wilderness spirituality: a sermon for advent (in a time of covid)

It’s Advent season again—though if I’m honest, it hardly feels like it.  This year has been so different with COVID, and the holidays don’t feel the same at all.  I miss hugging my family, and seeing my friends, and singing in church while we light candles.  Giving those things up is hard. 

In light of that, the lectionary text from Isaiah 40:1-11 (which you can and should read here) felt incredibly timely.  I’ve edited the sermon I was invited to give last weekend, and I hope the Word brings you comfort and strength. 

If you’d like to watch the worship service, including the full sermon, you can find it on Facebook HERE.

*****

Hundred years before this text in Isaiah was written, God’s people had their own kingdom: the kingdom of Israel.  It started with King Saul, and then passed to King David, who was called the “man after God’s own heart.” And God made a covenant with David that he would establish his house and his kingdom forever.  When he died, he passed the throne to his son, Solomon.  Under Solomon’s leadership, the Temple was built, the army grew, and the nation became wealthy and powerful. 

This was the height of Israel’s glory, and was a time of comfort and security.
That is the beginning of this story.
 
It has some similarities to our story, don’t you think?  Not in every way, of course.  We don’t follow the Mosaic law or have a king, but we (in the U.S.) do live in a nation that has, over time, built up great wealth and power.  Especially if you compare us with the rest of the developing world, we are very well off.  Most of us have immediate access to the things we need and want:

If we’re thirsty, we can turn on our tap and get water.

If we’re hungry, we can drive to the grocery store and get food.

If we’re cold, we can adjust our thermostats.

If we’re sick, we can see a doctor and get medicine.

If we want to worship, we can come to church.

If we’re bored, we can turn on our TVs.

If we don’t know something, we can ask Google.

And even if you don’t have these things, if nothing else you’ve found a way to access a computer or smartphone, or you wouldn’t be reading this blog right now. 
Being in a position of comfort and security and having our needs met is our “normal.”  
This is the beginning of our story.
 
Now, we know that these stories have an end, too, right?  All stories have an end.  And the end is good.

The people of Israel and Judah—God’s people in this Bible story—were promised that the rule of David’s descendants would be established forever.  And we know that centuries later, a “son of David” was born in a stable in Bethlehem to a woman named Mary and a man named Joseph.  They named him Emmanuel—which means “God with us”—and he was called the King of the Jews.  He fulfilled the covenant that God had made with King David. 
This is the end of the first Advent.  It is a good end to the story.
 
Our story has a good ending, too.  We haven’t gotten to the end yet, but we already know what it is.  The good news of Jesus’ birth wasn’t only meant to be good news just for the Jews, but for everyone.  He introduced God’s kingdom to the whole world, and we get to be part of the Church because of it.  After his death and resurrection, he promised that he will one day return—we call this the “Second Coming of Christ”—and when that happens, the Kingdom will be complete. 
That is the end of the second Advent.  It is a good end to the story. 
 
But as we all know, you can’t get to the end of a story without going through the middle.  
The middle usually kicks off with a conflict or complication—an inciting incident.  In the Star Wars story, this is when Luke Skywalker finds out his aunt and uncle have been killed and that Leia needs help.  Or in Lord of the Rings, when Frodo realizes he has the One Ring and he can’t stay in the Shire.
Something changes.  All is no longer well. 
 
Back in the days when Solomon was king, God said to him,

“If you walk before me, as David your father walked, with integrity of heart and uprightness… then I will establish your royal throne over Israel forever.”

But he also warned him,
              “If you turn aside from following me… then I will cut Israel off from the land.” (1 Kings 9)
 
Unfortunately, that is exactly what happened. 
Long story short, Solomon’s heart was turned from God… the nation split into two kingdoms—called Israel and Judah—which were both ruled by a succession of good and bad kings over many years… the prophets showed up (like Obi Wan Kenobi or Gandalf, we might say) to warn the kings to change their ways, and the kings didn’t listen… so God allowed Assyria and Babylon (neighboring kingdoms) to conquer Israel and Judah and send them into exile. 
 
