In Sunday school this morning, I made an offhand comment that these pictures would be like a baby riding a Tyrannosaurus Rex. That picture makes me smile. So let me humbly and simply continue in that vein.

The mongoose shall hang out with the cobra, cats and dogs shall live together, the angry raccoon shall look out for the Baby Groot, the Koopa Troopa and the plumber shall race together, the Pawneean and Eagletonian shall unite, the cyborg shall cancel the robot uprising, the shark shall decide that fish are friends and not food, and a baby shall ride a T-Rex.

Isaiah 2:1-5 reads like hope. All nations gather to walk in God's ways of love and justice. Weapons are turned into tools for farming and cultivating the earth. War is no longer taught. The image is beautiful. This is what Advent is about: looking forward to when God will make all things right.

Rewind just a few verses and one sees that Isaiah's vision is born in a time where the opposite is true. The prophet (problematically) calls the city a whore. He states that, once a home of justice and righteousness, it is now a community filled murderers. Everyone is looking to make that extra buck. The orphans are abandoned. The widows are ignored. Everything is broken.

"God is on the throne." I heard that refrain repeatedly in the lead up to and aftermath of the Election. Don't worry, God is on the throne. But there is a disturbing distance to that image, isn't there? Perhaps that's just me.

When things fall apart, the God on the throne seems like the God faraway. When children die, when war breaks out, when hatred devours, God is on the throne? The image of this pristine, heavenly king doesn't seem to connect with a world that needs so much help. I want God to get God's anthropomorphic hands dirty.

I looked at the passages for a good half hour, trying to get some neuron in my brain to fire. Nothing. I'm tired. I left for church at 8:30 this morning and got back at 7:30 this evening. It was a good day. A ton of people got together to unload an 18-wheeler full of pumpkins for our youth missions fundraiser. It was exhausting, but fun and meaningful. Meaningful in seeing all sorts of people gather in community for a common purpose.

But I'm tired. And, if I'm going to be honest, I'm lonely. I miss my family and the whiplash of so much change has gotten to me the last couple of days. People are nice and I'll see EA and the boys this coming weekend, but there are times I feel like a ghost fading in and out of existence. Coming here was the right decision. I do not doubt that for a minute. It is just a little more difficult than I anticipated.

So tonight I will rest.

"Why do you guys let me hang around? I'm not one of you."

"When you're outcasts like us, don't matter where you come from."

I remembered that conversation as we sprinted through the streets. Ten of us, lepers all. There was no community for us except each other. I don't remember how I ended up with them, but I was always acutely aware that I was the outsider. I saw the disgust when we came into town and then disgust heaped upon disgust when people saw me. I was worried the others would turn on the Samaritan. Abandon me. Those words assured me: None of that matters when you're already an outcast.

Five years ago, I preached for the first time as an adult in a seminary class. That sermon began with a story set in Nashville. Tomorrow morning I'll preach a sermon at our new church just a few miles away from where that story took place. The symmetry is kind of beautiful even as I worry about what I will say tomorrow (which is ironic because the sermon is on not worrying).

I remember the squeaking of the plastic folding chairs. The puddles of light cast from high above the backstage area where we sat. I don't remember his name, but I remember his voice: trying to remain composed but on the verge of breaking down. Like a dam was about to burst and all the pain was going to flood out of him.

In my mind, Luke 15 has always started with verse 11. The beautiful final chapter of Jesus' "Lost" trilogy challenges even as it paints a vivid picture of God's grace. A lost sheep and a lost coin? Neither can hold a candle to a parent abandoning all dignity as they sprint to welcome a wayward child. I've never given the sheep and coin their due.

Psalm 139 has always been a source of great comfort for me. I have written a few times before (maybe many times) about feeling out of place through during various seasons of life. To read that God knit me in my mother's womb, to affirm that I'm fearfully and wonderfully made presses a healing hand to the wounds that life inflicts on occasion.