Hope Through the Wilderness | 12/7/25
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Where do you see “wilderness” in your own life right now, and what does it feel like to stand in that place?
When have you experienced God’s comfort in a time of devastation or uncertainty?
In what ways do the words “I hope you make it” function as both prayer and promise in your relationships?
Where do you sense an invitation to help “clear the obstructions” for someone else right now?
How might helping prepare the way for others also be preparing your own heart to see God more clearly?
Transcript:
The debris was more than 20 feet high in some places that morning. In every direction you looked, you saw evidence of the massive destruction that had just happened the day before. The winds and the rain of Hurricane Helene had come and wreaked havoc across Western North Carolina. And in one area just outside of Asheville, those winds and rain had caused a landslide. Homes and other buildings ripped off of foundations, and practically an entire community came rushing down the side of a mountain, following the path of the water, picked up and swept away until it reached a place where the land leveled out.
And in that spot, where the ground was a little more level and where the water slowed down, everything began to pile up. On what Jennifer and Yosef had started ten years earlier as a family farm, a place where they had poured in their sweat and their time and their hard work and their dreams, to be able to be a place that they would not only manage, but also be able to host guests for years to come. And now it was gone. Everything. The word that Jennifer used to describe it in the days after it happened was “apocalypse.”
When you looked around, it looked like the scene of an apocalypse. Dreams shattered.
As I listen to the prophet Isaiah in this morning's scripture reading, and I think about the people of Israel to whom he was speaking, I think also about Jennifer and Yosef. You see, the people of Israel had assumptions about the way life was supposed to be. After all, they had a land. They had a king. They had a promise that they were God's people. And they had expectations that came out of their deep history for a future that was filled with opportunity. And all of that had been dashed as a foreign power had come in and invaded that territory, ransacked everything in the towns, and had carted people off in slavery. Nothing was as it was supposed to be. Devastation all around.
And whether the devastation has been experienced in Bethlehem or in Buncombe County, North Carolina, the good news this morning is that God is a God who promises comfort. For those who sit in darkness comes a word of hope. So hear the word of the Lord this morning:
“Comfort, O comfort my people,” says your God. “Speak tenderly to Jerusalem and cry to her that she has served her term, that her penalty is paid, that she has received from the Lord's hand double for all her sins. A voice cries out in the wilderness: Prepare the way of the Lord, make straight in the desert a highway for our God. Every valley shall be lifted up, and every mountain and hill be made low. The uneven ground shall become level, and the rough places a plain. Then the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all people shall see it together, for the mouth of the Lord has spoken. A voice says, ‘Cry out!’ And I said, ‘What shall I cry?’ All people are grass. Their constancy is like the flower of the field. The grass withers, the flower fades when the breath of the Lord blows upon it; surely the people are grass. The grass withers, the flower fades, but the word of our God will stand forever. Get you up to a high mountain, O Zion, herald of good tidings. Lift up your voice with strength, O Jerusalem, herald of good tidings. Lift it up; do not fear. Say to the cities of Judah, ‘Here is your God.’ See, the Lord God comes with might, and his arm rules for him. His reward is with him, and his recompense before him. He will feed his flock like a shepherd. He will gather the lambs in his arms and carry them in his bosom and gently lead the mother sheep.”
This is the word of God for the people of God, and God's people say, “Thanks be to God.”
Would you pray with me?
Come, Holy Spirit, and breathe life into the words that I speak, that they might carry a word from you into our hearts and lives this morning. Amen.
Every year around this time, Catherine and I pull out all the boxes and start to put everything out that serves as signs of the season, and Christmas is coming. You all knew that, right? Yes. Christmas is coming. And in the midst of all of that, there is a moment when I go out to our front porch to hang our Moravian star—something that's been a part of our family tradition since the first year we were married. And every time I do that, it's a moment for me that isn't just about preparing our home, but it's a moment of preparing my heart for the season as well.
In some mysterious way, as I get up on the ladder and hang that Moravian star on the hook and then pull the cord down and attach it to the extension cord and plug it in and the light comes on for the first time, in that moment I feel connected to the generations that have gone before me in seeking to know more and in seeking to find the Christ child in this season.
