When I was a little boy and just learning how to walk, I had a little wooden train with a rope on it that I loved to pull around the house.  I liked to watch the little train following me, so, of course, I walked backwards so that I could see it.  One day while pulling my little train along, I walked backwards right off the edge of the stairs and, like Winnie the Pooh, went thump, thump, thump down to the bottom, breaking my leg.  Despite being involved in a number of car accidents, most my fault but not all, some sledding mishaps, and a few boat capsizings, including one where I went bump, bump, bump, bump along the bottom of a river, the train incident is the only time I have ever broken a bone.  But I am told by people who have broken bones, or otherwise lost use of a limb, that you don’t realize how much you that limb until you don’t have it any more.  Until we lose use of a leg, we take for granted simple acts like walking across a room, climbing a flight of stairs, or driving a car.  Until we lose the use of an arm, we take for granted simple things like opening a jar, writing a note, or tying a shoe.  I’ve always been touched by Senator Bob Dole’s story.  Here was a man who was one of the most powerful people in the country: Senate minority leader; a vice-presidential candidate; and a presidential candidate and yet, because of his war injuries, he couldn’t button his own shirt, something a toddle can do.  It’s like Joni Mitchell says, “Don’t it always go that you don’t know what you’ve got ‘til it’s gone.”  Sometimes we see something most clearly when we look at its contrast.

Advent is a season of contrasts, as our lessons from both Isaiah and Romans make clear.  Both Isaiah and St. Paul give us a vision of the world they way it should be.  Isaiah envisions the world as a restored Israelite kingdom.  The king who rules over the kingdom is descended from the same line as Israel’s greatest king, King David.  Just like the kings and prophets of old, the Spirit of the Lord will rest upon him so that he will rule justly.  He will not judge based on what he sees or the rumors that he hears.  Rather he judges based on his fear of and relationship with God, fully aware of his special responsibility to the poor and the oppressed.  Even the animals are at peace in this kingdom of mercy and justice.  Predators and prey live together in harmony and children play safely with poisonous snakes.  Isaiah gives us a vision of the world as a restored kingdom ruled with perfect justice and in harmony with the natural world.

St. Paul also has a vision of the world the way it should be.  In St. Paul’s vision people of the world who had been at enmity with one another now live in harmony.  Jews and Gentiles were two groups that had been at odds, and Paul envisions them living together as peacefully as Isaiah’s wolves and lambs.   St. Paul’s vision is the fulfillment of Isaiah’s prophecy that all the world would be reconciled under the rule of a Davidic king.

Isaiah’s and St. Paul’s pictures of the world the way it should be make a contrast with the world the way it is.  We listen to those words and we can’t help but notice that our world is far, far removed from the ideal.  The rulers of our world don’t rule with compassion and justice, and they certainly don’t have a special concern for the poor and needy.  The rulers of our age may think that they rule in the fear of the Lord, but it is not a Lord I know.  The Lord I know thinks that we should welcome and nurture children, not make sure that poor children don’t have health insurance.  The Lord I know thinks that we have a special obligation to care for the strangers and aliens among us, not make sure that they live in fear and without legal protection.  The Lord I know blesses the peacemakers and thinks we should do everything we can to avoid war. And we can hardly say that we live in peace and harmony with the natural world.  Our waste and pollution of creation is catching up to us and will be as poisonous to our children as any snake.  After about two thousand horrible years, most Jews and Christians seem to be able to share the same planet but what about Jews and Muslims or Muslims and Hindus?  Those Advent pictures of Isaiah and St. Paul make a contrast between the world the way it is and the world the way it should be.

So how do we get there?  How do we get from the world the way it is to the world the way it should be?  John the Baptist draws us a map, a straight path through the wilderness of life.  That straight path is the path of repentance.  The New Testament word for repentance means to turn in a new direction.  John the Baptist invites us to turn away from the things of this world and to turn down the path headed toward God.  We can’t walk all the way down that path alone, of course, but the first step is to acknowledge that we are not satisfied with the world the way it is.  Each step we take down the path towards God prepares us and prepares the world for the day when the Christmas Child will lead us all the way. Amen.