What are you waiting for?

     The second Sunday in Advent is the love Sunday and our Isaiah text is 11.1-10.  This chapter is the source of the well known wolf living with the lamb, the Peaceable Kingdom.  It is also the source of the prophecy of a leader who will come from the house of Jesse (King David's father) and who will be the leader of leaders, judging all with righteousness and equity. In addition to our Isaiah text, our Advent candle is the Love candle this week, after our hope candle last week.
     I'm not sure about your holiday traditions, but in my family we inevitably share stories from Christmases and times past.  We do this as a country as well, thinking about the 'good old days' when our economy was strong, shoppers were adorning the bottom of their Christmas trees with extravagant presents, and families were strong and together.  This is what the prophet Isaiah is getting at when he speaks of the stump of Jesse.  When Jesse's son David was king of Israel, all was well.  The country was unified, the military was strong and successful, and people were relatively faithful to God.  After David, however, the country started to go downhill, the economy was worsening, their military power was getting less, and then the country split in two.
     Isaiah is recalling the 'good old days' and foretelling of a time when a leader greater even than King David would come to rule.  Can you imagine the excitement?  The excitement of a leader, stronger, more powerful, more wise, and more faithful than even their best king, who would finally do right by Israel?  Except that king didn't come.  There was a new king shortly after Isaiah's prophecy, but he proved to be no better than the many who had come before him.  So Israel waited.  And waited.  Until, one day an angel appeared to a meek and lowly teenage girl and informed her that she would bear a son, God's son.  This king took Israel by surprise.  In fact, it was so much of a surprise that no one but lowly shepherds came to his birth.  Who would expect the best king Israel had seen to be born in a stable?  Who would expect God to show God's power through an infant - the meekest of all?
    And yet God's love is so great that God did exactly that. The ruler of the nations becoming an infant to save the world. Unfortunately even after Jesus came and died our world seems to be in shambles.  So we continue to wait for that leader who will come and bring everlasting peace.  We wait for that leader who will judge with righteousness and equity.  We wait and wait and wait to see God's love - in us, in others, in the meek and lowly of the earth.  We long for the day when peace will finally come and all will live together in harmony. Emmanuel - God with us - has come, is coming, and will come. We live now in the mystery of waiting, anticipating that glorious day of Emmanuel coming again to bring God's kingdom. For what are you most excited this Advent season?