Isaiah 2:1–4

The message of Isaiah 2 provides a contrast to ch. 1, in which the prophet calls out God’s people for their failure to live as God commands. Isaiah 1 reprimands them for rebellion, murder, ignoring widows and orphans, giving in to bribes, and living unfaithfully. Isaiah 1 includes harsh and condemning words of the prophet, a call for the people of God to face the error of their ways. And this is immediately followed by the hope-filled message of Isaiah 2, and a vision of “the days to come” when, “He’ll show us the way he works so we can live the way we’re made” (Isa 2:3, The Message). The situation laid out in Isaiah 1 is grim, and yet, the message of Isaiah 2 is that God has not given up hope. God continues to call people to Godself and is willing to teach the ways of peace and faithfulness. While First Isaiah (chs. 1–39) is primarily communicating the judgment of God, Second Isaiah (40–66) focuses on transformation and a new future for God’s people. Isaiah 2 offers the first glance of Second Isaiah’s hopeful look to a new and different future that YHWH has in store for God’s people.

In many ways, our world does not resemble the eighth century BCE context in which Isaiah prophesied, and yet, this message of hope and the new future that God intends for God’s people is still highly relevant. We are still waiting for the day when, “He’ll settle things fairly between nations. He’ll make things right between many peoples. They’ll turn their swords into shovels, their spears into hoes. No more will nation fight nation; they won’t play war anymore” (Isa 2:4, The Message). This radical message of hope and possibility is one the church and God’s world still desperately need to hear. Every day.

In the Revised Common Lectionary, this text from Isaiah is assigned to the first Sunday of Advent, Year A. I think many of us associate this text with the anticipatory, hopeful optimism of Advent. And yet, this text is too important to be reserved simply for the season of Advent. With the news of wars, violence, oppression, environmental crisis, corruption, racism, and economic injustice filling our inboxes, television screens, and social media posts each day, we know this text still speaks volumes to God’s people today.

Interestingly, the prophet introduces this poem as something that he “saw.” Many artists throughout history have tried to depict this text for us to “see” this vision of God. Perhaps the most famous depiction is the statue that stands in front of the United Nations building in New York. This is appropriate, as Isaiah, in a way, is depicting something like a perfectly functioning, truly united body like the UN was created to be. But, as I was invited to “see” this text by the prophet, I was captured by the “Guns into Plowshares” statue created by mother and son artists Esther and Michael Augsburger, using a steel plowshare and 3,000 actual guns that were obtained by the Washington, DC police department in a buy-back program in the 1990s, funded by former boxer Riddick Bowe. The four-ton, 16-foot-high sculpture is the blade of a massive plow encrusted with thousands of actual guns. ¹

But, unlike most large statues that remain in place once installed, this statue’s home has been illusive, a bit like the dream expressed by the prophet whose message it portrays. Originally installed outside the Washington, DC police department’s headquarters and near Judiciary Square, the sculpture has been on the move for over a decade now. When the police department was renovated in 2008, the sculpture was moved and sat for three years turned on its side in a weed-strewn lot. In 2011, it was set upright again and placed on a concrete pad outside the police department’s new evidence control facility. Then, in 2017, it temporarily disappeared. The artists worked to recover the sculpture and have relocated it on the campus of Eastern Mennonite University. “Guns into Plowshares” was dedicated at EMU one week after the Las Vegas shooting, in October 2017. ² It will remain on the university campus for at least two years before returning to the Washington, DC police department. The unsettled journey of the statue mirrors our societal struggles with gun violence in the United States and inability to “see” the prophet’s vision for peace.

A recent event in my community provides another example of “seeing” this vision that Isaiah imagined. In this case, the “weapons” were words and symbols. The state university in my community, like many, has a “free expression tunnel” on campus. It is a place where people can walk between campus buildings to avoid the traffic on the streets above. On a recent weekend, students in the Hillel campus ministry group discovered a swastika painted in the tunnel with the words “Holocaust was a good thing,” and “Heil Hitler” written around it. The graffiti was immediately painted over, and campus leadership put out strong statements decrying the hate speech and reminding the campus community of the parameters of the free expression tunnel. The local rabbi also reached out to his clergy colleagues who met later the same week to discuss a response. The group agreed that simply speaking out about the issue was not a strong enough response, so they decided to work together to develop a project to promote inclusive art and expression in the same tunnel where the hate speech had been. The clergy raised funds for paint and reached out to groups on campus who are made up of primarily marginalized students. The clergy then invited the student groups to cover the tunnel with images and messages of affirmation and inclusion.

The message of Isaiah still rings true in the world today. God still calls God’s people to the holy mountain where we can learn peace and justice. Recently, the Roman Catholic Church named Archbishop Oscar Romero a saint. Romero, Archbishop of San Salvador was assassinated in March 1980, while celebrating mass in a small chapel in the hospital where he lived. His murder was an attempt to silence his prophetic voice that called for justice when he preached and spoke out for an end to violence and oppression in his native El Salvador. In his final years, after becoming the archbishop, he continued to remind his fellow citizens, the church, the government of his nation, and the world, of God’s vision of peace, non-violence, and equality, as we read in Isaiah 2. There is a poem, often attributed to Romero himself, but actually written by another priest in his memory, that provides some perspective when this task of seeking peace in our troubled world seems too difficult to achieve. It acknowledges the vastness of the task that God puts before us, and also reminds us that our call is to do our part, because God has the grander vision.

A Future Not Our Own

It helps now and then to step back and take a long view.

The Kingdom is not only beyond our efforts,

it is beyond our vision.

We accomplish in our lifetime only a fraction

of the magnificent enterprise that is God’s work.

Nothing we do is complete, which is another way of

saying that the kingdom always lies beyond us.

No statement says all that could be said.

No prayer fully expresses our faith. No confession

brings perfection, no pastoral visit brings wholeness.

No program accomplishes the Church’s mission.

No set of goals and objectives includes everything.

This is what we are about. We plant the seeds that one

day will grow… We are workers, not master builders, ministers, not

messiahs. We are prophets of a future not our own. ³

God’s grand vision for a kingdom of peace is not yet here, but Isaiah 2 reminds us to continue to work and to believe that God’s vision will be accomplished.