They were forced into the wilderness with no more kings, no more temple where they could hope to meet God, no more wealth and security… so that what they needed to hear were the words of Isaiah many years later:

“Comfort, O comfort my people…

Speak tenderly to Jerusalem, and cry to her

That she has served her term, that her penalty is paid.”

This is the middle of the story. 
 
Again, it has some faint echoes of our own story, doesn’t it? 
In this year of COVID especially, we’ve been disrupted from our “normal.”  Despite the great wealth and excess that we’re used to living in, people have lost jobs, we’ve seen family members and friends get sick or pass away, and a lot has been sacrificed. 
There has been a communal shift from comfort to discomfort, from security to anxiety.
This is a “wilderness experience” for us.  The middle of a story is always full of them. 
 
So let’s talk about the wilderness. 
When we say the word “wilderness,” what images or experiences or feelings come to mind?  
 
Some of us might have a little chill of excitement that goes up our spine when we hear it.  Maybe we’re picturing a beautiful, rugged place full of fresh air. 

 
Or some of us might be like my friend, Amanda’s, five-year-old daughter, Ava, who went out on a hike this summer in Eastern Washington—in this gorgeous landscape full of evergreen trees—and told her mom, “I don’t like nature…it has bugs!”  
 
Maybe it’s a little bit of both.  There’s part of me that longs for the wilderness, to be away from everything.  We used to go on camping trips when I was younger in the Cascade mountains in Washington (where I grew up), and I loved going hiking.  I would always take my little journal with me in my backpack next to my water bottle, and when we found a river (with the big rocks next to them like jungle gyms), I would scurry up the rocks and get out my journal and soak it all in.  Sometimes that’s where it felt like I met God, even as a kid.
I think it’s why we hear some people say, “nature is my church.”
Just this summer, my nephew, Josh, said out on a hike: “When I’m in nature I feel like I’m free.”
There is a freedom and a grounded-ness in nature… and I still get that sense of excitement in my gut every time I go into wild spaces.
 
But sometimes my head kicks in too and I know the wilderness is a dangerous place. 
What if we get lost?  
What if there are wild animals?
What if we run out of water?
Being in the wilderness can be exciting, but it also comes with risk. Our desire for comfort and security often hits a point where it starts kicking back in.  Especially when we don’t expect ourselves to be there, the wilderness can be a deeply uncomfortable and even terrifying place.      
 
But God’s people are no strangers to being in the wilderness.  There is a pattern all throughout Scripture of God calling, leading, or forcing his people into these spaces and this discomfort:

• God called Abraham out of Haran and into the desert, promising to lead him to a land that he would show him.  Talk about ambiguous! But still, Abraham went... (Genesis 12)
• Later, God called Moses through the burning bush in the wilderness to confront Pharaoh, and then used him to call the Hebrews out of Egypt and into the Promised Land—by way of forty years in the desert, which is where they received the Law that set them apart as God’s people (Exodus)
• David hid in the wilderness while he was being chased by King Saul (1 Samuel)
• The prophet Elijah fled to the wilderness to escape Queen Jezebel, and then he met God as a still, small voice in the wind on the mountain (1 Kings 19)
• The people of Israel and Judah were exiled for seventy years before they were allowed to come back to Jerusalem (Isaiah)
• John the Baptist lived in the wilderness of Judea by the Jordan river where he called people out to repent and be baptized (Matthew 3:1-6, Mark 1:4, Luke 3:2-3)
• Even Jesus was called by the Holy Spirit into the wilderness for forty days to be tempted after his baptism (Mark 1:12, Luke 4:1)
• And, Paul went out into the wilderness of Arabia for three years before starting his ministry (Galatians 1:15-17)

In the NRSV Bible translation, the term “wilderness” appears 278 times.  That’s more often than we see the word “faith” (and it doesn’t even include the times the same term is translated “desert”).  The story of the people of God is deeply embedded in the wilderness.  Why?
 
Because this is where transformation takes place.  

