Dreamer [Isaiah 35:4-7a - Proper 18B]

 The Rev. Jeremiah Williamson

Isaiah 35:4-7a

 

Dreamer

 

Isaiah was as dreamer.  And I mean that as a compliment.  And I say that, because, while I know pretty much what every person in this world is against these days, I know almost nothing of their dreams.  I know what makes them rage, but I have no idea what brings tears to their eyes. 

 

It sometimes feels like we are living on a scorched earth.  To me it feels like everywhere I look there is seething discontent, just so much anger; every post, that is not a baby, a pet, or a pun, is a complaint, frustration, or insult; every headline a tragedy; every cable news segment a red-hot poker; every life and every death fuel for some partisan fire.   Of course, there are things in the world that should fill us with holy anger, but just probably not everything. 

 

I don’t claim to know all the reasons for all the anger; I’m sure they are legion.  But it does seem that there is always something beneath the anger, a spark that grows into this burning flame: fear, a perception of powerlessness, despair, pain, this inability to fix all broken things.  And there are many broken things, to be sure.

 

And that is why Isaiah gives me hope.  Isaiah watched his world fall apart.  And still he found ways to see beauty in the broken pieces of his world.  Isaiah, and his people, had every right and every reason to be consumed by their anger, suffocated by their despair.  Nothing was good; life was pain and chaos and they were utterly powerless to fix it. 

 

And still these audacious dreams of streams in the desert, of life in the valley of the shadow of death, of brokenness miraculously made whole.  Isaiah dreamed these dreams in a world haunted by nightmares.  He dreamed his dreams in a nation scarred by trauma.  He dreamed his dreams in the midst of a city made barren wilderness.  

 

In the ancient world of our ancient text a wilderness was what was left in the wake of war; it was the ashes that remained.  War in the ancient world was waged not only on a people but also on their land; war was waged on past, present, and future.  The trees were felled, the crops were torched, the water was spoiled.  And what was left was barren, desolate, hopeless.  That was the reality with which Isaiah’s people lived after the Babylonians wreaked havoc and destruction on their nation and all the furious bluster in the world could not raise the dead or undo the damage.  

 

Life requires a dream.  And I know that dreams feel silly, or pathetic, or superfluous in a world on fire.  But they are not.  Dreams are hope in technicolor and hope is a kind of holy defiance in a world of impotent rage and suffocating despair.  Hope does not ignore the pain or the sorrow; it does not turn a blind eye to evil or injustice; it does not disregard the heartbreaking realities of the world.  It takes those heartbreaking realities seriously – seriously enough to believe that God has something better in mind, seriously enough to believe, that despite the evidence, God’s dreams for this world can and will come true.

 

The people who mourned their city and languished in exile only survived because they learned how to dream; they never gave up on hope.  And that is because they had voices willing to shout the good news over the deafening drone of bad news.  They needed a prophet, like Isaiah, who was defiant enough to keep dreaming of abundant life even as the ashes burnt his lungs, even as the sand stung his face.  They needed a prophet who was courageous enough to see possibility pushing through the scorched earth.  They needed a prophet who was foolish enough to plant seeds in a desert.

 

Like Ferdinand the bull collecting flowers in the midst of a frenzied mob, Isaiah stands amongst the chaos of war reciting his poetry.  And the beauty of his poetic dreams become an oracle of salvation for a defeated people.  His beautiful images allow them to glimpse possibilities in the rubble.  His hope, packaged in delicate verse, kept a community alive.  And they started to imagine a future, instead of just being consumed by their anger and strangled by their despair.

 

Isaiah was as dreamer.  And I mean that as a compliment.  Because dreaming is holy work.  The Bible is filled with dreamers, dreamers daring enough to confront the merchants of despair with the hope of the good news.

 

In this contentious world, I know what people are against.  I know who people are against.  I know where the lines are drawn.  

 

But I want to know about your dreams.  I want to know what brings tears to your eyes.  I want to know what makes you come alive, what makes you heart speed up, what makes your eyes twinkle.

 

I know it is easy to be angry these days – at times justifiably so.  But I do wonder: is there is something else to be?

 

Maybe be the one who finds the beauty in the broken pieces of this world. 

Be the one who plants the flower that breaks through the pavement.

Be the one who closes your eyes tightly when you kiss your beloved.

 

Drown out those angry voices on the screen with a song, a song sung a little too loudly.

Touch the untouchable.

Love the unlovable.

Invest in things that make this world more heavenly.

Recite your poem on the rubbled remains of civilization. 

 

Be a dreamer.  Like Isaiah and his desert streams.  Like Jesus and his kingdom come.  Believe in hope more than despair.  Believe in the dream more than nightmare.