Scripture reading: Psalm 122.

Sermon text: Isaiah 2:1-5.

Devotional

“Let’s go!” Those words can mean anything from “It’s finally time to leave” to “Let’s get this over with.”

Israel heard those words time and again their history. “Let us go to the house of the LORD,” the Psalmist David said to his people, describing the joy these words brought to his heart. When David’s son Solomon built a glorious Temple for God’s people, David’s song became a standard hymn for worshipers to sing on their way to the Temple.

Unfortunately, those words brought little comfort to the Jews in Jesus’ time. Israel’s glory days lay in the past; the sins of the nation had finally brought God’s judgment on Jerusalem. “Let’s go” took the people into 70 years of exile; “Let’s go” had taken countless Jews across the Mediterranean world from their homeland. In the first century A.D., “Let’s go” meant a trip to a city under Roman rule, including worship in a Temple where the Roman Fortress Antonia dominated the skyline. Praying for “the peace of Jerusalem” to the Jews of Jesus’ time meant crying for a Messiah to yell “Let’s go” at the front of an army intent on defeating the Gentiles and restoring the nation to prominence.

“Let’s go.” Today, these words can bring joy to our hearts as we realize the Messiah did come, and He did bring victory to all who would believe in His name. One day, “Let’s go” will ring through heaven as He gathers the faithful to join Him as He returns to judge the living and the dead. Until that day —

We wait.

Sermon

“A smart soldier wants to know the causes of wars. Also how to end them. After all, war is the normal state of affairs, isn't it? Peace is the name of the ideal we deduce from the fact that there have been interludes between wars.” — Jerry Pournelle, The Prince, p. 223.

We hear about this “ideal” called peace quite frequently in our lives. Nations try to make and keep the peace with one another and between each other. The charter of the United Nations lists “to save succeeding generations from the scourge of war” as its first reason for the existence of the organization. While the organization has many detractors — and I admit my own distaste for it — we must admit that no major world war involving military conflict has occurred in its existence.

Yet, strife exists. As I write this manuscript, North Korea has engaged in one of its increasingly common provocations with South Korea, threatening to unleash nuclear terror on its southern counterpart. The site globalsecurity.org currently lists 37 active conflicts worldwide, with the United States involved in 4 of them.

The people of Isaiah’s time would have understood the uncertainty that many feel today. Assyria had overcome one of its periodic weak spells and had begun pushing south again, threatening the tiny nation of Judah. Egypt, the superpower to the south, watched warily as Assyria began asserting its control over the Mesopotamian region, alert for any hint that the Assyrians would begin moving south toward Egyptian territory. The Assyrians would destroy the Northern Kingdom of Israel in Isaiah’s lifetime.

When you read the first few chapters of Isaiah, you see that peace within the nation of Judah existed only as a memory. The Jews had forsaken the Covenant under which God had promised to provide for them and protect them as long as they remained faithful in their obedience to the Covenant. The first chapter of Isaiah reads like a laundry list of social ills, all the result of faithlessness to God and human pride: injustice, oppression of the fatherless and widows, theft, corruption in high places, and ritualistic religion that meant nothing to the worshipers. As before, God called the people to repentance and promised restoration to those who obeyed; as before, the people ignored the prophet’s call and carried on as if God would never enact the punishments contained in the Covenant.

However, chapter 2 begins with a hint of promise. Notice the wording of verse 1: “The word that Isaiah the son of Amoz saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem.” In particular, notice the verb: “saw.” Remember that in Hebrew prophecy, God displayed the prophecy to the prophets, who then knew the prophecy would occur. So confident were the prophets that they often recorded their prophecies in a tense called “prophetic perfect” that used past tense verbs.

Isaiah told the people that he saw a glorious future for Israel. Jerusalem itself, the center of disobedience and lawlessness in the land, would rise from the cesspool of sin everyone saw to become the greatest city in the world. This rise would occur when God Himself appeared in the city and reigned over all the nations.

Isaiah wrote, “It shall come to pass in the latter days that the mountain of the house of the LORD shall be established as the highest of the mountains, and shall be lifted up above the hills.” Jerusalem sits about 2,500 feet above sea level. Around here, 2,500 feet sounds rather high, but this actually is less than half the height of Denver, the “Mile High City.” Other mountains on the planet tower even higher. Isaiah’s prophecy doesn’t mean that the mountain on which Jerusalem sits will rise above even Mt. Everest; it refers instead to the prominence of the city itself. The city would rise politically and religiously above all other cities in the world, even above the current capitals of human government and activities. Today, people would think of Washington, D.C. as the political capital of the world, with Rome serving as one of the major religious capitals as the home of Vatican City, the residence of the pope. Isaiah prophesied that Jerusalem would eventually, inevitably eclipse all other human capitals.

Today, people in other nations often speak of going to prominent places to learn how to rule their countries. People want to look to the United Nations for legal rulings that will bind rogue nations; others look to the Hague in the Netherlands, site of the International Court of Justice and the International Criminal Court. These courts theoretically serve as legal forums for the prosecution of crimes that nations themselves will fail to pursue, but these courts have little jurisdiction.

