Isaiah 2:1-5

Amy Jacks Dean, December 2, 2001

I grew up in a nice, ordinary, brick, ranch house. Three bedroom 2 bath - regular ole’ house. I liked the house – everything except the basement. The basement was unfinished junk space that was creepy. It was damp and musty, cold and dark. To this day, I have no idea why we had to keep the ice cream in the deep freezer in the basement. Surely we could have a made enough space in the freezer of our refrigerator upstairs for one half gallon of vanilla ice cream! But no, my mother stored it in the basement freezer. I can remember as vividly as yesterday being about 8 years old and wanting a bedtime snack of vanilla ice cream with chocolate syrup. It would be a little before bedtime and quite dark outside when I would force myself to make the trip – to the basement. You entered the basement through a door in the den that hid the staircase. I would slowly open the door, reach in to flip the switch on for the light and wait for a brief moment for the light to sufficiently engulf the basement – not that that didn’t happen instantaneously, but I just wanted to make sure. Then I would slowly walk down the steps peering into every nook and cranny on the journey. At the bottom of the steps, I quietly walked the 4 steps to the large freezer, opened the lid up, reached in for the carton of ice cream – then SLAM – I dropped the lid, ran up the steps as fast as I could, flipped the light off and closed the door. My father swore that I could make it to the top of the steps before the freezer would slam shut! I was afraid of the dark – especially of basement dark. Basement dark is darker than regular dark, and I wanted the light on for the slow journey into and the quick journey out of the great abyss.

Today we are going to think on two things: hope and light and the unexpected way those 2 things come together. What is it that would NOT be just some pat answer about the Hope of Christmas? The last thing the church needs to be giving is pat answers. There are so many wonderfully trite religious things that can be said at Advent – things that would merely focus our thoughts and our hearts toward a baby, wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger. I hope that merely pat answers and religious jargon will not be what you will hear in these holy Sundays as we prepare for the celebration of Christmas. Do you accept the challenge to expect (anticipate, presume) the unexpected (that which comes without warning)?

What is it that you hope for? That answer is as varied as the number of people in this room. The answer ranges in levels from: I hope for world peace to I hope to find love to I hope for just one full night’s sleep. We hope for stability, security, peace of mind. We hope that the world will be better for our children because one generation always hopes for the next. The anorexic hopes for the strength for one day at a time. And the cancer patient hopes for a long life without pain. Homeless people hope for a church that will feed them and give them one warm night’s sleep on a mattress. Those who grieve hope for an escape – just one moment of rest, one moment of joy that is not clouded and consumed by death. We hope to exceed the quota so that the commission will support the family. We hope to wake up tomorrow with not only a desire to get up but the energy to follow through it. We hope for a cure. We hope to graduate. We hope to have friends that will love us in spite of ourselves. We hope that Christmas day will be more joyous with family than frustrating (though that may be hoping for too much!)

It’s difficult to preach on Unexpected Hope. You see, I’ve experienced God enough that I have come to expect God. I expect God’s grace because I have recognized God’s grace from time to time, and I assume that God will continue to invade my life. I come here expecting week after week - expecting something – anything – and many times I find it. I’d even say most of the time I find it. But sometimes I don’t, and it is always a disappointment because my expectation was not met.

But many folks come here week after week with no expectation at all. They put no preparation and no energy into worship. They expect to sit until it is time to get up. Those people baffle me.

Perhaps the reason many don’t come here at all is that their only expectation is that nothing will happen here. They won’t be moved and they won’t be changed. They have not known God’s grace (or at least not recognized it), and they haven’t experienced God’s grace and therefore they have no expectation of God. When you think about it, that may not be a bad place to be because when you expect something you know where to look for it and therefore you are rarely surprised. And because those of us here are always looking where we think God can be found, perhaps we actually keep missing God, for I believe God is always in the places we would least expect. Do we limit God in our own expectations of God – who God is and how God works? Would we know unexpected hope if it hit us upside the head?

How does one expect unexpected hope? The prophet Isaiah paints a picture for us of God’s house being on the highest of high mountains and the people flocking to it – and they say may God’s ways be taught and may it be in God’s paths that we walk. And then Isaiah says that it is God that will judge between the nations and it is God that will arbitrate for many people and then the people will “beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks” - which means that the people will turn their weapons of war into instruments of agriculture. ( ) And “nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more.” Is that too much to hope for? It certainly is unexpected, isn’t it? Isaiah doesn’t seem to think that this is too much to hope for. And, yes, I am thinking here of our most recent tragedy in New York City and Washington, DC and Pennsylvania, and the war we have pursued in its aftermath. Can we hope and trust that God might judge between the nations and that God might arbitrate for many people and that people – that we – might beat our swords into plowshares and our spears into pruning hooks? How can we sit here in holy worship and hope for anything less?

