The Lutheran Hour
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"The Age We Live In"
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Text: Isaiah 11:1-10
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Prayer: Almighty God, Lord of the universe and Governor of the affairs of men: mercifully look upon Your troubled world and give to us that peace which the world cannot give, through Jesus Christ, Your Son, our Lord. Amen.
As recently as three months ago, catching a flight in Fort Wayne, Indiana to come and do a radio broadcast in St. Louis, Missouri, was pretty routine: lots of up-close parking, a quick trip through security, and straight to the gate. Now, as in airports all over the world, that’s changed. You park far from the terminal; dogs and the National Guard, rather than sky caps, meet you at the curb; and the metal detector goes off practically from a wedding ring. Amazingly, 73 percent of American travelers say they wouldn’t mind even further inconvenience. I didn’t mind a bit. That’s the age we live in.
Three months ago we were eager to tear open a personally addressed envelope from a place we didn’t recognize, and if a white powder spilled out, we assumed someone’s free sample of laundry detergent must have burst in the mailbag. No more. That’s the age we live in.
Three months ago, we thought a world war was a global struggle between massive armies over clearly defined territory. Now the world is at war, and we really aren’t sure who the enemies are or where to find them. What we do know is that people have died, more people will die, discord and hatred prevail in the world, and toppling a government or eliminating a maniac will not bring all this to an easy end. That’s the age in which we live.
In an age like the one we’re living, the words of our text sure do sound like a pie in the sky. The Prophet Isaiah writes: “The wolf shall dwell with the lamb, the leopard shall lie down with the young goat, the calf and the young lion and the fatling together; and a little child shall lead them . . .. They shall not hurt nor destroy in all My holy mountain” (Isaiah 6:9).
Wouldn’t that be the day! Wouldn’t we love to live in that age!
You know what? We do. I know it doesn’t look like it on CNN Headline News, but this–the age Isaiah is describing in our text–THIS IS THE AGE WE LIVE IN.
The prophet Isaiah knew all about days of insecurity and uncertainty and fear. Israel’s golden age, the days of David and Solomon, is long gone. Foreign enemies, Assyria and later Babylon, would bring terrible suffering on God’s people. A nation which once thought itself immune to attack would soon be reduced to a smoldering stump.
But out of Israel’s stump something would grow. Isaiah says verse 1: “There shall come forth a rod from the stem of Jesse, and a branch shall grow out of his roots.” In the darkest age of Israel’s history, a tender shoot of new life. A descendant of Jesse and his son King David: The Messiah. The Messiah was Israel’s hope. When He came, all Israel believed He would usher in a whole new age.
It’s this Messianic Age that Isaiah is describing in our text, and, yes, that age has come. It came when Jesus, the Messiah, that greatest son of Jesse and David, came to earth. When Jesus died on the cross and rose from the grave, He initiated the Messianic Age. The age we’re living in is the age of the Messiah.
But so what? The Messiah has come. We’re living in the Messianic Age. What difference does it make? Innocent people are going to work in the morning and never coming home to their families. Terrorists are perpetrating unspeakable violence, seemingly without conscience. The FBI interviews hundreds of material witnesses, but we want action. We want convictions. We want criminals punished. The age we live in is crying out for justice.
What does living in the Messianic Age mean? Frankly, it means that Christ has initiated a whole new concept of justice: “He shall not judge by the sight of His eyes, nor decide by the hearing of His ears; but with righteousness He shall judge the poor, and decide with equity for the meek of the earth. He shall strike the earth with the rod of His mouth, and with the breath of His lips He shall slay the wicked” (Isaiah 11:3-5). These days, I don’t see justice being done. But Christ doesn’t judge by what His eyes see, by what His ears hear. He looks into hearts, and what He finds there often turns justice upside down.
Oh, the wicked will be punished all right; the righteous will be vindicated. But in the Messianic Age, the age of Christ Jesus, the age we’re living in, you can’t tell the wicked by the shade of his skin or his country of origin. You can’t tell the righteous by the fact he renounces international terrorism. The fact is, everyone has always fallen short of being right with God–not because I crash a plane into a building, but because my heart is selfish, maybe prejudiced, maybe unforgiving. No one–on his own, or on her own–wears a white hat. No one is innocent. I’m not. You’re not.
But in the Messianic Age, the age we’re living in, I’m not judged. You’re not judged by the usual evidence against us. Jesus Christ judges on the basis of the righteousness which He Himself has given us. His perfect obedience, His submission to innocent death, He credits to all who believe in Him. All who do not believe–these He will slay with the breath of His mouth. But all who believe in Him He will judge not guilty, worthy instead of eternal life. That’s the way justice works in the Messianic Age.
Despite everything we see on the news, despite everything our senses tell us about the age in which we live, we are actually living in the age of the Messiah’s righteous judgment.
Yet, the most incredible description Isaiah gives of the Messianic Age is that part again about peace between the wolf and the lamb, the leopard and the young goat. Remember? Is it possible, is it really possible that this could be the age we live in? “The wolf shall dwell with the lamb. The leopard shall lie down with the young goat, the calf and the young lion and the fatling together; and a little child shall lead them. The cow and the bear shall graze; their young ones shall lie down together; and the lion shall eat straw like the ox. The nursing child shall play by the cobra’s hole, and the weaned child shall put his hand in the viper’s den. They shall not hurt nor destroy in all My holy mountain, for the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the sea” (Isaiah 11:6-9).
That doesn’t sound anything like our day, does it! And we don’t even care that animals don’t get along. We humans are nowhere close, are we?
