Isaiah 40:1-11

“A voice cries out: in the wilderness prepare the way of the LORD, make straight in the desert a highway for our God.”

Despite the activity outside our doors in the last few days, those words were not the instructions that the Garden Committee gave to the workers creating the new pathway to the Cutler Memorial Garden. If you did not walk by the Parish House this morning, make sure you take note of the lovely new brick walk that will now lead folks back to our other sanctuary — the garden behind our church.

And besides, if those were the instructions, the workers were not listening – the garden walk was designed with gentle curves; it’s not a straight highway, but rather a beckoning path that invites both friend and stranger to make their way, to go to a quiet place of rest, and there to meet God.

The words from scripture were spoken long before our own day. They were uttered by a prophet in the sixth century before the common era. He is given the name Isaiah, and is sometimes called second Isaiah, because he wrote much later than the author of the first 39 chapters in this book. And he wrote to a people lost in exile. After the nation of Judah had been conquered, the people were taken to Babylon, there to dwell in a wilderness, far from their beloved Jerusalem, where the temple and most of the city had been destroyed.

Having suffered in exile, the people now awaken to a prophet whose first words are “Comfort, O comfort, my people.” These are words of promise and of hope. God has not forgotten them. Indeed, the word of the prophet is this: they are to prepare a way, a highway, for their God will come to them.

A highway. What comes to mind when you hear that word? In the last fifty years, our has been a culture that both built and been transformed by highways. They make much of our current lifestyle possible. But there are consequences to building highways. Those of you who have lived here in Charlestown for a long time know something about announcements of highways being built, with the rough places being made plain and the ground being made level — and it was not always good news.

You can recall what it was like when the Mystic River Bridge – the Tobin Bridge — was built, and how a highway to that bridge came to define one border of this community. And you know that as part of that project, the Training Filed was going to be made level, so that an entrance ramp to that highway might be made there. And you know of the efforts of Mr. Cutler and others to prevent that.

Whether we talk of that highway, the Central Artery, I 93, or even the current discussion about Rutherford Avenue, we know that highways can have a dramatic, and not always positive effect on the fabric of a community.

Why did the prophet choose such an image to speak about the promises of God? Well, it might help to know that these Israelites who were dwelling in Babylon probably would have been familiar with a religious custom of their conquerors. In the Babylonian religion, special processional ways were constructed along which the images of the gods were carried in an annual procession so the people could see the representations of their gods.

The prophet proclaims that there will be another highway; the highway of Israel’s God, Yahweh. And this is stunning news. It is news to those who have lost their faith that God was in any way present in their lives. It is news to those who have lost hope. It is news for those who longed to return to their homeland, yet saw no possible way.

But the prophet has a new word. He proclaims God has not forgotten. God is entering into the life of that community. So get ready. Prepare a way.

This is not about making a highway in the midst of neighborhoods that are full of life. This is about creating a path where there is no path. It is the Good News that where God has seemed absent, we need to look and prepare for God’s coming.

And God’s coming may surprise us. We may discover that God is already doing something in our lives before that activity is clear to us.

Which brings me back to our garden path. I had a chance to watch the workers who designed and completed the path over the course of three days, and it was a revelation. When they first dug up the ground and laid out guidelines for this path, I was puzzled, and concerned. It was, quite frankly, a crooked path – going this way and that as it made its way along the side of the building. And I thought — is that what the Garden Committee wanted? Did they realize what it was going to look like?

Then came the preparatory work – a layer of crushed stone, packed down, and made firm; then a layer of sand, packed down as well. And suddenly I began to realize that a brick path is not just about what we see, but like, most things in life, also about what lies beneath – the firm foundation – the rough places being made plain in a good and supportive way.

But still, even after the bricks started being laid, it still did not seem all that beautiful – a jagged road more than a beckoning path. And then, finally, stones were being cut, and what had been a crooked path suddenly was transformed with gentle curves. In the end, the way was clear, the design emerged, and all that I saw had been dependent on what had been done before.

And it occurred to me – how has God already made ways into my life? Where are rough places being smoothed out and supportive foundations being built? Where are ways and paths that I may not yet recognize, ways that will eventually be revealed as those that graciously invite me into a deeper relationship with Jesus Christ? For if a highway is being made, it is so that we might greet God even as we find God coming to greet us.

For the pathways of God will beckon. Even before our garden path was done, some of our children were eagerly skipping on it yesterday after the pageant rehearsal. And one of you confessed to me this morning that you did a little dance on the walk before you came into church. Not a four lane highway, but a gentle and inviting path. Inviting God into our lives. Inviting us to receive all that God offers.

Our psalm this morning concluded with these words :

Righteousness shall go before him, and peace shall be a pathway for his feet.
(Psalm 85:13)

May you and I, through our life together this season, see our lives become those pathways of peace, that God might dwell with us.

Amen.

A Sermon for St. John’s Episcopal Church
Charlestown, Massachusetts

Preached on the Second Sunday of Advent
December 4, 2011
by the Rev. Thomas N. Mousin