Isaiah wrote that when God exalts Jerusalem, people will come to the holy city to learn how to live with one another. “Come, let us go up to the mountain of the LORD, to the house of the God of Jacob, that he may teach us his ways and that we may walk in his paths.” In the day of which Isaiah writes, all people will come to realize that only God can truly teach them how to live rightly with one another. All people will come to realize that walking “in His paths” will lead to right relationships between nations. Isaiah wrote that in that day, “out of Zion shall go the law, and the word of the LORD from Jerusalem.” In that day, God will finally receive the recognition He deserves as the true judge of humanity.

In that day, “He shall judge between the nations, and shall decide disputes for many peoples.” Remember the quote at the beginning of the sermon? I can add 2 other quotes that explain why we need a powerful military today:

1. •“War is nothing more than the continuation of politics by other means.”
   

2. •“To secure peace is to prepare for war.”
   

These 2 quotes from Carl von Clausewitz tell us plenty about how nations see their militaries. Like it or not, we need some way for nations to settle their disputes short of war. Otherwise, the most powerful nations will constantly exert their control over all other nations.

At the United Nations, you can see a statue by Soviet artist Evgeniy Vuchetich. This statue, “Swords to Plowshares,” was donated to the United Nations by the Soviet Union in 1959. (Yes, there’s a great deal of irony here if you know anything about Cold War history.) This statue represents the ideal of which Pournelle wrote: A time when no nation would ever need to maintain a military. In the day of God’s rule over the nations, no country will need to spend money on weaponry. We’ll have no need for institutions such as West Point, Annapolis, or Sandhurst. The lessons of military history and strategy will finally disappear from the pages of human learning.

Following his prophecy of Jerusalem’s future, Isaiah offered a plea to his nation and his beloved city: “O house of Jacob, come, let us walk in the light of the LORD.” Even after prophesying that the Gentile nations will follow their God, Isaiah still had to call for his own people, the covenant people chosen by God as a kingdom of priests, to walk in the laws the Gentiles would one day accept.

As we look at Scripture and salvation history, we know that Isaiah’s prophecy still remains mostly unfulfilled. In Advent, however, we begin to understand the multiple meanings of Isaiah’s words.

For one thing, God Himself did visit Jerusalem. Jesus, the divine Son of God, rode triumphantly into Jerusalem in A.D. 33, recognized by many on that day as the “Son of David,” the true heir of Israel’s greatest king. His claim to David’s throne went unappreciated by the Jewish leadership. Instead of recognizing their true King, the Jewish leadership colluded with the Romans to crucify their Messiah. We must not fail to understand the “principalities and powers” of this world will fight to the death to maintain and extend their grip on political and economic power.

On 3 April A.D. 33, a hill in Jerusalem rose above all other mountains on earth; not in height, but in significance. Jesus, the Messiah of the Jews and the Son of God, was crucified on Mount Golgotha outside the walls of Jerusalem. Jesus’ death on that mountain fulfilled the Covenant Isaiah’s people had repeatedly broken for centuries. Jesus’ death provided the ultimate sacrifice of the Covenant from Mt. Sinai.

The leaders may have executed Jesus, but they could not maintain their grip on His life. Jesus rose again, an event we celebrate weekly in our worship. Jesus had promised that all who believed in Him would “not perish but have eternal life” (John 3:16). Jesus conquered death, bringing eternal life to everyone who will accept Him as Lord of their lives.

Jesus may not have established His rule in Jerusalem in A.D. 33, but He fulfilled part of this prophecy nonetheless. Jesus’ death on the cross and resurrection made possible our own peace with God. St. Paul told the Romans, “we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ” when we believe in Him by faith (Romans 5:1). In spite of our rebellion against God, the rebellion that led to all the suffering between nations and peoples, through Jesus we have a living relationship with God.

When we confess Jesus as Lord, we not only receive peace with God. The origin of righteousness — that is, right living — sends the Holy Spirit into our hearts to help us live peaceful lives with one another. The Holy Spirit guides us to live as God expects, using Scripture, the Church, and our consciences to direct us to live selfless and joyous lives that point others to God and His expectations of right behavior.

Jesus also brought a sense of peace between nations that remains unrecognized by the powers that rule the world today. Everyone who confesses Jesus as Lord receives adoption into the family of faith, the Church. The Church encompasses believers of all nations, races, and languages. The Church has worked during our entire existence to bring peace, one soul at a time, by proclaiming the soul-saving gospel of Christ. The Church carries out missions to alleviate suffering in poverty-ridden and war-stricken places. We also work throughout the world to bring peace by promoting ways other than war to settle the differences between nations and ethnic groups.

Advent really reminds us that we live in the “now, but not yet” period of history. Jesus has come, and He has brought the kingdom of God to life in the world; yet, we live in the “between” times before His final return to establish His righteous rule over all nations. You don’t have to wait for His final fulfillment of Isaiah’s prophecy to experience peace with God. Come to the mountain; come to the cross of Jesus, where your sins were atoned and you will find redemption. Confess Jesus as Lord, believing in His resurrection, and come to know true peace in a living relationship with a living God.