It’s not just a matter of commandos versus bin Laden, of air strikes and cruise missiles against the Taliban. Our lives here at home often seem to be nothing but war. We cross words–if not swords–with those who are closest to us. Our homes too often become battle grounds over the silliest things. And the thoughts we harbor about that guy who shows me up at work, about the lady who thinks she’s such hot stuff. Our thoughts about them suggest anything but peace on earth, goodwill toward men. How in the world could Isaiah’s vision of perfect harmony be true of the age we’re living in?
Well, Isaiah is telling us thus, the age of the Messiah would bring changes as radical as the transformation of all nature. As if mortal enemies, calves and lions, became friends. As if poisonous snakes, cobras, were teddy bears. As if predators became herbivores.
Believe it or not, something just this radical has happened. Yes, this is the age we’re living in. The little Child in a manger has led us there. But to recognize it, to see the radical thing, we can’t look at world events. We have to look past images of twisted steel and concrete rubble. And we can’t expect a day when nations and air forces and guerrilla fighters and terrorists will cease going to war. Our world will never have that kind of peace.
Instead, Christ Jesus has transformed us–our hearts, the hearts of Christians–as radically as the vision Isaiah sees in our text. We who were natural predators, who back-bite, who devour, who once fed only our own desires, He now miraculously enables to love. His love for us, so costly that it meant His death, so rich that it gives us life in heaven, moves us to love others. Knowing that we have never-ending joy and wealth and peace in store, we don’t have to prey on others to get what we want. We’re already assured of more than we could ever want!
That truth has transformed us, and already now, in this present age, we live in peace. Despite what we see all around us, despite what we see when we look inside ourselves, we are at peace. As sinners, we’re going to have spats with our loved ones–but ultimately we are at peace; our hearts are united as sinners mutually forgiven by Christ. The old nature in each of us is still jealous and resentful of others. But the new person Christ has made us has no desire to fight for pride. The sinner that remains in me reads the papers, watches the news, and wants revenge–but the believer inside wants something very different: for even our deadliest enemy to come to know the love of Jesus, to repent of his sins, and to receive Christ’s unlimited forgiveness. With even him, our worst enemy, we are at peace–right now. Really. That’s the age we live in.
The age of the Messiah. The age of Christ Jesus. The age in which justice is forgiveness, the forgiveness Christ earned on the cross, for the worst criminal, for you and me. The age in which He has set us all at peace. That’s the age we live in.
And the peace of God which passes all understanding will keep your hearts and minds through faith in Christ Jesus. Amen.
LUTHERAN HOUR MAILBOX (Questions & Answers) for December 9, 2001
ANNOUNCER: Can we have peace this Christmas? I’m Mark Eischer. Joining me in the studio is Dr. Ken Schurb, former assistant to the president of The Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod. Dr. Schurb, thanks for being with us today.
SCHURB: Mark, it’s always great to be here. Thanks for inviting me.
ANNOUNCER: During the Christmas season, we traditionally think about “Peace on Earth.” But can we really think such thoughts this year? Doesn’t it seem like wishful thinking?
SCHURB: Times like these help Christians appreciate what the Bible says about faith and hope. We walk by faith, not by sight. Contrary to all appearances, the Messianic age is here. Jesus brings peace. We receive His peace in faith, and from faith springs forth a powerful hope we have in Christ.
ANNOUNCER: Could you give an example of what it means to live in that sort of hope?
SCHURB: Toward the end of his epistle to the Romans, St. Paul addressed some problems the Roman church was having, disputes over things that God has neither commanded nor forbidden New Testament Christians. Paul did not want such things to divide them.
ANNOUNCER: So, faced with this ticklish situation, how did he handle it?
SCHURB: He wrote, “May God grant that you think the same thing as one another in accord with Christ, that altogether with one voice, you may glorify God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.” Then he immediately told them therefore to welcome one another as Christ had welcomed them.
ANNOUNCER: Just like that?
SCHURB: Not exactly. Here’s where Christian hope comes in. Before and after these words, Paul struck that note of Christian hope. He wrote that “by steadfastness and encouragement of the Scriptures we might have hope.” A few lines later, he added: “May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that by the power of the Holy Spirit you may abound in hope.”
ANNOUNCER: So, Paul expected this hope would have this effect on their lives?
SCHURB: Exactly. The Roman Christians had not been praising God with one voice. They weren’t accepting one another. But because of the hope they shared in Christ, Paul could write to them as if the problem was already solved and they could praise God with one voice. They could accept one another. In effect, Paul was telling them, live as though your problems are already solved, for in Christ they are and they will be.
ANNOUNCER: So let me see if I understand this. For them, peace was already the objective reality despite the appearances or even how they might have felt about it at the time.
SCHURB: Yes. It’s an interesting thought, isn’t it?
ANNOUNCER: Would this have something to do with the effect of God’s Word in our lives, that God’s Word creates that of which it speaks?
SCHURB: Sure, God’s Word brings the very forgiveness and life and peace and hope it describes. It brings it right into our lives and bestows it upon us.
ANNOUNCER: And that’s the kind of Christian hope we can have now even during war time?
SCHURB: Yes. In fact, you were showing me a quote from Dr. Walter A. Maier who said something very similar on a Lutheran Hour broadcast in December of 1941. Why don’t you read that?
ANNOUNCER: Dr. Maier said: “This year, many of us feel the need of the Christ Child perhaps more than ever before. Through Him, ours can be a blessed, though saddened, Christmas. Despite the inferno which may surround us with blood and disaster, famine and disease, murder and torture, bomb and blasting . . . the promise ‘On earth, peace’ can re-echo in our hearts, whether the future may bring prosperity or adversity, joy or sorrow, health or sickness, life or death.”
SCHURB: That peace and hope be with you in Christ, Mark.
ANNOUNCER: And also with you.