Second Midweek Advent Service 12/7/11

Second Midweek Advent 12/07/11 Text: Isaiah 40:3-5 Title: Prepare the Royal Highway. Today we are going to focus on verses three through five of our Old Testament reading. “3 A voice cries: "In the wilderness prepare the way of the LORD; make straight in the desert a highway for our God. 4 Every valley shall be lifted up, and every mountain and hill be made low; the uneven ground shall become level, and the rough places a plain. 5 And the glory of the LORD shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together, for the mouth of the LORD has spoken." Isaiah hears a voice! God has commanded his servants, still unidentified, to bring a message of comfort to his people. Now Isaiah hears one of those prophetic voices. He hears the content of the comforting message. Since God’s Word is timeless, speaking to all people though out time we need to ask the question, “What is God saying to us today?” First of all, God is saying that our King is coming. He comes to us as we are, where we are, in the wilderness and desert of our real lives. He wants us to get ready to receive him, because right now we aren’t ready. We know from Luke 3:1–18 that Jesus is the coming King and that the readiness we need is newness of life. We can’t hide behind denominational labels, however correct we might believe they are. We need to prepare the way of the Lord! Secondly, he is saying that God will accomplish his purpose. Before he comes everything will be made ready for his coming. He is sending those he has chosen to prepare his people for his coming. Isaiah is not talking about literal changes in the earth in this text. He is talking about preaching of his Word, so that the removal of all that stands in his way no matter what it might be will be removed. He is saying that lifting and lowering and leveling and smoothing are necessary to the kingdom of Christ. He is talking about depression being relieved, pride being flattened, troubled personalities becoming placid, and difficult people becoming easy to get along with. And he is also implying that if we cling to the status quo and refuse God’s upsetting but constructive salvation, we will have no part with Christ. Thirdly, he is saying that the glory of the Lord Jesus will be revealed to the whole world. We can be certain of it. God has decreed it: “for the mouth of the LORD has spoken.” His glory will be admired and delighted in and trembled at everywhere. We talk a lot about the glory of God, giving him glory and such, and we should, but do we understand what we’re talking about when we talk of God’s glory? I have come to the conclusion that we have diminished God’s glory by putting him a box where we can keep him out of our lives when we want and then when we have exhausted all our resources let him out to help us, but God is not going to let this go on indefinitely, for his glory must be seen. Listen to the words of John Piper a rather famous Baptist pastor. He writes, “In the church, our view of God is so small instead of huge, so marginal instead of crucial, so vague instead of clear, so impotent instead of all determining, and so uninspiring instead of ravishing that the responsibility to live to the glory of God is a thought without content. The words can come out of our mouths, but ask the average Christian to tell what they know about the glory of this God that they are going to live for, and the answer will not be long.” I am afraid that what he said applies to too many of us. We need to know what the glory of the Lord is, for then we are prepared for his coming. God’s Word tells us a lot about his glory present and future. I am going to just share with you today just a few of the verses, so that you get a better idea of his glory. We see his glory is the fiery radiance of his very nature. For we are told in Exodus 24:17 that at Mount Sinai “the appearance of the glory of the LORD was like a devouring fire.” Ezekiel tells us in Ezekiel 1:4-28 that he saw the glory of the Lord in the form of something like a supercharged war chariot coming down from Heaven to establish the rule of God on earth. When Jesus was born, we are told in Luke 2:9, “the glory of the Lord shone around the shepherds, and they were terrified.” In John 1:14 we are told that Jesus himself is the ultimate display of the glory of God. In Luke 9:28-40 we see God’s glory in Jesus’ transfiguration. We read in John 13:31 when Jesus is telling his disciples of his upcoming suffering, death, and resurrection that they are going to see God’s glory. And in Jesus’ cry “It is finished” he showed his glory. To those there that day there was nothing glorious in Jesus’ suffering and death. We, even as followers of Jesus have a hard time adjusting our view to see anything glorious in what happened. But it is there, for in his willingness to humble himself all the way to a wretched death for us he shows all with eyes to see and ears to hear God’s glory. Paul taught us in 1 Corinthians 2:8 that in this arrogant world only a weak and foolish gospel can reveal “the Lord of glory”. The cross of glory shames all human pride. But when Christ returns, how different it will be! He will appear in overwhelming glory. And God has called us to share in that glory of Christ. We are told in 2 Corinthians 4:17 that believers in Jesus will inherit “an eternal weight of glory”. This phrase does not translate well into English but what is doing is comparing the heavy tribulations of life to the life of glory we will be living with God. It will be even more so. And last but not least we are told in Revelation 21:23 that throughout eternity the New Jerusalem, that is the Kingdom of God, will need no sun or moon, for “the glory of God gives it light, and its lamp is the Lamb” The glory of the Lord, therefore, is God himself becoming visible, God Incarnate bringing his presence down to us, God displaying his beauty before us, the fulfillment of our deepest longings. And he promises to do this for us. It is the central promise of the gospel. God kept his promise in the hidden glory of Christ’s first coming. Jesus the helpless baby and the dying man on the cross. He continues to keep his promise as the Holy Spirit shows us the glory of God in his Holy Scripture and sacraments of Baptism and the Lord’s Supper. He will complete his promise at the second coming of Christ when all people will bow before his glory. Amen.