I think there is a kind of peace in repentance and forgiveness. There is peace in learning to get along with others. No one is bothering you, and you are not bothering anyone else.
Isaiah 40.1-11
1 Comfort, O comfort my people, says your God. 2 Speak tenderly to Jerusalem, and cry to her that she has served her term, that her penalty is paid, that she has received from the Lord’s hand double for all her sins. 3 A voice cries out: “In the wilderness prepare the way of the Lord, make straight in the desert a highway for our God. 4 Every valley shall be lifted up, and every mountain and hill be made low; the uneven ground shall become level, and the rough places a plain. 5 Then the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all people shall see it together, for the mouth of the Lord has spoken.” 6 A voice says, “Cry out!” And I said, “What shall I cry?” All people are grass, their constancy is like the flower of the field. 7 The grass withers, the flower fades, when the breath of the Lord blows upon it; surely the people are grass. 8 The grass withers, the flower fades; but the word of our God will stand forever. 9 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!” 10 See, the Lord God comes with might, and his arm rules for him; his reward is with him, and his recompense before him. 11 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.
Mark 1:1-8
1 The beginning of the good news of Jesus Christ, the Son of God. 2 As it is written in the prophet Isaiah, “See, I am sending my messenger ahead of you, who will prepare your way; 3 the voice of one crying out in the wilderness: ‘Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight,’” 4 John the baptizer appeared in the wilderness, proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. 5 And people from the whole Judean countryside and all the people of Jerusalem were going out to him, and were baptized by him in the river Jordan, confessing their sins. 6 Now John was clothed with camel’s hair, with a leather belt around his waist, and he ate locusts and wild honey. 7 He proclaimed, “The one who is more powerful than I is coming after me; I am not worthy to stoop down and untie the thong of his sandals. 8 I have baptized you with water; but he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit.”
Spoken words for “Who Brings Peace?” by Rev KellyAnn Donahue.
May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be acceptable to you, O God, our strength and our redeemer. The words in our first reading are from Deutero-Isaiah or Second Isaiah, a person writing from the Persian city of Babylon. He was one of the people taken captive from Jerusalem to Babylon in 586 BCE. He wrote predicting that their punishment in Babylon is ended. God has promised them that they will get to go home. That predicted event did happen. They did return to Zion, to Jerusalem, 48 years later. The city was a wreck. The people persevered, and the Temple of Jerusalem was rebuilt in 520 BCE. Isaiah’s words told the people that God had not forgotten them. God would keep the promises made to Moses and Abraham. The gospel writer Mark used Isaiah’s words to point to John the Baptist, who pointed to Jesus as fulfilling those same promises.
Isaiah spoke of a herald, one who has glad tidings of the Lord God coming with might, and coming as a shepherd. Benjamin D. Sommer said, “Normally, a herald would inform a city that an enemy army was arriving, but here God arrives as a gentle shepherd, not to destroy but to protect.” I wondered about all the times we see Jesus as the “Good Shepherd” and of that way of describing him. It is a peaceful image, but I am not sure how relevant or engaging it is to us now. Then I came across this passage from Antoine De Saint Exupéry, who wrote the children’s book, “The Little Prince”. In his book “Wind, Sand and Stars”, Antoine was describing a shepherd named Bark from Morocco. “And Bark, armed with an olive-wood scepter, governed their exodus. He and no other held sway over the nation of ewes, restrained the liveliest because of the lambkins about to be born, stirred up the laggards, strode forward in a universe of confidence and obedience. Nobody but him could say where lay the Promised Land towards which he led his flock. He alone could read his way in the stars, for the science he possessed was not shared by the sheep. Only he, in his wisdom, decided when they should take their rest, when they should drink at the springs. And at night when they slept, Bark, physician and prophet and king, standing in wool to his knees and swollen with tenderness for so much feeble ignorance, would pray for his people.” Now I get it. The coming one will be a shepherd and gatherer of people. The shepherd is the difference between life and death; members of the flock will not live long without the shepherd. This seems contrary to our ideas of independence and of taking care of ourselves. Some of us like living alone. Yet when we are at our most vulnerable, when we mourn for those we lost, when we need comfort, we read Psalm 23 and speak of the Lord as my shepherd.
Who brought this type of comfort to the exiles of Jerusalem? Who brought them peace? Isaiah brought it with his words. Cyrus brought it in reality when he conquered the Babylonians who were holding the exiles. He decreed that they could safely return to Jerusalem and the kingdom of Judah. They returned to worship of God, too. They repented of the sin of worshiping the gods of Babylon.
About 540 years after the return to Jerusalem, the Romans were in charge of Jerusalem, with a series of governors and kings in local control. One of these kings was Herod. John the Baptist started speaking of the coming of the Messiah, and of a need to repent and turn back to God. The Gospel writer Mark wrote about 30 years after the death of Jesus, using the words of Isaiah to show that John was a prophet just as Isaiah was. Mark used Isaiah’s words to point to John the Baptist, who then pointed to Jesus as fulfilling the same promises God made throughout the scriptures. People were ready to be free of the occupation by Rome, and free of the requirement to worship the Roman gods. That is the kind of peace they were looking for. That is the kind of peace they thought the Messiah would bring; a peace brought by a conquering king.
I think there is a kind of peace in repentance and forgiveness. There is peace in learning to get along with others. No one is bothering you, and you are not bothering anyone else. The peace allows you time to think, because you are not fleeing or fighting. Jesus was preaching a kingdom of care, one that we have to produce with our own work. He can point to it, but it is our hands that will create it.
We have to bring peace where ever we can, to family gatherings, to dealings with neighbors and in our on line posts. We bring peace when we contribute or donate or help others in any way. We bring peace when we visit or care and when we add our prayers together. May we strive for peace instead of striving against each other.
Copyright © Rev KellyAnn Donahue