Joy Can't Wait

[00:00:01] Speaker A: Pray with me. Come Holy Spirit, and enlighten our hearts and help us to focus our minds on your word this morning. Teach us your ways so that we will walk in your path and be led by the light of the Lord. We praise these things together in your name. Amen. Our scripture reading this morning comes from the prophet Isaiah, chapter two, verses two to five, and it's on page 550 in your pew Bible. In days to come, the mountain of the Lord's house shall be established as the highest of the mountains and shall be raised above the hills. All the nations shall stream to it. Many people shall come and say, come, let us go 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. For out of Zion shall go forth instruction and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem. He shall judge between the nations and shall arbitrate for many peoples. They shall beat their soul swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks. Nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war anymore. O house of Jacob, come, let us walk in the light of the Lord. This is the word of the Lord. Thanks be to God. [00:01:52] Speaker B: It is a tremendous joy for me to be with you again today and I'm really honored to be able to worship with you here. Pastor Matt had asked me before I launch into my sermon to give you a little bit of an update for our church and our community. As Pastor Matt mentioned, we did lose our entire church campus. The entire city of Palisades was affected and quite extensively decimated. And it has been a year, hasn't it? It's been a year. It's been a very difficult year for our folks and for our church. Quite a few families in our church, the majority of the families in our church lost their homes completely destroyed. Those who did not lose their homes have not been able to return to them and are still, as many of you are aware of in the Altadena fires, are still working with insurance and the great unknown. There are so many unknowns and it has been very difficult. It is the same road that we are traveling on with our church. There are so many unknowns with not enough insurance money, not enough money to rebuild. Our folks are scattered everywhere. We've lost the great majority of our church family to as far as Connecticut. They've relocated to Connecticut, San Clemente, Northern California. And it has been a difficult year. We have the spirit and the hope and the intention of rebuilding, but that will take. As you know, for those of you who might have lost your homes, it is a very, very difficult road with a lot of unknowns and many twists and turns. So we are in deep prayer for the way that God is going to lead us and our church. We appreciate you being in prayer with us and for us and through all of the difficult things, we have seen that God is good. It is our first Christmas without our church and it has been hard, but God is good and there have been points of joy and hope and light and peace even in the midst of this difficult year. So there's an update for you. A little bit of a tear jerker, sorry, but will you join me in prayer as we look to God's Word now as people of faith, Let us pray. Loving God, we thank you that your Word is here for us in the midst of so many unknowns in our lives. And we give you thanks that your word is strong and holy, holds promises for us, and also holds peace and hope and joy in the midst of so many uncertainties in life. And so God, we turn to you now. We turn to your Word. And I ask, oh God, that I would decrease that you might increase so that your Word and and your will would be made known to your people. Amen. So we are in the third week of Advent and we interrupt the deep blue and the purple of Advent to remember pink, the rose colored candle which is the candle of joy. An Advent is a season of waiting. The candles, the hymns, everything in this season beckons us to watch and to wait for the coming Messiah. Advent teaches us to wait, but waiting is hard. We live in an age of instant gratification. We live in a culture that invites us to avoid waiting. We avoid waiting as much as possible because we have two day shipping, we have Instacart, we have Google searches, we have one click ordering next day delivery. Everything in our culture is teaching us to avoid waiting. Perhaps we don't like waiting because waiting often feels like a waste of our time. An Advent is an entire season of waiting. But Advent invites us to a different kind of waiting. It is not passive and it is not impatient, but rather it is a hopeful waiting and it is a sacred waiting. It is a time when we ask God to show up to show us to teach us our scripture. Today that was so beautifully read by Nancy was written by the prophet Isaiah, who knew something about waiting in Isaiah 2. The context of this passage is that the people of Judah, when Isaiah was writing this, the people of Judah were living in very, very dark Times. It was a time of waiting. It was a time of uncertainty. It was a time of conflict, corruption, fear. And yet. And yet Isaiah writes this. He lifts up his eyes and he says, in the days to come, the mountain of the Lord, the mountain of the Lord's house will be established as the highest of all the mountains, and all nations will stream to this mountain. Isaiah isn't speaking of a world that was present. Isaiah was speaking to a world that wasn't yet, but one that will be. Isaiah is painting hope across a very dark sky. He proclaims this even when the world around him is deeply troubled and very broken. And he's not saying someday when all of this is fixed. He's saying right now, right here, in the midst of this mess, we need to walk to the light. And so it's in the mess and it's in our waiting that we need to see the light, the hope, and even joy. We see the Palisades and the Eton and Altadena communities waiting to rebuild and to build again after the fires. We see families waiting for peace in regions that are wracked by war. We see people waiting for justice, marching in streets, speaking out, wondering when the needle will finally move toward compassion and equity. These are not small weights. These are life shaking waits. And hope and joy in these spaces are a lifeline. And into these real, aching spaces, Scripture dares to speak about joy. Not a joy that denies pain and sorrow. It's