Isaiah 64:1-4
O that you would tear open the heavens and come down, so that the mountains would quake at your presence—as when fire kindles brushwood and the fire causes water to boil—to make your name known to your adversaries, so that the nations might tremble at your presence! When you did awesome deeds that we did not expect, you came down, the mountains quaked at your presence. From ages past no one has heard, no ear has perceived, no eye has seen any God besides you, who works for those who wait for him.
One of my favorite fictional characters is Father Tim, the priest of Lord’s Chapel, in Jan Karon’s series of books about the small town of Mitford. As I have read and reread the Mitford books, Father Tim has become for me a role model of how God calls us to be in the world. He is a person who consistently recognizes God’s kingdom breaking in all around him, who acknowledges It when he sees It, and acts to further It when he can. His daily conversations are sprinkled with phrases like, “Thanks be to God,” “Hallelujah,” and “He restoreth my soul.”
The author of today’s verses from Isaiah ups the ante and focuses on the Kingdom breaking in on a grand scale. In his description, mountains quake and brushwood kindles. Could there be a grander description of God’s power to break into our human world? Could there be a promise more powerful, as we wait, than that we can anticipate with certainty God’s presence here with us?
Although God’s power and promise are enormous, he works through us on a human scale. During this Advent season we focus on a quiet event, the birth of a baby, to a young woman who recognized her chance to play a role in God’s Kingdom breaking in. A quiet event at which any of us might have said “Thanks be to God” if, in the midst of our humanness, we were focusing on God and his Kingdom, and which, over time, would have the metaphorical power of mountains quaking and brushwood igniting.
And so, this Advent season, look around you for God’s Kingdom trying to break in, whether in ways big or small. Acknowledge It and try to further It if you can. Mary did. The Wise Men did. The fictional Father Tim does. And, like them, we can too.
Diane Bricker, Chair, FUMC Adult Education Council
