Isaiah 11:1-10; Psalm 72:1-7,18-19; Romans 15:4-13; Matthew 3:1-12
If there’s one word that knits together all the scripture readings for today, it’s Balance.
Balance is good thing. Car tires need to be balanced if a car is to drive safely. Scales need to be balanced if you want to receive your fair share. Checkbooks need to be balanced if you want financial stability. Diets need to be balanced to achieve optimal health.
A healthy lifestyle is a balance of physical, emotional, and intellectual wellbeing. Our spiritual lives need balance as well if we are to achieve lifelong faith.
We’ve all seen lives out of balance. Addictions like drugs and alcohol. Addictions like money and possessions. Addictions like wielding power and having control. Addictions like gambling and food and sex.
We’ve seen whole societies and whole nations out of balance. Creating and supporting institutions like slavery. Espousing prejudice. Enforcing classism. Tolerating patriarchy and misogyny. Allowing religious intolerance. Encouraging Homophobia. Protecting agism. Preaching xenophobia. Being intolerant of mental illness and those with disabilities. Think of the Nazi regime in Germany. Think of the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia. Think of Stalin in the Soviet Union. Think of Kim Jung Un in North Korea. Think of Putin in Russia.
Balance can be hard to achieve and difficult to maintain, especially in the world of social media overindulgence and unrestrained capitalism. So many uninformed and uneducated sources of information bombarding us with “alternate truths” and flat out lies for profit and personal gain. This is not what God wants for us.
Today Isaiah speaks of the One who shall come to bring balance back to creation. “The spirit of the Lord shall rest on him, the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge and the fear of the Lord. His delight shall be in the fear of the Lord. He shall not judge by what his eyes see, or decide by what his ears hear; but with righteousness he shall judge the poor, and decide with equity for the meek of the earth; Righteousness shall be the belt around his waist, and faithfulness the belt around his loins.” His reign will bring the end of violence in any form, even the violence of survival and natural world. In his reign the human race and the animal kingdom will be reconciled to itself, creation fully in balance.
The letter to the Romans has God putting his children’s lives in balance. “May the God of steadfastness and encouragement grant you to live in harmony with one another, in accordance with Christ Jesus, so that together you may with one voice glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. Welcome one another, therefore, just as Christ has welcomed you, for the glory of God.” God calls on us to be reconciled to each other, to seek the welfare of our neighbor, to live a life that encourages us to love one another and to pray for each other. God seeks to teach us how to live in peace with one another, to live lives of mutual joy and affection for each other. God asks us to set aside our own personal enrichment and to pursue a course that balances our needs with the needs of all of creation. And then the author of Romans offers us this blessing: “May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that you may abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.”
The author of Matthew’s Gospel tells of the coming of John the Baptizer, John who baptizes in anticipation of the coming of the One who will bring balance to God’s children’s lives and to creation as well. John is the one foretold by the prophet Isaiah, “The voice of one crying out in the wilderness: ‘Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight.’” John brings God’s message of the coming of balance to all of creation. God’s balance according to John is not something to simply be received, but something to be prepared for, something to set your priorities in life into balance for, something that will bring transformation and salvation to your life but only if you embrace what balance looks like in God’s coming kingdom. Justice and mercy. Honesty and integrity. Repentance and forgiveness. Loving your neighbor as you wish to be loved yourself. Giving not just of your excess, not just of your peripheral, not just what you can afford and what you can tolerate. God calls on us to give from our core, giving from ourselves, giving from what makes you you, giving from your personal gifts and talents and from our collective gifts and talents. God calls on us to help bring balance to each other and to creation, that is our mission and our ministry that we as Christians, we as human beings are called to.
But bringing balance to creation will not always feel comfortable. Bringing balance to creation will not always feel warm and fuzzy, will not always even feel like a blessing. Jesus’ message of love and balance is not what the world preaches. The world preaches that there is only a finite amount of everything, from wealth to food to health to peace. The world teaches a zero-sum mentality, where you are either a winner or a loser, where some must always be losers so that others can win. The world teaches the lie that I’m the only one who ultimately matters, who’s security and comfort must be one at the expense of another’s security and comfort. The world teaches that in order for me to have enough, you must have less that enough.
The Good News today is that God does not rule creation as the powers of this world do. God has given the world enough of everything for everyone. But God has not given to each according to what they deserve or what they need. God has given more to some and less to others, not so that we who have may be gluttons and those who have less may suffer. God in his wisdom has distributed his gifts so that we may each participate in God’s work of divine providence. We have been given the gift and the responsibility to participate in God’s plan of balance for creation. We have been given the knowledge and the wisdom to ensure that the scales are balanced between the haves and the have nots. We have been given the opportunity to bring an end to empty stomachs and cold houses, to bring joy to those who weep and those who despair. God, in his infinite wisdom and love, have given us the gift to help balance the scales in creation. Do we have the courage and the faith to do that?
This is the season of Advent, the season of light. If ever there was a time to find out, that time is now.