, in too many continents, too many people are dying from violence. In too many places, in too many continents, people are living in poverty; people are living as if there is no God; people in leadership have lost their way. Isaiah would stand before them and say, “You, who are in the wilderness, there is a way. But you have to trust that way and you have to seek that path, that the people may rejoice and come home.”
Last summer I rented a car in Scotland. I have always prided myself on my sense of direction and have actually been a little bit arrogant about it from time-to-time. I know where I am going. I don't need any help. “Trust me, I will get us to where we need to go,” is my normal reprise. This time, I didn't know where I was going but I found that my car had a satellite navigation system. Amen! Praise the Lord! Not having used one of these things before and being a bit of a Luddite, I punched in where I wanted to go and assumed that the satellite navigation system would take me there. I was heading north towards Inverness from the borders of Scotland and I punched in Inverness and this little voice came on and said, “Turn right at the roundabout. Second exit, turn left. Stop; turn right. Do not take the exit to the left. Turn right. Keep going for 30 miles.” I did as it said - and I ended up back in England! Seriously! I was crossing the Tweed when I was supposed to be going to the Highlands!
What did I find out? You can't just put in where you are going; you have to put in where you are starting from. Evidently, I had been starting from Manchester Airport and that was where I was returning. My friends, it doesn't matter if you try to say you know the way if you are not assessing where you really are. What Isaiah wanted the people of Israel to recognize was their need to know where they were and then to trust in God to lead them in the way.
This Advent, I would like you to do two things: I would like you to honestly assess where you are and whether you are genuinely following in God's way. Ask yourself honestly in various parts of your life if you are truly trusting God to lead you in your path and your walk with him. If you are in the wilderness, if you are uncertain with the winds and the sand blowing across your life, all the more reason to keep your eye on the God who is the way, and whose Son is the source of the journey. Also, this day, I genuinely believe we need to pray for our nation and our world. It is not enough just to pray for ourselves; we need to pray for our leaders of all stripes that they may have a sense of the way in which we need to go to help our people, to help our nation, and to protect our country. We need a vision for the world to protect the innocent, to uphold the weak, to bring justice to the oppressed, to vindicate the broken and to give hope and peace an opportunity to prevail. This, I believe, requires our prayers that we may truly know and follow the way. Amen.