“Vigilant Hope” Colchester Federated Church, November 30, 2025, First Sunday of Advent (Isaiah 2:1-5)

The season of Advent begins with hope—vigilant hope.  Advent is a time of preparation and anticipation.  A time of longing and hope-filled expectations.  We know that the birth of Jesus has already happened, and we are still waiting for all the promises of his birth to be fulfilled.  The hope of Advent is that Jesus was born into our perfectly imperfect world, and there is the continual rebirth of Jesus Christ in the human heart.  We continue to explore the reality of already and not yet when it comes to this time of year.  Hence we often consider those Advent themes of preparation and anticipation, longing and expectation—embracing vigilant hope.

Advent begins the new year in the Christian liturgical calendar.  Advent ushers in a holy time of expectant waiting.  As scholar Diana Butler Bass reflects in her book A Beautiful Year: “Even though Advent begins a new liturgical year, it also anticipates endings.  Oppression and war will end—the angels sing of peace on earth.  The long wait for Messiah is coming to an end—Mary is heavily pregnant with child.  Joy to the world!  The ancient promises of God are about to be fulfilled.  The first of the year anticipates the ending of our waiting for God to show up.”[1]

Perhaps this helps explain why the First Sunday of Advent begins with hope.  Our text is from the second chapter of the Book of Isaiah.  Now Isaiah was a prophet in the 8th Century in Jerusalem (long before Jesus was born!) and his work spanned the reigns of four different kings of Judah.  Isaiah had an educated understanding of the traditions of Israel.  Some scholars would also classify Isaiah as a poet.  We can see Isaiah as not just a prophet of warning, but as a poet of possibility.  The words we sometimes hear from Isaiah chapter 9 on Christmas Eve come to mind: “The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light; those who lived in a land of deep darkness—on them light has shined . . . For a child has been born for us, a son given to us; authority rests upon his shoulders and he is named Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.”[2]  Poetic, right?

Though what got Isaiah into trouble sometimes is that he insisted that the elite of Jerusalem had an ethical responsibility to care for those they ruled.  Isaiah emphasized that being God’s people was not just about worshiping God, but about behaving consistently with God’s compassionate ways.  Isaiah railed against injustice quite often: “Doom to those who pronounce wicked decrees, and keep writing harmful laws to deprive the needy of their rights and to rob the poor among my people of justice; to make widows their loot and steal from orphans!”[3]  The prophet Isaiah did not mince words when it came to calling out folks who took advantage of the most vulnerable in society.  As the CEB Study Bible explains the situation, “God’s care extended especially to the people without wealth, who stood outside the halls of power.  Isaiah was appalled by those who used the legal system to enrich themselves and cheat the needy.”[4]

It is important to understand the context a bit before we turn to this famous passage from Isaiah, this passage that we sometimes hear on the First Sunday of Advent.  The Sunday where we are thinking about hope.  Because today Isaiah presents this poetic, sweeping vision of world peace that if we take to heart is deeply meaningful.  This is true even in a world that can be violent.  Isaiah was not completely naïve about the way the world works.  Isaiah spent his life railing against injustice and calling on people to care about those outside the halls of power.  This sweeping vision can cause us as people of faith to consider what the future could hold.  Not because we are being simplistic or unrealistic, but because we can be defiant with our hope. 

From Isaiah we read that in the days to come: “God will judge between the nations, and settle disputes of mighty nations.  Then they will beat their swords into iron plows and their spears into pruning tools.  Nation will not take up sword against nation; they will no longer learn how to make war.”[5] 

The sequence of events here is important, for Isaiah holds up a vision of what our hearts are attuned to hear and understand.  First we have Zion elevated and exalted, the holiest ground becomes the highest ground, the place of wonder.  A pilgrimage of all people to God’s holy mountain follows—this is none other than the Temple Mount in Jerusalem, a holy place still to this day.  In Isaiah’s vision the people are singing to others to call them forth, urging one another on, “Many nations will go and say, ‘Come, let’s go up to the Lord’s mountain, to the house of Jacob’s God so that he may teach us his ways and we may walk in God’s paths.’”[6]  A new community is gathering—multicultural, multiracial, multilingual; all are called into the Divine Presence.  Then we hear that God is going to listen to the concerns of the nations and will give instructions.  The nations are about to make peace.  The gift God gives is justice.  God instructs them to turn their instruments of war into farming tools.[7]  The ways of God and the paths of God are metaphors for moral conduct, for treating one another with compassion.

Notice that God doesn’t force the nations to make this change from stockpiling instruments of war to fashioning them into tools for peace.  God instructs and teaches (which was a role usually held by priests) and then God puts it back on the people to destroy their weapons of war and walk in God’s paths.  In antiquity, spears and swords were expensive.  In order to have the metal to make them, resources had to be diverted from farming tools needed to harvest crops and feed your people.  War could be devastating whether it happened at home or abroad.  Because you literally had to take the metal used for farming and fashion into a sword or a spear for war. 

On the other hand, it was a simple transformation to beat a sword or a spear into farming equipment.  Any blacksmith could do it no matter one’s skill level.  This is a commentary on the costly nature of war versus the way of peace that transcends Isaiah’s time and place if we allow ourselves to be affected by these words.  War costs so much—war between nations, war within our nation, war between neighbors, war within our families, war within ourselves.  War is costly.  And there are different paths before us—talk about defiant hope! 

Because when faced with violence and corruption, with trust broken and the unethical treatment of the most vulnerable Isaiah dared to imagine a different world.  Isaiah dared to imagine a world that could be reordered by the divine wisdom of God.  Isaiah did not wait for perfect circumstances in the world around him to proclaim God’s peace.  Instead, Isaiah casts this poetic vision while the chaos continues to swirl! 

“Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord . . . they shall beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation; neither shall they learn war any more.”[8] 

This is defiant hope.  This is hope that is spoken into a world tempted to give into despair and cynicism.  We are invited to be part of the faithful stream surging forward to walk in the ways of God.[9]  Thanks be to God.  Amen.

[1] Diana Butler Bass, A Beautiful Year: 52 Meditations on Faith, Wisdom, and Perseverance, pg. 13.
[2] Isaiah 9:2 and 8, NRSVUE.
[3] Isaiah 10:1-2, CEB.
[4] Isaiah in The CEB Study Bible with Apocrypha, pg. 1091 OT.
[5] Isaiah 2:4, CEB.
[6] Isaiah 2:3, CEB.
[7] Paul Simpson Duke, “Homiletical Perspective” on Isaiah 2:1-5 in Feasting on the Word: Preaching the Revised Common Lectionary, Year A, Volume 1, 3.
[8] Isaiah 2:3 and 4, NRSVUE.
[9] “Character Spotlight of Isaiah” in The Will to Dream Commentary & Preaching Guide from Illustrated Ministry, © 2025 Illustrated Ministry, LLC.

Photo by Greg Rakozy on Unsplash