In the days to come...

Sometimes I wonder why the translators feel they have to make prophets sound so fancy. Isaiah is speaking words he believed were given by God - so he’s using prophet-speak; words that push us well ahead in time and space, to the ‘promised time’ when misery is ended, and God reigns supreme…But I wonder if the prophet’s first draft wasn’t a little simpler.

My Hebrew dictionary tells me that the word under translation here suggests conclusion - an ‘end of time’ scenario - but the poet in me would have taken another approach.

“One of these days…” - those are words of promise too - words that suggest the hearer will ‘get what is coming to them.’ But they can be words of hope - for people who hope. 

For folks who long for justice; for relief; for protection; for ‘salvation.’ For those folks, ‘one of these days - in the days to come - someday soon - all of these phrases resonate.

These are words that look to a future beyond trouble - a future full of promise and joy and light. This is why the prophets are so often heard at this time of year in the church. Isaiah especially tells us about the ‘almost.’ He sets before us an nearly impossible ideal:

All nations, like-minded, streaming to the wisdom of the holy one.

All nations willing to submit to the same Holy judgement.

All nations united in peaceful endeavour.

 Not yet - maybe not in our lifetime (says Isaiah) but in the days to come -

one of these days.

 

The prophet’s words ring with the harmonic of hope, and down the ages these words find sympathetic ears & hearts & minds.
The timing of these promises remains a mystery of frustrating proportions - even to the faithful of Jesus day - in fact, the timing Is a mystery even to Jesus. And that always catches us by surprise.

Jesus and his disciples are well versed in the prophetic texts. They have read and debated the significant phrases, and parsed the grammar of all the prophets. They live in a time when the faithful were sure that it was long past time for God to relieve their suffering ‘once and for all.’  There would have been regular debates on the how and the when of the coming of God’s righteous judgement - in fact, the disciples were engaged in such a debate in this section of Matthew’s gospel - even as they arrived in a bustling Jerusalem at the height of festival season. They are eager for signs - some insider knowledge. They have long accounted Jesus as something more than a prophet, and for the disciples, Jesus’ proclamation on the matter will carry some weight…

Jesus argues that the how & when don’t matter, and reminds them that the timing is God’s own business, and no one else’s.

When will it be? The disciples want a schedule, and Jesus gives them nothing but advice

‘It will come like a thief in the night - (and if you knew when, you could take precautions and keep the thief at bay) so PAY ATTENTION. And know that you will have to endure some uncertainty. Strange things will happen all around. You must be ready. You must be faithful.

It’s further proof that faithful people have never really liked waiting.

It will come - the time of righteousness and peace - the time of joy and judgement - but you can’t mark it on the calendar, or work it out by the phases of the moon. Jesus says that the work of the faithful is to wait faithfully.

Hope is faithful waiting; enduring the now while being encouraged by the almost - 

Hope is forgoing certainty for the excitement and promise of ‘one of these days.’

Hope is the first step in our Advent journey, year after year, and it never gets easier for most of us.

We remain hopeful, though the promises of God seem just as distant - just as difficult to see - as they did on that day in Jerusalem…or on that night in Bethlehem.

In all of those moments, a prophet’s words must be enough. The promise of God must be enough. Our encounter with Jesus; in the cradle and on the cross - risen in Glory, reaching out from Scripture, sustaining us through the Spirit - all this, though hard to fathom, and often difficult to understand - all of this must be enough to bring us hope.

The stories of the infant Christ will come. The words will find their way into our hearts once again - the promise will find its way into our gathering and our gifting - our sharing and celebrating. The Christmas story brings our ancient hopefulness into sharper focus.

But until then, we wait, sure that God is with us in our waiting; because ‘one of these days,’