Psalm 36:5-6; Isaiah 11:1-3; 6-9; January 19, 2025; Second Sunday after Epiphany
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I once built a train set for my son. And if I do say, it was really quite nice.
It had bridges, ports, and fake felt for rivers. It had trees, mountains, and cardboard animals in fields.
It took a while to build. And yet, it only took seconds for him to destroy.
Oh yes, seemingly like most children, Seth loved to destroy what I created. He got more amusement out of it. More satisfaction from it.
And though the original intent of building it was for him to enjoy it as he saw fit, I must admit that it brought me a bit of sadness to see it reduced so easily to ruin.
I legit remember feeling a sense of melancholy as I held a broken wooden lamppost in my hand. A detached caboose. A severed tree.
And then it dawned on me that if I can feel such grief over literal toys, imagine what God must feel when the living world God created is also destroyed and so eagerly so by God’s other creation. By God’s sons and daughters. By us.
God cares for it all, my friends. Not just for us, but for all of it. After all, God designed it and built it all.
And so, we do great harm to God, our creator, not only when don’t care for each other, but also when we abuse the interests and well-being of the environment too.
In the world to come then, in the Heaven that awaits, I hope and pray that God will redeem and restore all of it. Not just us, but land and sea as well.
Such that no more will there be wildfires that destroy, nor earthquakes that break, nor hurricanes that flood. But rather, a world where nature and creature work fully together, perhaps just as it was always intended in Eden.
Our text from Isaiah today beautifully imagines such a world where there is restoration and peace. Where opposites come together, predator and prey, coexist and lay.
Rivers and valleys, wolf and lamb, all of creation.
And it’s not the first time he employs these images from the natural world to articulate a point.
Earlier in chapter 7, Isaiah speaks of a day where warring nations, Egypt and Assyria – indeed the enemies of ancient Israel – will occupy the Holy Land. But rather than peacefully, it is seen as a time of violence and destruction, as famine and hardship stretch over creation.
Listen to what he writes: “On that day, the Lord will whistle for the fly that is at the sources of the streams of Egypt, and for the bee that is in the land of Assyria. And they will all come and settle in the steep ravines, and in the clefts of the rocks, and on all the thornbushes, and on all the pastures… and on that day, every place where there used to be a thousand vines, worth a thousand shekels of silver, will become briers and thorns.” – Isaiah 7:18-19, 23
This vision then stands in opposition to what we read and hear in our text from chapter 11, where these images of flies and bees, creatures that swarm and sting, are replaced by a painting of larger animals, resting together, looking upon grand vistas of majesty and beauty in peace.
(Goggle the painting by Edward Hicks called “The Peaceable Kingdom”)
Isaiah is showing us then through prophecy and vision that there is good news to come! That even though this world right now feels irreparable, occupied by annoying and destructive forces both inside and out that swarm and sting, one day, they won’t be there.
For there will be harmony, Isaiah promises.
And not just with each other, but where all of creation will come together and recognize the hand of the Creator at work in all.
For just as the Psalmist writes and comforts us:
“Your righteousness is like the mighty mountains, o Lord
you save humans and animals alike.”
– Psalm 36:6
Humans and animals alike.
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Here’s what I distinctly remember:
- His silly cute smile. (See pic 1 at bottom of page…)
- Running to me with joy. (See pic 2 at bottom of page…)
- Retrieving his favorite frisbee. (See pic 3…)
- Excited for a greenie under the tree. (See pic 4…)
- Finding out he’d be a brother. (See pic 5…)
- Watching this strange creature roll around on a bed. (See pic 6…)
- Having his ear tugged by said creature. (See pic 7…)
- Being diagnosed with a brain tumor. (See pic 8…)
This final photo is the last one I took of our sweet labradoodle, Vincent. (See pic 9…)
I took him to one of our favorite spots. And we just sat and laid there in the field together. Doing so for hours before it was time to take him to the vet. Before it was time to say goodbye.
Seth asked me when I returned home where Vincent had gone. And I told him he was in Heaven. In a giant field, a peaceable kingdom where dogs and cats play, where birds and worms sing the same song. Where all of creation gets along and lives forever for eternity.
He asked, “how do you know that, Daddy?”
And I thought, “I don’t know. But scripture tells me so. And so, I hope.” For God’s righteousness is promised to be like the mighty mountains, and God is said to save humans and animals alike.
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In my previous church, I once had a kid tell me that they figured out what God looks like.
I said, “Pray tell, do let me know! But just please don’t say an old white guy with a beard.”
And she immediately responded, “No silly! God looks like a dog!”
I said, “A dog? How on Earth did you come to believe that?
She said, “Because the name spells backwards.”
…
Makes you laugh and smile, right?
But perhaps, she was onto something.
Maybe God is more like a dog than we would otherwise admit. Or at least, more in the image of a dog than in the image of us. Though God is likely neither anthropomorphic nor doggy-morphic. But something else entirely.
But unlike us, and more like a dog – a friendly dog — God is seemingly willing to always wait on us.
To run to us.
To love us, kiss us, and lie with us.
Not judging us by what His eyes see, nor by what His ears hear (Isaiah 11:3)
But is seemingly devoted to us no matter what.
Despite how we behave or how we might feel.
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Some years ago, I came across this book called “Devoted — 38 Extraordinary tales of love, loyalty, and life with dogs”
One of the tales was about a dog named: “Schoep;” with the subtitle: “Understanding What It Means to Heal.” The story, which is true, goes like this:
John Unger and his then fiancée spent 18 months canvassing Wisconsin shelters looking for a dog to adopt. They then laid eyes on Schoep, named after a famous state ice-cream. And they instantly fell in love.
A couple of years later, quite sadly, John and his fiancée split, and John’s life began to spiral downward. Downward so fast and so far that one night he went to a lake to drown himself. For some reason unknown to John, he also took Schoep with him that night. And as he got deep into the water, about to go under, Schoep stood at the bank and looked at him with “a look never seen before or since.” And that look did something to John, for as soon as he saw it, he charged out of the water, weeping, apologizing to his dog repeatedly while holding him tight.
Fast forward some years, John is in recovery from depression, but Schoep has been diagnosed with arthritis. Old, with failing vision and pain in his joints, John now takes Schoep back to that lake, that same body where life almost came to an end, but now, instead of drowning, he lets Schoep float and lay on his chest as they wade together in the water, breathing in and out.
(See final picture of Schoep and John)
They stay there for hours, witnesses say, each and every day; and John would do it onward and forever if he could, as it’s apparently the only place where Schoep’s pain is soothed away.
This photo you’re looking at went viral. And John was subsequently interviewed where he told the story you just heard. But he also added this: “I think in today’s world we are faced with such heaviness and sadness, we are moving too fast, and so perhaps, people look at this photo and say, ‘That’s the way the world should be… filled with pause, compassion, love, and hope.” Pasue, compassion, love and hope.
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Now, I don’t know about you, but all of this reminds me of God and the prophetic promises of Isaiah and the Gospel.
Where when our broken bodies are taken to the water, there God holds us, and loves us, so to ease our pain and to bring us comfort.
Where God is there at the bank when we find ourselves in the valley and at the end of our rope and looks at us in such a way that life can rush right back into our bones.
And where, on the final day when our time comes, God is there again ready to carry us home.
To a place where there is no more ruin and no more pain. To a place where trains run free and the wolf and lamb sleep in harmony.
And where the only fires lit are those there to warm us, such that at our feet, our furry friends from long ago breathe in and out. With us again at peace.
Amen
