by Dorthy Sadler - Birch River United Church

Theme- To Explore Isaiah's Vision of God's Realm
Isaiah Chapter 2 -V 01.4

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

What does God's reign of justice and peace look like as Isaiah saw it? Would it be for a world filled with compassion, peace and love? Think about it. What do you see when you imagine what God wants the world to be? One of the predominant themes of Advent is being "Awake" and "Aware." "Awaken us from our slumbering mighty God; help us to make our love known in this world."

Our opening prayer today, "God you call us together to learn how to trust each other, how to love each other, how to make peace with each other. You call us in a violent world to take up your work of peace." you call us.

We believe that every human being has the spark of God written in him or her and possesses a dignity and a value that can never be taken away. Are these just words?

Nuclear proliferation is the greatest threat to our world today. Why are we so bent on destruction? Will we have a better world if we make bombs and guns in order to increase our Gross National Product so that we can have a better economy? Then, of course, we must use the bombs and guns for some reason. Maybe to attain another nations oil, or whatever, our excuse being, we must go after the terrorists. Who, pray God, are the terrorists? A great part of the world hates the Americans. (9-11) What the Americans don't realize is that it's not the American people the world hates, but what the Americans do to other nations. George W. Bush, the leader of the most powerful nation in the world believes that an apocalyptic Armageddon, or final battle between good and evil is currently in god's plans, and that it will be fought in and around Jerusalem. I wonder if he has even heard of the concept of self -fulfilling prophecy. He always ends his speeches with, "God Bless America." Well, what about the others? I'm sure he believes he is doing the right thing. He was the people's choice in the election. The American people live in fear and they believe Bush's policies will protect them, but will they?

"He who overcomes others has force, he who overcomes himself is strong," says Lao Tzu, a Chinese philosopher. "There is only one comer of the universe we can be certain of improving and that is your own self," says Aldous Huxley a Novelist.

This is our hope -to be awake and aware and to act accordingly to our God given conscience. This inner experience and power of God, however we perceive this God, in whatever religion, is available in every heart. We can tap into this power through meditation, prayer, silence and finally action.

War is not the norm. Peace is. We need not concentrate on war, but on solutions to our problems. What causes wars? Poverty, lack of education, basic needs such as food, clean water, shelter, disease (AIDS rampant in the world today). These are the real sources of our strife but there is hope -Paul Martin was over in the Sudan today declaring that Canada will invest in their education. The Canadian government sent a message to the Ukraine condemning its undemocratic election. We are sending a message from Canada that we care. The world cares. We are called to represent God in the world to care for the greatest and the least aspects of that creation, including ourselves, and to nurture love for the sake of others. The world is a community of the interconnected living things that are mutually dependant on each other for life and survival, a balanced and diverse domain where we, as responsible custodians, can function as partners rather than rulers, to sustain a balanced and diverse community.

The theology of the text I read at the beginning is very simple: There is nothing -no gun, bomb, tank, factory, vacant lot that can't be turned into something else; a shovel, a swing set, a house, a garden. There is no fragment, no molecule, in all creation that is not a vessel of God, and so a means of life. Isn't this the core teaching of Jesus? Where others saw useless and broken people, he saw humility, possibility, and beauty, shalom unfolding.

Let's stop for a moment and dream. We have seen, this past year, the largest and best-resourced armies humanity has ever deployed. We have unfolded plans for new towers and museums. We have a sense of the scope in which we can do things. Can we think now about a massive re-imagining of our capacities? We can change the world by re-imagining it to Isaiah's vision of God's Realm. The holy one is not finished with the act of creation yet. Our hope is the redeeming, of not just our steel, but the heart of each and every one of us. This is our Christian message of joy and generosity and hope.

God Bless Us All!