Advent Meditation: The Mountains Made Low

Isaiah 40:1-11 is the text for this Sunday, the second week of Advent, that I will be preaching from.

1 “Comfort, O comfort My people,” says your God.
2 “Speak kindly to Jerusalem;
And call out to her, that her warfare has ended,
That her iniquity has been removed,
That she has received of the LORD’S hand
Double for all her sins.”
3 A voice is calling,
“Clear the way for the LORD in the wilderness;
Make smooth in the desert a highway for our God.
4 “Let every valley be lifted up,
And every mountain and hill be made low;
And let the rough ground become a plain,
And the rugged terrain a broad valley;
5 Then the glory of the LORD will be revealed,
And all flesh will see it together;
For the mouth of the LORD has spoken.”
6 A voice says, “Call out.”
Then he answered, “What shall I call out?”
All flesh is grass, and all its loveliness is like the flower of the field.
7 The grass withers, the flower fades,
When the breath of the LORD blows upon it;
Surely the people are grass.
8 The grass withers, the flower fades,
But the word of our God stands forever.
9 Get yourself up on a high mountain,
O Zion, bearer of good news,
Lift up your voice mightily,
O Jerusalem, bearer of good news;
Lift it up, do not fear.
Say to the cities of Judah,
“Here is your God!”
10 Behold, the Lord GOD will come with might,
With His arm ruling for Him.
Behold, His reward is with Him
And His recompense before Him.
11 Like a shepherd He will tend His flock,
In His arm He will gather the lambs
And carry them in His bosom;
He will gently lead the nursing ewes.

Notice verse 4:  Let every valley be lifted up,
And every mountain and hill be made low;
And let the rough ground become a plain,
And the rugged terrain a broad valley;

God is continually revealing Himself, first through Israel and then out to all the world, as the God who capsizes our modes of thinking and being.   My initial response when reading this text is to think of the lowly being exalted and the proud humbled.   I liken it to Jesus saying that the first shall be last and the last shall be first, or something along those lines.   And then I was struck by a completely different and altogether suprising thought.   It has to do with mountains and valleys.  

For the Jewish people and most if not all ancient peoples, the mountains were seen as the abode of God.   Mountain tops were mysterious places and they carried with them the presence of the “Most High” God.  It is no suprise that Moses goes alone up Mount Sinai to be with God and even then cannot look upon God’s face.   The mountaintop can be a frightening place.   In the valley below, the people begin to wonder if Moses, or God, has forgotten about them.  They begin to get restless.    They turn to other things to worship and form a golden calf.    The valley is also a symbol of death.   The great poet likens the valley to the “shadow of death” in Psalm 23, for instance.   Nothing good happens in the valley.   Unless…

…Incarnation happens.    The mountain being made low is perhaps a beautiful way of depicting the very presence of God descending upon us.   The Prophet Isaiah is looking to a day when God’s presence will no longer be seen as solely mysterious and frightening and hidden from view atop a mountain but will rather “be made low” (see the Kenotic hymn of Phil. 2) even as the valley is lifted up – both meeting in a beautiful embrace.   No longer will we have to wonder if God has forgotten about us.   No longer will we have to think of the valleys as places harboring death but we can see them as places that intersect with the incarnate presence of God himself. 

It is then, and only then, that, as the next verse proclaims:  The glory of the LORD will be revealed, and all flesh will see it together.

Come, Lord Jesus, Come.  Amen.

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