I think of the wise men who followed the star to be able to get to where the Christ child was. I think of John Wesley and how the Moravians had such a profound impact on his life, especially at a time when he was struggling, and their faith served as an inspiration to him on board a ship in the midst of a storm. I think of the Moravians in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, and the impact that they have had in that community, including on my mother-in-law, Pat, who grew up in that city. And certainly, that, combined with my father-in-law’s growing up in North Carolina, had an impact on the family starting this tradition of hanging a Moravian star every year. It is one of the ways that I prepare.
“Prepare the way of the Lord.” And, you know, when I get to this scripture passage in the season of Advent, and I hear those words, I tend to think of them in relation to myself and preparing me for Advent. And that's a good thing. It's not in a selfish way. It's in a “I really want to open up my heart and be ready in new and perhaps different and even surprising ways for what God wants to do in my life in this season of Advent.”
But this year—this year as I've been sitting with those words—I am drawn in by an invitation to help prepare the way for others. Don't get me wrong. I still need my own preparation. There's still work for God to do in my heart and in my life this season of Advent. But I look around, and I see so many people facing hard things, and I want to do something to help lighten the load a little bit. And I don't think that I'm alone in that. As I have conversations with others, including some of you all, I hear people wrestling with all the difficult things that folks are facing and wanting to do something to help—wanting to do something that matters and can make a difference for somebody else.
This past week, a friend of mine shared a video on her Facebook page. And as soon as I opened it up, I began to resonate with the mantra that the speaker in this video was offering, and it connected with some of these feelings that I am having this year during Advent about the hard things that others are dealing with. It was powerful enough as I watched it that I thought, “I'm gonna share that with my friends on Sunday morning.” So I invite you to take a look for a moment.
Facebook video transcript:
I’m not religious, but when I see someone running to catch the bus, I say a silent prayer for them. I pray to no one and everyone when I silently say, ‘I hope you make it.’ And these five words contain all the things I wish for this stranger. I hope you make it. I hope the stars align and you can be at the right place at the right time. And once the fight to catch the bus is won, you can rest and catch your breath instead, knowing that you are exactly where you need to be.
I have all these little hopes for the strangers I see. Like, I hope you have the most perfect cup of tea. And I hope that your mornings are slow. And that you learn how to let go like the autumn leaves do in bursts of bright color, making way for something new.
And I hope someone always holds out a hand for you when you need it, but also that you have the courage to take it, knowing that you have the strength to hold heaviness when you face it. And I hope you always have a place that feels like home, whether it's a physical place or one that you carry with you in your soul. And I hope that people are kind and life is good and you are safe and loved as everyone should be. We all deserve this.
And I’m not religious, but I have been praying more lately for the strangers I see in real life and the ones on the telly. And it can be for things as mundane as catching trains or for the people who are fleeing things some are more hesitant to name. Because what is a prayer but a wish for all humanity—one that shoulders all of our collective hopes for the things that we see and that we fight for? Because we hope and we fight for equal rights, the end of genocide, peace on this earth, and kids to not know what hurt is.
So when I say ‘I hope you make it,’ those five words contain not only the weight of the world, but the promise to break it and remake it and rebalance the scales—to be a drop in the ocean that swells to make all ships rise so we can all sail safely and actually self-actualize. So when I say ‘I hope you make it,’ I am not only praying for you. I hope you make it because I hope we all do.
So when you see someone running for the bus or someone who is facing something you would rather turn away from, I hope you hold on to your hope and stay engaged. Your hope shines out like the sun’s rays. Without it, the world only gets more gray. Without our collective hope, we can’t believe in change—and change is something we need to make. So I hope you make it. I hope we all do. Thank you.
“I hope you make it.” What a powerful five words. You know, that's a message that you share with somebody who's going through a wilderness. It's a message that you offer to try to encourage another person who is facing hard things. “I hope you make it.”
