"Shalom and Salaam" given 12/4/16

Almost twenty-five years ago, I had a very interesting visitor during office hours. It was a man only a couple of weeks out of prison. He had served twenty years for counterfeiting-- no early release, no parole. He was glad to be free. But he was finding it hard to accept much less adjust to what our society had become.

He’d been mugged the night before. He had seen his first bag lady a few days before that. He talked about encountering first hand the homeless,, the addicts, the shelters and the pantries and the soup kitchens-- things you and I take for granted. He talked about seeing reports of slashing and rapes and worse on the evening news.

He talked about having to become street-wise. He quickly learned not to go out ac night. He learned to walk in the center of the sidewalk--not too close to open doorways. He learned to ignore people who accosted him on the sidewalk got fear they might attack him.

"Don't misunderstand," he told me. We have TVs and magazines inside. We hear what's going on. But subconsciously I guess, I didn't realize how bad it's all become. You live with it everyday. You're used to it. You don’t notice."

For me, at that moment, that old, black ex-con suddenly became a prophet. Like Isaiah, like John the Baptizer, like Jesus, he reminded me of the dream of what Jesus called “The Peace this world cannot give.” The Hebrew word Our Lord would have used to speak about that peace was “Shalom” (or “Salaam” in Arabic).

And the word points to something in this life that is much more than just an absence of fighting. Shalom (or Salaam) points to the Divine Dream planted in human hearts. It’s the dream of a world of justice and righteousness and peace and equity.

I knew perfectly well that guy in my office that afternoon was basically trying to put the bite on me for a handout. But in doing so, he graphically reminded me of how far in our land we’ve strayed from our ideals. He pointed bow far our world still is from Isaiah’s vision of the wolf lying down with the lamb, the leopard with the goat, and the lion cub feeding beside the lamb.

The Apostle Paul recalls that vision for us as well in Romans 15, as he quotes Isaiah of Jerusalem. "The root of Jesse shall spring up, one who will arise to rule over the nations, one in whom the gentiles shall find hope."

Paul wanted his readers to understand. Isaiah's original vision in the midst of exile-- the dream of a just king from the line of David, a human messiah, a righteous ruler who would deliver Israel from captivity-- had been transcended and transformed by the Christian vision of Jesus our Messiah’s Return and Rule in glory.

Every generation needs to capture that dream of a root springing up from the stump of its own tradition. Every people and every land needs honest prophets who will not be co-opted by either good times or bad in their call to covey to us the Word of our Creator. Every era needs those who will recall for us the primal vision. The vision is that there was once-- and there one day will be again-- an Eden-- in which there was enough for everyone's needs-- although insufficient for everyone's greed.

When Jesus proclaimed again and again in his preaching, the nearness of the Kingdom, when he promised his friends in the Upper Room, that Shalom, he was deliberately pointing to that vision for us--using an old beloved symbol to share a new spiritual reality. Shalom is a covenant relationship between God and humanity. It is a state of being, as well as a symbol. And it points directly to the return of Eden through the Return and Reign of Christ.

It calls us to a new order of existence-- a new way of living and being and relating for people as well as our nations. It is a new way of life that can begin now. And it is at the same time, a foretaste of Eternal Life, as it will be enjoyed in the New Jerusalem of our God.

This "Shalom" was proclaimed and dreamed of and worked for and prayed for all throughout the Old Testament era. Yet it was only with the coming of Jesus our Messiah that Shalom actually became an actual possibility in this world. It is Jesus the Christ who incarnates Shalom among humanity. That’s why we share “the Peace of Christ” That's why we pray; “Thy Kingdom come”. He brings it to us as a promise of God's ultimate Will for humanity, and for Creation itself.

The prophets, and Isaiah and Paul and Jesus' stir up our imaginations and our memories to the possibilities of Shalom. They challenge us-- they call us-- they admonish us. "You don't see it. You're used to it". They point to the wrong, they shine the light of truth on want and need, and they remind us that we are better than that.

This particular time of year many of us feel stressed, drawn tight as violin stings by the expectations of society and our families-- and our own selves-- of what Christmas ought to be like. We praise something we call “The Real Christmas Spirit” through sleigh bells and silver bells to Santa. We become so frantic and busy in our Rudolph Sweatshirts that we forget the Redeemer of the world-- the Babe in the manger.

What then can Christians—what can you and I—do in this Advent season to bring this broken world closer to the dream of Shalom? It seems to me that we must begin to stand up for peace-- with our voices and our actions. We need to keep alive the vision of the angelic song “Peace on Earth and Good Will to all”, in our hearts and in our relationships. We need to pray for it-- and work for it. If our ministry reaches out across the continent or no farther away than the kitchen door.

You and I have so many opportunities-- to support Relief efforts-- to pray and fast for peace-- to stand up to those racial and ethnic and religious slights we all hear from time to time-- to contact our legislators-- to give to the needy without worrying about cost-- to volunteer at the Food Pantry, or at one of the area hospitals, to visit a nursing home, even if nobody there is related to us-- to give funds and donate toys and time to social agencies-- especially those caring for children-- to resolve to become a Big Brother/Big Sister or Foster Parent next year.

The prophet’s vision stretches before us-- if we have eyes to see. The angels song calls us to join in the chorus-- if we have ears to hear, and a voice to proclaim. The prophets’ vision speaks to you and me in our personal lives as well. Shalom is a dream, a vision, and a possibility in our homes and hearts and mind-- as well in the world around us.

Perhaps you're living in a relationship that is more captivity and abuse than joy and support for one another. Perhaps you struggle with the question of conflicting values--- falseness and contradiction instead of encouragement and promise. Perhaps you're caught up in feelings of unresolved anger at someone, or of inappropriate desires, or incapacitating guilt, or temptation, or resentment, or even patterns of domestic violence. Perhaps you’re enslaved by grief or Depression.“You don’t see it-- you’re used to it.”

Grumpy old John the Baptizer points out for us a path through the desert -- a path of honest repentance of our wrongs -- a path of prayer and fasting -- a path of metanoia (repentance). He calls on you and me to simply turn around-- turn our lives around and simply walk away from false values and shoddy morality built upon cheap justifications and consumerism. He urges us and set our sandals upon the path of love and self-giving -- the path of new life.

So many of us in this life are bent on "having it all." So many of us are determined to claim "what's mine". So many bf us are struggling to "get it together", or to "pay back" or to "show them". But when and if we do get what it was we wanted so desperately, we inevitably end up with nothing at all.

Whatever our situation, the Apostle Paul reminds us in Romans 15 that we are embraced and inextricably under-girded by a God of steadfast love and eternal hope. Whatever our feelings, our struggles, our trials, Martin Luther King reminded us in one of his sermons that

“..at the center of the Christian faith is the conviction that in the universe there is a God of Power who is able to do exceedingly abundant things in nature and in history.”

Exceedingly abundant things—do we truly believe that? Exceedingly abundant things—even to tearing down walls of hatred and prejudice. Exceedingly abundant things—even to healing us and making whole our troubled lives and situations. Exceedingly abundant things—even to one day achieving true Shalom, the peace of Jesus Christ on earth.

“Shalom on earth—Good Will to all peoples.”

At this dream, at this possibility, at this promise, at this prophetic word, let us rejoice this Advent in the hope and promise of Christ’s coming reign of Peace—of Shalom.

Let us pray,

Reveal yourself to us anew, O God of Creation, in ways that even we can understand. Turn us around so that we may genuinely join all peoples and nations of this earth in welcoming your Advent. We long for that day of peace when all your people shall bear good fruit, and when child-like trust shall lead us all into the ways of peace. Amen.