A Way Home

I have never known what it is like to not be able to return home. I have never had the experience of not being able to go back. I don’t know what it feels like to be homeless. I cannot comprehend the thought of being forcibly removed from a place and told never to return.

I know there are some who have. Forty-three million people worldwide have been forced from their homeland. They are exiles with no home. Syrians are living in camps while their homes are destroyed. Kurds are on the run. Sudanese are separated from their families. It is difficult to comprehend the desperation and pain that the exiles must feel.

I know there are prodigal sons and daughters, who because of bad decisions were told never to return home. A choice was made. A decision was given. And a no-return policy was enforced. Son’s who have not spoken with their mothers in years. Father’s who have refused to acknowledge their daughters exist. Abandoned. Excluded. Rejected.

Exile is a difficult condition. No place to call your own. No home to be proud of. No identity other than a person on the run. There is overwhelming sadness that comes with grieving what once was, and what is now, and what never will be again, that many of us have never known.

However, I bet you have known the feeling of loss. You have experienced being disconnected. And maybe, you even know what it feels like to have a place to call home but never having the sense of peace that should come with naming such a place “home.”

With Judah, Jerusalem, and the Temple left in ruins behind them, the people of Israel were marched off to Babylon. In 587 BCE Jerusalem was conquered and destroyed by the invading army of the Babylonians. A significant part of the population was taken into exile. If you were to ask the prophets, the exile was not a result of an overpowering army but instead was based on the sinfulness of the people. The people had rebelled against God. They had lived at the expense of their neighbors. They put their own selfish desires above the needs of others. Exile was judgment.

Now the time of judgment has come to an end. The new word for the new day is “Comfort.” “Comfort, O Comfort my people, says your God” (Isaiah 40:1). Judgment is a word of the past. Now, on the other side of their exile experience, the people hear a word of relief. It is a bold declaration of hope in the midst of destruction. A voice cries out, “In the wilderness prepare the way of the Lord, make straight in the desert a highway for our God” (40:3). God promises a new way, a direct route through the desert. The people of God are returning to their home through the desert that separates them from their current location in Babylon. They are coming home. And God is making a way.

The trip home is possible because God is directing the path. The crooked roads are being straightened out, the valleys are being lifted up, and even the mountains are made low. God is making the rough places plain. Hope for a new life is possible because God has made it so. Hope for a new day has arrived because God is acting.

Fast forward a few generations, the Gospel of Mark sees a new journey beginning for God’s people with the arrival of God’s messiah, Jesus. The writer of Mark’s gospel takes the liberty to start out his story quoting this same passage from Isaiah. John the Baptist with his message of repentance in the desert of Judea is preparing the way for Jesus. John proclaims judgment on those living for themselves and comfort for those suffering. He reminds the people that God again promises to act for the salvation of God’s people and God is doing it through the sending of the Messiah.

The story of Christmas is the story of God’s comfort. It is a reminder that God is making a way. God has not given up on us. God continues to make the path straight. God will move mountains or rise up valleys if needed to rescue His people. Your life may be in the desert of despair, but God can make a way. God will make a way home.

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