“You Can’t Always Get What You Want”

Isaiah 11:1-9

Not only is this Advent Season; it is also our quadrennial running-for-President season. Every time this political season rolls around I find myself wishing that our next President would be a 21^st Century George Washington or Thomas Jefferson. Now those guys were leaders: wise, intelligent, brave, and full of integrity. Or so the history books say.

I trust the history books to be true, but only up to a point. No President of the United States can ever live up to the idealized versions of Washington and Jefferson that are part of our collective American consciousness. We must remember that they had critics and opponents, that they made their share of mistakes, and that they were sinfully imperfect human beings just like the rest of us. We may one day elect another Washington or Jefferson, just not the idealized version.

Every time Israel or Judah anointed a new king they hoped and prayed that he would live up to his God-given job description, that he would be wise, merciful, brave, just, and righteous; that he would carry out God’s will for God’s people. That king never came. Not even Israel’s greatest king, David, ever lived up to either the people’s or God’s expectations. Some were better than others. Some were downright corrupt and inept. All had feet of clay. Each was, to a lesser or greater extent, a disappointment.

Still the people hoped, dreamed, and prayed. After their Babylonian exile their hopes, dreams, and prayers were for an idealized David, that great and mighty Messiah for whom they all so desperately longed; that Messiah described by Isaiah. He would be Spirit-filled and rule with wisdom and integrity. He would possess the gift of discernment. He would be the epitome of justice and righteousness, a fair, equitable, and compassionate judge and ruler of his people. The poor, weak, and helpless of his kingdom would have a champion, someone to make sure that they were taken care of.

All people would be in right relationship with God. All people would be in right relationship with one another. They would live in perfect peace and harmony. More than that, God’s peace and harmony would be displayed throughout all of creation. Wolves, lions, and other predators would no longer hurt or destroy. Those animals that had once been their prey would live safely among them. A baby could safely crawl over a rattlesnake’s den or stick his hand in a cobra’s den.

Wow! What a great time that would be, but for the children of Israel it never came to pass. The Messiah did come. Jesus was born in Bethlehem. But he wasn’t what people expected. He wasn’t their idealized version. He wasn’t the Messiah they wanted. As the sermon title – borrowed from the Rolling Stones – puts it, you can’t always get what you want.

Jesus wasn’t the Messiah Israel wanted. He was, however, the Messiah the world needed. He was a Suffering Servant rather than a mighty warrior king. He was Spirit-filled, wise, gentle, just, righteous, and fair. He possessed perfect integrity. But instead of conquering nations and building empires he won hearts and souls for his Father’s Kingdom. He was a healer who offered abundant life and a peace that surpassed all understanding. He was the Lamb of God who came, by way of crucifixion and resurrection, to take away the sins of the world.

Most rejected him. Some followed him. In time those followers, by the power of the Holy Spirit, built a worldwide church. Salvation was no longer restricted to Israel. There was no worldwide empire centered in Jerusalem. The human race was still as brutally sinful as it ever had been. Sin and evil abounded. Death, disease, war, and violence continued. Lions and wolves did not lie down with lambs and calves. Children dared not play with serpents. On the surface nothing had changed.

But for followers of Jesus everything had changed. Their sins were forgiven. Eternal life was guaranteed to them. Sin, death, and evil no longer held them in unbreakable bonds. They would hurt. They would die. They would experience poverty and hunger. But by faith they could experience a peace that did pass all understanding and a joy that had nothing to do with the external conditions of their lives. They would be citizens of that Kingdom of God that is both already here and still yet to come.

Isaiah’s words of prophecy have yet to come true in a literal way. The kind of Messiah he prophesied has yet to appear. But the Jesus who came has promised to come again. When he does God’s peace and harmony will rule the universe. Death will end, as will all sickness and pain. Warfare and violence will cease. God’s people – Christ’s Church – will experience God’s ultimate justice and righteousness. The day is surely coming when the earth will be full of the knowledge of God as the waters cover the sea.

Meanwhile life goes on. We who follow Jesus still live, work, worship, and witness in a dark and sinful world, a world of imperfect, and sometimes grossly immoral and tragically inept, Presidents – imperfect people just like the rest of us. We know grief. We know sorrow. We know pain. In spite of our faith, and sometimes because of it, we suffer. Still we have the sure hope of resurrection to eternal life. We still know that these lives we lead are not the sum total of our existence. While we’re not perfect, we’re on our way to the ultimate perfection of God’s realized Kingdom. We know beyond the shadow of a doubt that Isaiah’s prophecy will come true. We don’t know exactly when. We don’t know exactly how. We simply know that it will.

But what are we to do in the meantime? How are we to live? Do we fall into deep depression because the Lord hasn’t returned yet? Do we cynically start thinking that the world is right and we are wrong, that Jesus will not come back and that the world we have is the best one we’ll ever get? Do we get caught up in dispensationalism with all of its timelines and charts that are based on some very questionable proof texting? Do we withdraw from the world into our own little enclaves of the elect and let the sinful world go to hell around us while we smugly and passively wait for the Lord to come?

No, no, no, and no! We go about the business of the Kingdom, the mission that our Lord Jesus has charged us to fulfill. We do those things that keep us near to God: prayer, worship, the sacraments, Bible study, and Christian fellowship. We obey the Ten Commandments. We seek the blessings of a life lived according to the Beatitudes.

We live together in Christ’s Body in ways that build it up. We pray for one another and laugh and cry with one another. We avoid as much as is humanly possible the backbiting, competiveness, and vindictiveness that tear apart the Body of Christ.

We go into the whole world and make disciples. We share the Good News of Jesus with everyone around us. We live as light and salt in a dark and decaying world. We heal the sick, comfort the grieving, befriend the lonely, and shelter the homeless. We feed the hungry on both the life-sustaining bread that is food and on the eternal Bread of Life. We do what we can, even if in only small increments, to make life better for all God’s children.

We work for peace, the real peace of God, in our own lives and relationships. We practice humility and forgiveness. We put others first. We become servants in the manner of the Suffering Servant Jesus. We live life with an ongoing attitude of gratitude. Remembering that we are sinners saved only by the grace of God, we work to root self-righteousness out of our lives. We welcome home the prodigals of our lives. We make amends for the hurt we’ve inflicted on others. In all these things we live as citizens of the Kingdom, practicing the justice and righteousness God demands of his people.

None of this will bring into being that perfect world described by Isaiah. None of this will bring about the universal practice of justice, fairness, and equity in either our culture or others. We will always need policemen and military forces. We will always need some sort of judicial system. We will always need prisons and other places of incarceration. Such forces and institutions will be necessary until Jesus comes again.

But in the name of Jesus each of us can bring peace, healing, and justice into the world: one day at a time, one person at a time. I cannot single-handedly bring about peace in the Middle East. I can live peaceably with you and others. None of you on your own can end world hunger. We can all see that one or more people get fed today. I cannot conquer the world for Christ. I can, along with you, share the love of Jesus with an individual. Neither you nor I can bring mass civility to our culture. We can, however, be civil in all our interactions: saying please, thank you, and you’re welcome; giving a smile to a harassed and harried waitress or clerk; not beeping at the driver in front of us for not moving the second the light turns green. Little niceties that make the world a better place.

The Kingdom has come. The Kingdom is coming. Jesus may not be here with us in exactly the way we want him to be. He does, by the power of the Holy Spirit, walk among us in ways we need. He will come again. Meanwhile we have his work to do in the world. Amen.