New and Safe

Here are some thoughts on this Sunday's text. This is our last Sunday of the Season of Creation, Mountain Sunday. This was sent electronically to the people of St.Timothy Lutheran Church.

Isaiah 65:17-25

¹⁷For I am about to create new heavens and a new earth; the former things shall not be remembered or come to mind. ¹⁸But be glad and rejoice forever in what I am creating; for I am about to create Jerusalem as a joy, and its people as a delight. ¹⁹I will rejoice in Jerusalem, and delight in my people; no more shall the sound of weeping be heard in it, or the cry of distress. ²⁰No more shall there be in it an infant that lives but a few days, or an old person who does not live out a lifetime; for one who dies  at a hundred years will be considered a youth, and one who falls short of a hundred will be considered accursed. ²¹They shall build houses and inhabit them; they shall plant vineyards and eat their fruit. ²²They shall not build and another inhabit; they shall not plant and another eat; for like the days of a tree shall the days of my people be, and my chosen shall long enjoy the work of their hands. ²³They shall not labor in vain, or bear children for calamity; for they shall be offspring blessed by the Lord— and their descendants as well. ²⁴Before they call I will answer, while they are yet speaking I will hear. ²⁵The wolf and the lamb shall feed together, the lion shall eat straw like the ox; but the serpent—its food shall be dust! They shall not hurt or destroy on all my holy mountain, says the Lord.

So many themes run through this part of Isaiah: joy, long life, fruitful vineyards, enjoyable work, blessed offspring and lastly, the wolf and lamb feeding together. This is known as the peaceable kingdom and there are a number of pieces of art devoted to that, such as the one above. 

This is a time and place that is spoken of in very ideal terms, what is known as apocalyptic literature. Isaiah is writing of a future time, for those who had lived in exile in Babylon were now back in the land from which their ancestors had come and it was not all sweetness and light. Those who had stayed in Jerusalem saw themselves as more faithful than those who were deported. When the deportees returned, there was a division between them. And the place was a mess! This was no great, wonderful homecoming.

“They shall not hurt or destroy on all my holy mountain…” God’s holy mountain is a safe place. It is the place associated with the temple in Jerusalem, God’s house. We can only experience true safety and peace in Christ, for it is in him that all things are being made new. 

Flickr picture