This is the journey that is necessary to get from the beginning of the story to the end. 
Our “wilderness experience” may not be out in nature, but it’s wilderness all the same.  The “normal” is disrupted and the hero sets out on a dangerous, but redemptive path. 
As the saying goes, “God loves you just as you are, but he doesn’t intend for you to stay that way.”  

There is a refining process that happens when we step out of our comfort zone and learn to trust God in ways that we may never have had to before. 
 
A couple years ago, my husband, Matt’s, aunt and uncle gave us a book called Rewilding the Way: Break Free to Follow an Untamed God, by Todd Wynward.  In this book, he identifies three things God’s people often find when they enter the wilderness:
 

1) An experience of limits. 
 
There’s a form of fasting involved when we go out into the wilderness because we no longer have access to the comfort and security that we’re used to.  When we get into wild spaces and away from our “normal” there are things we’re forced to do without.
  
What are you having to do without right now in this COVID wilderness season? 
What has been the hardest to sacrifice?
What have we learned that we may not really need, and what has it taught us to value?
 
2) An experience of Sabbath. 
 
Sabbath is time set aside for rest and communion with God where we take a break from all our work and anxiety and fear, and we trust that everything is in God’s control. 
Wynward writes that, “Time in the wild gives us an enforced holy rest, exposing our restlessness.”
 
When have you felt restless in this season?
How might God be allowing you or inviting you to rest or trust him?
 
3) An experience of identity formation.   
When we get pulled out of our own “kingdoms” and our sense of control, and into a wilderness experience, it becomes easy to realize how small and fragile we really are. 
We recognize the truth in what Isaiah says—that we are like grass, that we can wither and fade so easily when the breath of God blows upon us. 
We realize that life is fleeting and there is so much we are not actually in control of. 
 
But does God want us to wither and blow away?  Is that the point in all this? 
I don’t think so.  I think God invites us to realize how small we are so that we can appreciate and embrace how big he is. 
Getting out into the wilderness and away from all our distractions is where we are finally freed up to encounter and lean into a wild and powerful God.
 
This is not often a pleasant experience.  The wilderness is uncomfortable. 
The Israelites who were with Moses were so frustrated with the desert that they wanted to go back to slavery in Egypt to escape it.  The people of Judah felt abandoned in the exile because they had lost most of their identity as a nation.  We’ve likely spent most of this year echoing the psalms that David wrote in the wilderness when he said, “How long, O Lord?”  This feels painful and we don’t like it!
 
But God says, “Comfort, O comfort my people… do not fear.” 
 
If we look, we just might see the bush burning in the distance. 
If we listen, we just might hear the sound of the still, small voice that spoke to Elijah in the mountain. 

The wilderness where we experience limits and Sabbath is where God often chooses to make his presence known and to change us in the process.
 
If part of this Isaiah text sounded familiar to you at all, it’s because it shows up again later in the story.  It’s how the gospels identify John the Baptist when he preaches near the Jordan river—as the voice in the wilderness who prepares the way of the Lord. 
But notice what John does here…
He calls people out of Jerusalem, away from their place of comfort, and into the wilderness of Judea.  And that is where he says, “Repent, for the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand.”
Repent and embrace your new identity as people of a kingdom far greater than you could ever construct for yourselves. 

Photo credit here

If you’ve ever seen the movie, The Hobbit, there’s a scene where Bilbo Baggins is sitting with Gandalf the wizard trying to decide whether or not to set out on this dangerous quest with this odd group of dwarves. 

Gandalf tells him a story and then says, “You’ll have a tale or two of your own to tell when you come back.” 
Bilbo then asks him, “Can you promise that I will come back?” 
And Gandalf says, “No.  And if you do… you will not be the same.”
 

I think this is the secret John the Baptist knew when he called people out into Judea, and what God knew would happen to the Israelites when he sent them into exile—that they would not be the same.  There’s a point in the beginning of every story when something changes, when trials in the wilderness need to be experienced before we reach the story’s end.  So even when the journey seems long and vulnerable, take comfort, for there God says, “the glory of the Lord shall be revealed.”
 
Where might God be meeting and changing you in this uncharted territory?  What is God doing in this wilderness?  Look and listen for it… because His is the road we walk as we find our way home.