A Candle for PEACE - 2nd Sunday in Advent

Isaiah 26:3-4
You will keep in perfect peace  
those whose minds are steadfast,
because they trust in you.
We will trust in the Lord forever, 
for the Lord is our Rock eternal.
​

Today is the second Sunday in Advent and the theme for today is PEACE.   Peace is a lovely concept, I think we can all agree on that, but peace does not always mean that everything is butterflies and rainbows.  True peace is something much more profound, and here – a little under three thousand after Isaiah’s words were written down, we still live in a world where peace can be pretty hard to find.

Even in scriptural writings peace has many meanings and usages that often contradict each other.  In Isaiah 26, the chapter from which today’s opening reading comes, we hear that the Lord who establishes peace does so by leveling cities, and wiping whole peoples even from human memory by consuming them with fire.  Not my idea of peace.

Our Christmas hymns and our iconography also seem to completely overlook the realities of Jesus’ birth, which is that Joseph and Mary were forced by their Roman overlords – the occupiers of their conquered homeland -- to travel from Nazareth in Galilee in the north, to Bethlehem, south of Jerusalem, most likely for tax purposes.  And once there, Mary ended up giving birth in a cow-shed with not one of the woman of her household to assist her.  I’m not trying to be the Grinch here – just pointing out that the images of peace that we are given at this season are often unlikely, not to mention improbable.

That’s why I want to share another story I found on-line.  This time it’s a story about peace.  And Just like last week’s story, I have no idea who actually wrote it.  I found it several times on different sites, but none cited an author or source.  It goes like this:

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• There once lived a king who announced that he planned to give a prize to the artist who could paint the best painting depicting “peace”.  Many great painters sent the king several of their very best art pieces.  
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• One of the pictures among the various masterpieces submitted was of a calm lake perfectly mirroring towering snow-capped mountains.  Overhead was a clear blue sky with lazy, fluffy clouds. The picture was perfect.  The feeling of peace was profound.  The viewer could breathe deeply and simply relax into the view.
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• Most of the people who viewed the picture from this artist thought that it was by far the best among all that were offered.  They all assumed it was the obvious winner, but when the king announced the actual prize-winner, everyone was shocked.
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• The picture which won the prize had mountains too, but they were rugged and bare. The sky looked very angry and the trees lashed in the high winds.  There was clearly a storm. This painting didn’t appear peaceful at all.  It looked like the artist had mistakenly submitted a painting depicting a violent storm rather than peace.  How could this painting be the winner?
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• But when everyone went back to look more closely at the painting, to try to see what the king saw, they found a tiny bush they had all overlooked.  It was growing in a crack in the rocks at the base of the mountain, and in that bush a mother bird had built her nest.  And in the midst of the threatening storm, the bird sat on her nest in peace.
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• The first painting – the one everyone expected to win --  depicted a world untroubled by storms.  But in the second painting, it was shown that even in the presence of all the turmoil the outer world can throw at us, it is still possible to be calm in one’s heart and spirit.
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• Peace doesn’t always mean to be in a place with no noise, no threat, no fear.  Peace also is the ability to be in the midst of all the chaos and turmoil, and yet be still and calm in the heart.  Real peace is to be found in trust, not the state of our  surroundings. The mother bird sitting calmly on her nest, despite her chaotic surroundings, was indeed the best representation for peace.
  

The bird was just a bird.  There was not one thing she could do to control the world around her.  So she built her nest as securely as she could in the circumstances, then she settled in, covering her eggs to keep them warm and safe.  She did all that she could do.  Then she rested.

The people to whom Isaiah was speaking so long ago could do little to control the often frightful and brutal circumstances of their lives – all they had was trust.  Trust and absolute faith that God was with them, regardless of whether God’s presence was obvious or not – and that trust allowed them to live with a sense of inner peace.

So it is for us.  I’ve known people (and I’m sure you have too) who lived in a constant “the sky is falling! the sky is falling!” state of panic – always living in fear because the worst is surely about to happen – whether it ever does or not.  They live very sad lives.

There are also, of course, times in all our lives when fear is a rational response – when we’re facing a bad health diagnosis, or when the destructive forces of nature are headed our way.  Fear may be natural, or even logical, but it does not need to rule us if we truly believe that God is with us.  If we believe that, and live our lives in that understanding, then we know that when God is with us then all shall be well.  Not necessarily as we want it to be – but well – and safe in the love of God we can be at peace.

This is the peace the Advent and Christmas remind us of.  Not the peace that comes of being the winner, but the peace that is ours from having our hearts set in God’s promises of safety and love.  The peace that truly does pass all understanding.

May that peace be with you all, this special season, and always.