not a joy that pretends everything is fine, but biblical joy, a joy that comes from knowing that God is at work even when we yet cannot see real results. So Isaiah is calling people to move right then, to journey together toward God's peace. And joy is not the same as comfort. Joy is the deep and sometimes very strange gladness that comes from trusting in God's future. Even when the present is difficult, We cannot wait for joy to come and think somehow God will fix it. We have to pick up our lantern today and take the next step in Advent joy. Says the light is coming, so we need to start living like the people of the dawn. Perhaps the problem about the way that we think about hope and joy is that we treat it like it only belongs to the future. But Advent joy, this joy that Isaiah is writing of here, is something that refuses to wait for perfect God conditions. Isaiah doesn't wait for peace to break out before preaching peace. He says, now. Now is the time to beat swords into plowshares. He doesn't wait for people to behave before he says, come, let us walk in the light of the Lord. Because joy isn't just a feeling that we will find when and after things are better. It is the courage to believe that things can get better while they are broken. Joy cannot wait for the world to be right. Because isn't that exactly when the world needs hope the most, when it's most wrong? We often also mistake waiting for wishing. Wishing is passive. It's waiting with no assurance. But advent waiting is a joyful anticipation, a trust that what God has promised will come to pass. The Hebrew word for hope, tikva. It comes from the word for rope or cord, something that you hold onto. Tikva means hope. But this hope carries with it a much deeper expectation of strong expectation. It is a cord or a rope that signifies an anchor, an anchor that binds ones to God's promises and and God's future blessings. It's not just a passive wish for hope, but an active, powerful expectation of deliverance from suffering. Tikva represents a powerful, enduring faith that is able to provide strength and purpose through all of our suffering. We see this word used in Jeremiah. Jeremiah 29 says that God promises us a future and a hope. So hope is not just optimism. It's holding on to the promise of God with both hands tightly. And advent joy and advent hope are knit together. And when we hold on to tikva, the cord of hope tied together with the cord of joy, it changes how we live now. It changes how we treat one another. It changes how we face despair. Hope and joy can change everything. It is a hope that holds on tight and a joy that strengthens us. And so when the world tells us to despair, advent whispers wait because the light is coming. And when fear tells us it's too late, joy answers no, God's story is not done yet. And when injustice feels too powerful, advent joy reminds us that God's mountain still stands and people will come to it. The interesting thing about this passage is that Isaiah doesn't wait for peace to show up before announcing peace. He doesn't wait for the nations to behave before inviting them to come to the mountain of the Lord. He doesn't wait until the weapons are gone. He proclaims that God will turn plowshares, will turn them into plowshares, even when the clanging of swords can be heard in the streets. Isaiah does not teach wishful thinking. Isaiah teaches active, present tense hope for a joy that we can both anticipate and embrace. Hope that shows up to work when the world is still undone. Hope that expects God to move before the evidence arrives. Hope that walks in the light even when the sky seems so dark. And so hope and joy cannot wait, because the world cannot wait for healing or peace or love. And so, friends, it is a calling for us to act now, for us to toil now, for us to pray now. And this is Advent waiting, the kind of waiting that moves and builds and acts and prays and serves and loves. So Isaiah ends with this breathtaking invitation. Let us, friends, walk in the light of the Lord. Not tomorrow, not when things calm down, not when we feel ready, but now. And this is the great scandal of Advent. God does not wait for a peaceful world before coming. Christ entered in. Christ entered into the instability, the fear, the darkness, the waiting. A baby born to a dark world. So, brothers and sisters, if God didn't wait, if Christ didn't wait, then joy cannot wait either. And joy can take root in our hearts right now in how we speak to one another, in how we care for our neighbors, in how we pray, in how we choose generosity over fear, in how we show mercy, in how we walk into the week ahead. Hope cannot wait for a better world, because hope is what makes the world better. So on this third Sunday of Advent, as we light the candle of joy, we are not lighting it because all is calm and bright. We light it because the world is still aching in the waiting. We light it because our hearts need reminding. We light it because God is not done yet. Joy cannot wait. Not in a world still hungry for peace. It cannot wait. Not in communities that need healing. Joy cannot wait. Not in families that are praying for miracles. And joy cannot wait because, friends, God is already at work. So, friends, the call today is to lift our eyes with Isaiah. Look to the mountains. Get your feet moving. Let your heart lean forward. Let your life shine with the light of God. And let this candle today remind us, let us walk in the light of the Lord. Because joy starts here. It cannot wait until Christmas morning. It can't wait until the wars end, or the wounds heal, or the world finally feels safe. It starts here, in the present, in this sanctuary, in our homes, in our hearts, because God is already at work among us. And Advent joy says, start living into the peace that you long for. Start showing the love that you're waiting to see. Start walking in the light even before the sun rises. And so I repeat this beautiful invitation that Isaiah gives us. Come, brothers and sisters, let us walk in the light of the Lord. This is not a command for tomorrow. It is for today. Because of the truth of the Advent secret is this? God's light is already breaking through. The dawn is already glowing on the horizon. And our calling, our calling as people of faith is to live like that light matters. Let it be so. Amen.