And so this Advent, I am keeping my eyes open for those people, those places where I can offer that word of encouragement, where I can pray for them, and where I can not only pray for them, but where I might be able to do something that can make a difference. And just as I am thinking about the things that I can do, a word comes from the prophet again today that is both humbling and liberating.
“All flesh is grass,” Isaiah says—reality check. Life is fleeting. It's here today, gone tomorrow. Goes quickly. And so anything that I might do is just a drop in the ocean, which doesn't mean that I shouldn't do it. I should. We should. People need encouragement. People need hope. But when Isaiah says, “The grass withers and the flower fades,” it's a reminder that I am just a conduit. It's not about me.
Because then Isaiah points us to what really matters: that God's faithfulness endures forever. That God's comfort will come. That God will show up, and that God shows up even in the wilderness. And the task that is in hand for me is to be a part of preparing the way so that others can see God coming when they are living life in the wilderness.
To do what I can to help clear the obstructions, to make that curvy path a little straighter. To take a walk into that deep and dark valley that somebody is facing with them and hold their hand so that they know that they're not alone. To stand in front of the mountain that for somebody feels insurmountable and say not only, “I hope you make it,” but, “I know you can, and I'm here with you,” to do what we can to help prepare the way in this season, to smooth out the rough places, to make it a little easier for the person who is struggling in the wilderness of life to know that God has not abandoned them.
Two weeks after that morning when Jennifer and Yosef walked out for the first time and saw all the debris in every direction that they looked, they still hadn't seen any help come. For one thing, communication was difficult. You all may remember some of the stories that were coming out. Roads were impassable, so people couldn't get to some places. And so day after day, it was just the two of them trying to begin to uncover and to begin to clean out. But with just two of them, it seemed like it was an impossible task. And there was discouragement that was setting in.
Finally, access to the internet became available again. And Jennifer went out one day and on Facebook posted a message about what was going on with them. And somehow, somebody in Alabama who didn't know her saw that post, shared it with some friends, and then that group of women shared it with their husbands. And the woman sent a message back and said, “We've got people coming to you.” And a couple of days later, they did—with tractors and plows and tools and resources and hands and bodies to begin to clear out all of the stuff, to begin to remove some of the obstructions. Not just the ones that were keeping them from rebuilding their family farm, but also the ones that made it so hard to see in that moment that God had not abandoned them.
I think of other ways that people do this when friends and others—even strangers—are spending time in the wilderness. I think of the person who prepares a meal to deliver to the hospital to a family who is spending every waking hour there because their daughter is fighting for her life. I think of the generosity that bubbles up from a congregation to say yes to teenagers who live on the other side of the world, who have experienced isolation and exploitation, but have now found community through Zoe. And I think of what it means to one of those kids to have somebody actually make the trip to the other side of the world and show up and sit with them and listen to their story.
I think of women who accompany a friend to the courthouse who has finally made the hard and scary decision to step away from an abusive relationship in order to make sure she takes care of herself and her children. I think of men—and we have some of these right here among us at Trinity—who have been doing this for years, who visit a prison every month to say to inmates, “You matter. God is with you. God loves you.”
I think of gifts that will be delivered tomorrow to children who are in the Guardian ad Litem program here in Alachua County. And while it may not be a lot, a Christmas gift can speak volumes to a child about somebody's care for them. And I think of some of our high school youth who this past summer went to Jennifer and Yosef's family farm to work alongside them and help them continue the process of recovering and rebuilding.
“Prepare the way of the Lord,” helping make it possible for people to see through the wilderness of their lives that God is with us—Emmanuel.
This Advent, we are walking through this season under the theme of carrying hope. And, you know, the word “carry” implies that we are not only just holding onto something for ourselves, but we are sharing it. We are carrying it to somebody. We are offering hope to others who need it. And I wonder—if just maybe, as we carry hope and help clear the way for others to see, if we might not also be preparing ourselves to see more clearly as well.
After all, the way Isaiah tells it, when the way is cleared, the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together. Now that, my friends, that is something worth getting ready for this Advent.
Amen.
