Help Me Make it Through the Night

Isaiah 2:1-5

With all the emphasis that we place on individual piety, salvation, and holiness, we sometimes forget that this spiritual journey was never designed to be a solitary walk. When we are remade in Christ, we become parts of a whole body, members of a family, ambassadors and citizens of a kingdom. Our successes are not ours alone, and we are not the only ones who live with the consequences of our failures.

The future that Isaiah envisioned which provides our Advent reading for Day 2 occurs during a period of decline for Israel and Judah, symbolized in darkness. Yet the prophet imagined not only the restoration of the local and nationalistic fortunes of Israel and Judah, nor even just the reunion of these estranged family members. No, he imagines a restoration of universal significance, centralized in the image of light that comes from the mountain of the Lord. This new kingdom has a just sovereign who will make things right, making it safe for nations to retrofit their weapons and turn them into tools, and put war strategists permanently out of business.

But it's this last sentence that strikes a chord with me today as I spend time thinking about Christian community. "Let us walk in the light of the Lord." It's the message I think we're supposed to take from Advent. If we really catch the vision of the future that God promises, we can walk now in the light of it and encourage each other to do the same. Even if we're in the dark, if we can see the light ahead and continuously point it out to one another, we can make it through the night.