It is Advent. It is a season of hope and a season of waiting and a season of expectation and a season of preparation. We anticipate the celebration of the birth of a baby who will grow up to be someone we follow. And when that baby grows up, he will hope himself that Isaiah’s words might just be true. I know that since the time Isaiah spoke these words they have never been realized. But we hope that life at least moves in the direction of this kind of peace.

As much as I think Isaiah’s words speak to us today in a global manner – about what is happening in our world even as we speak, I think Isaiah’s words speak to us as individual children of God as well. We are at war with ourselves – fighting guilt, thinking we are not good enough, wanting to be and to offer more but not having the energy to do so. We are at war with our families – unable to forgive or ask for forgiveness, clinging to our grudges. We are at war with work – wanting to spend time with our children and wanting the best that we think money can buy. We are at war with insurance companies and doctors and cancer.

My prayers in the last couple of months have often included the question: O God, is it too much to hope for peace in your world? O God, is it too much to hope that the pain would go away? O God, is it too much to hope that depression may be overcome? O God, is it too much to hope? Not if you are walking in the light.

In her book Tender Mercies: Some Thoughts on Faith, Anne Lamott describes her out-of-control life. She’s an alcoholic and drug abuser. She’s having affairs with married men. She’s not making a living and, for all practical purposes, she’s not living at all. She says,

I was cracking up. It was like a cartoon where something gets hit, and one crack appears, which spiderwebs outward until the whole pane or vase is cracked and hangs suspended for a moment before falling into a pile of powder on the floor. I had not yet heard the [lyrics of a song that said] “There are cracks, cracks, in everything, that’s how the light gets in.” I had the cracks, Lamott says, but not the hope. (pages 39-40)

Where will you find unexpected hope this Advent? Just when you think you are cracking up - the cracks will allow the light to come in. Isaiah knew then, and we still know today, that we need to be a people who walk in the light of God. Today we lit the Candle of Hope, and if you are cracking up, squint real hard and you will see a glimmer of light shining through the very cracks that make you feel like you just might fall apart. That is unexpected hope. Cracking up is something we all face to varying degrees. One thing I know about hope – it is usually self-centered and self-serving – so use the light that shines through the cracks to make your move.

I do not listen to Christian contemporary music – with one exception. Kyle Matthews is a singer/songwriter in Nashville, TN, and he is a genius who is making it pretty big in a difficult business He and Russ were college roommates at Furman. Kyle has a song entitled “As Far As You Can See.” The first verse says,

I broke a glass in the kitchen

Dad sent me out for a broom

It was thirty-five yards to the tool shed

On a pitch black night with no moon

I tried not to let on I was frightened

But finally my Dad understood

And he gave me an old fashioned kerosene lantern

That hardly did any good

I can't see where I'm going—[Dad said] how far can you see?

Just the trunk of the chestnut—[Dad said] then go to the tree!

I can't see where I'm going—[Dad said] how far can you see?

Aw, it's just the old tractor—[Dad said] you're where you should be!

I can't see where I'm going—[Dad said] it's just up ahead…

Hey, it looks like the tool shed—[Dad said] then go to the tool shed,

You've got all the light you need, boy

So go--as far as you can see

by Kyle Matthews

creation: 10/17/98

BMG Songs, Inc./Above the Rim Music (ASCAP)

Isaiah says, “Come let us walk in the light of the Lord.” If you have just enough light shimmering through the cracks of your life – then you’ve got just enough light to make your way – slowly and surely. You may be as afraid as I was, and still am, of basement dark, but there is light and it comes from God, and that is hope that is always an unexpected surprise. May it be so.

Pastoral Prayer

(adapted from a Frederick Buechner prayer entitled “Be Born in Us Again”)

Thou Son of the Most High, Prince of Peace, be born again into our world.

Wherever there is war in this world, wherever there is pain, wherever there is loneliness, wherever there is no hope, come, thou long expected one, with hope enough for us.

Holy Child, whom the shepherd and the kings and the dumb beasts adored, be born again.

Wherever there is boredom, wherever there is fear of failure, wherever there is temptation too strong to resist, wherever there is bitterness of heart, come, thou long expected one, with hope enough for us.

O God, be born in each of us this Advent and surprise us with your hope in unexpected ways. Amen.