Message 12-02-07

Series:            Say the Words

Scripture:            Isaiah 2:1-5

Title:                                        Walk in the Light

1 This is what Isaiah son of Amoz saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem:

 2 In the last days the mountain of the LORD's temple will be established as chief among the mountains; it will be raised above the hills, and all nations will stream to it.

 3 Many peoples will come and say, "Come, let us go up to the mountain of the LORD, to the house of the God of Jacob. He will teach us his ways, so that we may walk in his paths." The law will go out from Zion, the word of the LORD from Jerusalem.

 4 He will judge between the nations and will settle disputes for many peoples. They will beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks. Nation will not take up sword against nation, nor will they train for war anymore.

 5 Come, O house of Jacob, let us walk in the light of the LORD.

It is the season of Hope. Don’t you hope you can make it through the season? Aren’t you hoping that you can get the right thing for that person on your list? Aren’t you hoping that you don’t get certain things from the people who have you on their list? These are the hopes of every person who lives in our culture and who participates in the season. They’re hoping for a happy holiday and for things to go smoothly. Christ followers have those kinds of hopes, but people who follow Jesus also have different hopes during the season of Christmas. We don’t hope just for things to go well for ourselves and others.

We look for ways to produce hope in others. And that’s because we are interested in the “hopes” of God.

What does God hope for? What is God looking toward?

The prophet Isaiah, in our Scripture, tells us that he is looking toward the time when all people will come to him. He is waiting for the time when the people of Earth will seek out his companionship and wisdom. God wants everyone to find real life, to find health and wholeness in their relationships. God wants people of the Earth to return to the relationship they had with him at the beginning.

God’s wants that experience of living to be shared by all the people on the planet.

Not only does he want these things, but through Isaiah we learn that a time is coming when this is what will happen. When God talks about the future it becomes a promise and that promise becomes our hope. God is going to bring about a time when people from all over the planet will return seeking him. God’s domain, symbolized by the city of Jerusalem will be the focal point of the thoughts of people from all over. As they come to him they will find that He’s going to be able to settle the struggles people go through. The people of the planet will start building peace and strong relationships with each other and the world itself. They will work as hard in developing peace as they do now in developing war.

This is God’s perspective on the future. That’s what God is interested in and if that’s what he wants – then what does that mean to us, the people of God, who are called to walk in the light of the Lord.

Walking in the light is a metaphor for living in the reality of God’s presence in our lives and also for living in the hope of God fulfilling his promise. We don’t seek to live “good” lives, “nice” lives, but lives that show that God is right here with us. It means we start walking in the way that is lighted. It means that we are to walk in what we already know about God.

How do we do that? I think one way we do that is in the words we say.

When people speak into the lives of their friends or children anyone can speak words of hope, but what we, as Christ followers are called to do is more than that. We’re called to create with our words. We are called create a new world that’s more than wishful thinking but the creation of a new reality. We’re called to create not just any world, but the world that we’ve seen in the light of God. We have a direction in which to move. And so when we speak hope into the lives of other people – our friends, our coworkers, our children, our enemies – we seek to create the world God promised and to do that with our words.

What I’m suggesting is that as we go into this season we “say the words” that will create the world God promises. God created the world by expressing it. God said it and it became real. God said, “Light” and there was light. Do you realize that you create with your words as well? We all know this even if we don’t think about it.    We realize that when we say something, many, many times there is a concreteness about it. We can’t take it back. It becomes real in someone else’s life. One of the things we do as we walk in the light of God is we speak the reality of what will be. And as Christ followers we are called to create not just a world we want but the world God has promised.

When God spoke everything into existence he created order out of chaos, light out of darkness and he also called beauty into reality. He called the interconnectedness of our ecology into reality. God spoke the importance of relationship into reality. And he calls on us to continue that act of creation in the lives of those around us. We are called to speak into existence the world he promised is coming.

As we head into this season, let’s use our words to create a reality in which we and other people can experience the light of the Lord, the reality of God’s presence. Let’s speak life into the lives of other people. Let’s say the words that create hope for others. Let’s say the words that create love for others. Let’s say the words the create life for others. These are the words of relationship.

They can be as easy as words like “Thank you,” “Can I help you?” and “Forgive me” and “I forgive you.” Opening the door to hope is a pretty easy thing, but don’t get me wrong creating hope can be a tough thing. Creating love and creating life are tough things to do. They’re hard. They take work. That’s what walking in the light of God is all about. It’s doing that hard work. This is what “living” is; it is being involved in courageous expressions of hope.

It’s tough because it can be awkward and even intimidating. You don’t know how other people, especially someone who has a problem with you will react. But creating a new world through the spoken word doesn’t always require a lot of words. Sometimes it is all you can do to do a small thing.

I had a breakdown in a relationship with a friend that reached a point where he wasn’t talking to me. He was so angry at me that he wanted nothing to do with me. Every year, twice a year, for a number of years I called this guy. Just 2 or 3 times a year I called and asked how he was doing. I would call and he would answer and say, “Yeah.” And I would say, “Hey, I’m just calling to see how you’re doing. How’s everything going?” And he would say, “Okay.” And there’d be this awkward silence on the phone and I’d say something like, “Well, that’s what I was calling about. Just wanted to make sure that you and your family were doing well. You take care.” And he’d say, “All right. Good-bye.”

For a while a couple of times a year that was our entire conversation. I did that with the intention of creating a new world. I hoped that another time was coming. I was hoping and my hope was that I was creating hope that life didn’t have to remain estranged or angry.

Eventually it changed. Now this man visits me. We are friends again. We can relax and talk as if those hard times never happened. I do believe and I want to encourage you to discover that we can create hope in the words we say.

So, let us walk in the light of the Lord. Some day people from everywhere will live in the light of God, seeking his presence and wisdom. But we have the light, we can see with the light, we can understand because the light is with us… let’s live so that others experience the light with us. This Season. . . say the words. Create the world of God’s promise.