The Mountain of The Lord's House
Isaiah 2:1-5 for December 1, 2013

In days to come
the mountain of the LORD's house
shall be established as the highest of the mountains,
and shall be raised above the hills; all the nations shall stream to it.

NRSV  The Hebrew Testament Reading for December 1, 2013

15" x 20" pastel on cotton paper, matted and available to frame as a 22"x 28" outer dimensions

"I have always loved Thomas Cole's image of heaven as he painted it in The Voyage of Life; Youth, and images of The Mount of The Holy Cross either as photographs or as in Thomas Moran's paintings.  Here I have combined them in one!"--JHA

The central idea I'd like to present is that this isolated wilderness image with the looming heavenly structure isn't teeming with people streaming! In fact, not enough are now or ever have been streaming toward God! Oh there are plenty streaming toward heaven, or toward the Disney/OZ-like idea of heaven, but that is probably not what the prophet Isaiah had in mind!

I'm not giving those folk who worship nature an easy out either. We are not to live as a Jeremiah Johnston hermit-type, nor as the consumate consumer, but somehow in this early 21st century we've got to learn to be more Christlike. So we begin Advent recogning the journey to stream like salmon to the living waters and we find our headwaters of the stream in the begining of the story with the birth of Jesus coming, which is a restart and a reset for humanity, --a chance for us once again to maybe get it straightened out and figure out what this whole thing is about.

Pastor Jack