Learning to Eat Grass

Scripture

Isaiah 11:1-9

11 A shoot shall come out from the stump of Jesse,
    and a branch shall grow out of his roots.
² The spirit of the Lord shall rest on him,
    the spirit of wisdom and understanding,
    the spirit of counsel and might,
    the spirit of knowledge and the fear of the Lord.
³ His delight shall be in the fear of the Lord.

He shall not judge by what his eyes see,
    or decide by what his ears hear;
⁴ 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 kill the wicked.
⁵ Righteousness shall be the belt around his waist,
    and faithfulness the belt around his loins.

⁶ The wolf shall live with the lamb,
    the leopard shall lie down with the kid,
the calf and the lion and the fatling together,
    and a little child shall lead them.
⁷ The cow and the bear shall graze,
    their young shall lie down together;
    and the lion shall eat straw like the ox.
⁸ The nursing child shall play over the hole of the asp,
    and the weaned child shall put its hand on the adder’s den.
⁹ They will not hurt or destroy
    on all my holy mountain;
for the earth will be full of the knowledge of the Lord
    as the waters cover the sea.  (NRSV)

 

Devotion

Last weekend, I had one of those moments when the Holy Spirit convicted me about my own sinfulness right in the middle of everyday life.  I was finishing up shopping for Christmas presents and was more than a little tired and grumpy as I rolled up to the shopping center's Starbucks to get some much-needed caffeine for the drive home.  The place was packed.  The baristas were taking orders and making drinks as they could, but there was no way to keep up with that kind of demand.  And wouldn't you just they had run out of straws?  Nothing about this situaion boded well for my already fraying temper, but I still got in line and placed my order.  And then I waited...and waited...and waited.

The longer I waited, the more annoyed I became.  The place was Too loud.  Too bright.  Too busy.  And definitely too full of people voicing their extreme displeasure about the no-straws situation.  I wanted stomp up to the counter and and demand that someone just give me my coffee so I could get out already.   

As I stood there and watched an employee half my age get snapped  for not being able to magically produce a straw to put in a middle aged-man's frappuchino, I thought, "This what the lead-up to Christmas has become: entitled consumers yelling at over-worked and underpaid employees about about minor things beyond their control." 

 That's when the Holy Spirit told me that I might want to check myself.  After all, wasn't I about two seconds away from losing my own temper?  If I thought about it, was I really any better than the guy who had just stomped out the door still yelling about not getting a straw?  And just like that, I found myself convicted of my own nasty tendency to let my temper run rampant from time to time.

I believe that the the Peaceful Kin-dom described in Isaiah 11 is so awe-inspiring because it feels so unnatural.   Who can imagine a lion eating straw, a bear contentedly grazing next to a cow, or a venomous snake ignoring the child playing at the mouth of its den?  We expect those the lion, the bear, and the snake to attack, because its in their nature to be aggressive--just human nature includes the desire to lash out and hurt others who hurt us, annoy us, or simply get in our way.

We give into that temptation more often than we should.  Just as a predator's attacks can spell death for the defenseless creatures around them, our aggressive instincts can lead to painful consequences for the people we come into contact with.  And when we hurt someone the way we did, we may find ourselves shrugging our shoulders and saying something about it being unavoidable--that that it's just human nature for things to turn that way sometimes.  Lions eat lambs, bears maim oxen, and snakes strike out at people.

The wonderful thing about Jesus is he helps us overcome sin and aggression.  Truly preparing for Christ's means challenging ourselves us to set aside our more violent tendencies and developing the better parts of what it means to be human.  Jesus can inspire us to become more loving.  More forgiving.  More peaceful. Thanks to Christ's incarnation and the Holy Spirit's influence, we can become the kind of people God has always intended us to be.

Modifying the way we think and act in the world might not come naturally at first.  We may even feeling as strange as a lion learning to eat grass.  The Good News is that while these changes may not feel natural, the are Spirit-filled.  They reflect Isaiah's vision of  the Kin-dom to come--the world where nothing kills or destroys on God's holy mountain.  And the more we work to reflect that coming Kin-dom here and now, the more Christ's continued presence is made known in the world around us.

Today, I am thankful that while I may not have been at my best in that coffee shop, the Holy Spirit kept me from being at my worst.  Now that I've once-again been convicted of the mean and spiteful tendencies that reside within me, I'm going to try to spend the rest of this Advent on the lookout for the moments that bring those tendencies to the surface.  I want to prepare myself for Christ's coming by trying to live as a member of that Peaceful Kin-dom that is coming.    For while doing so may not always feel natural, I want to be someone who delights in God's peace and love. 

Prayer

Jesus, thank you for granting us a vision of your coming Kin-dom through the word of Isaiah.  When I am tempted to rip into someone who seems weaker or more vulnerable than me, may you encourage me to stuff my mouth with grass.  When I want to attack those next to me,  may you inspire me to calmly graze beside them.  And I am about to lash out at someone who threatens or offends me, may you convince me to remain peacefully coiled in my den.  May I see the day no one hurts or destroys anyone upon your holy mountain and all the world is full of your knowledge.  Amen.