by Richard Coble
Isaiah 11:1-10; Matthew 3:1-12
“Friends, believe in the already and not yet of God’s peace. Find it within yourselves, and your communities. Especially at your lowest. When you are ready to disengage, throw up your hands, turn off the news. When you’re tempted to bury yourself in the cynicism spreading all over this country today, remember the already and not yet of God’s peace. Because the spirit that Isaiah proclaimed is real and loose and working among and within us. Because we are not just spectators but actors in the peaceful vision of God.”