Most sinful cities in America revealed that...got you listening? And it got me clicking when I saw that headline on a news website this week, as a piece of click bait. It's perfect. If you see this link, you have to click on it, don't you? However pure you consider yourself and however much above such grubby trivia you think you are, your curiosity is going to overpower your good taste.
Well, mine did. So I clicked because I had to know what was number one, and more importantly, whether I've ever lived there before. I name names. Let me tell you how the verdicts were reached. Someone at the website Wallet Hub plowed their way through tons of data, including some pretty reliable sources like federal agencies and reputable non-profits, as well as outfits like Google Ads and Tinder.
So you know this is accurate. The compiler of this groundbreaking piece of social science then classified the data into seven areas of sin--anger and hatred, jealousy, excess greed, lust, vanity, and laziness. I apologize if your personal favorite sin isn't listed there. So something about 37 metrics under 100 point scale and weighted averages, blah, blah, blah.
Later we get wallet hub vice indexes ranked 182, and the number one sinful city in the United States is Las Vegas, which we all knew anyway, even without any research. The other 181 though really interested me. If you're wondering where Alabama cities fall in the list, well there are none in the top 20, so that's nice.
Take Montgomery. In fact, the highest ranked Alabama city is not our fair capital. It seems that John Prine angel from Montgomery is doing a fine job, so I hope you feel as righteous as I did when I clicked on that bait. Of course, there are several major problems with this research. The biggest is that the researcher is not God and who is he to judge.
He can't see into people's hearts. He can't discern their attitudes and their motives. He doesn't have a perfect knowledge of God's heart and mind. In fact, just the name of the website he works for Wallet Hub, makes me suspect that his employers don't fare very well on at least three of his seven categories of wickedness, greed, excess, and vanity.
I reckon that Jesus was right when he taught that each person should focus on their own sin before they get worked up about other people's. And Isaiah in today's Old Testament lesson was onto something when he prophesied the Messiah shall not judge by what his eyes see or decide by what his ears hear, but with righteousness, he shall judge the poor and decide with equity for the meek of the earth.
We are in week two of Advent and our walk with Isaiah through some of the most beautiful and inspiring prophecies about the coming of God's kingdom. So how is that for a gorgeous promise? When the kingdom comes, when Christ appears, when creation is reborn and resurrected, when the home of God is with humans, and when crying and suffering will be no more hypocritical, displays of holiness will be exposed for what they are worthless.
And the pure hearted and the humble minded will be seen for the heroes that they are. I can't tell you how amazing Isaiah chapter 11 is, and I don't think I need to because as Rich was reading it just now, I know your heart warmed at these amazing promises. The wolf shall live with the lamb. The leopard shall lie down with the kid, the calf, and the lion, and the faling together, and a little child shall lead them.
The cow and the bear shall graze. They young shall lie down together, and the lion shall eat straw like the ox. The nursing child will play over the whole of the ask, and the weaned child shall put its hand in the lion's den. They will not hurt or destroy on all my holy mountain for the earth will be full of the knowledge of the Lord.
As the waters cover, the sea, creation red in tooth and claw will be transformed. It'll be like enjoying those David Attenborough documentaries without having to fast forward through the gory bits. Yes, this is poetry. It's picture language. It's not totally literal, but think about the radical monumental truth behind the imagery.
Creation will be transformed. For a lion to eat straw like an ox, the entire physiology of cats must change. Their jaws must change, their teeth must change, their stomachs. Their gut must change. For a wolf to muzzle up to a lamb wagging its tail and cozy up as it goes to sleep, doesn't just require a change in physiology, but of mind of nature.
The wolf will lie with the lamb, and yes, the lamb will get a good night's sleep.
Which means not just the wolf's nature changes, but the lambs also. There is no fear on God's holy mountain. Isaiah implies because there is nothing to be afraid of. Wolf and Lamb are both changed. The only downside to this, for those of us who are not vegans, is that we will have to tolerate people who are vegans telling us for eternity that they were right all along.
I'm looking at you, Tim Johnston. Tim is my vegan son in London and he's watching.
As I was researching for this sermon on Thursday, I learned about the painter Edward Hicks. He was born in Pennsylvania in 1780. His parents were Anglicans and were also loyalists in the Revolutionary War, but I know you will forgive them as easily as I do. But early in his life, Hicks moved from the Episcopal Church to the Quakers, the Society of Friends and looking at his art, it's easy to see why he made that switch in church Membership inspired by Isaiah's vision of the wolf lying with the lamb and the lion eating straw.
Like the Ox, Hicks painted this Bible passage 62 times. That's 62 variations on the same vision. And just to make sure we all got the point, he named every version the same title. All the peaceable kingdom, all of Isaiah's animals are there and there's always a small child playing near a snake's nest and another child leading them all in precession.
But art historians have noticed something else about these 62 paintings. As Hicks ages, his carnivals become scarier. The lion becomes more fierce, the bear more ferocious, the wolf more threatening. The peaceable kingdom looks less peaceable as time goes by. The earlier paintings even depict some Quakers having friendly chats with indigenous people in the background.
The later ones down play that picture of human harmony. It's as if the young, idealistic artist with dreams of peace and unity grows cynical as he learns how humanly impossible it is to achieve the peaceable kingdom Isaiah prophesies.
It is Advent 2025, and if you haven't felt a pang of Hicks's doubt, then there may be something wrong with you. Cynicism is one of the defining qualities of this moment. We've seen it all before and we know nothing good will come of it. We've tried everything and we know it won't work. The people and institutions we used to trust are all corrupt and motivated by pure self preservation, so why bother with them?
Many of us have learned to become cynical in our relationships with other people. Face it. If you have ever looked to someone for love, protection, loyalty, respect, dignity, friendship, and being let down, rejected or betrayed, cynicism can become your companion. The problem with that companion though is that it promises to protect you, so you won't be hurt again.
But it lies. It promises to keep you safe, but it just makes you bitter. Joyless, friendless, even Godless. Yes. Let's add cynicism to Wallet Hub's seven deadly sins.
Advent is the burst of light that scatters the darkness of cynicism. There is a divine plan. There is a grand future hatched in God's imagination and set on an unstoppable destiny. There is an end to human suffering and an end to creations suffering. It's not long to go. Now, it's getting late. That Advent Bird is singing.
Can you hear it above the cynical apathy. The night is nearly over. The day is almost here. Hold on, keep going. Don't lose faith. Don't give in to cynicism. The wolf will lie with the lamb. The lion will eat straw like the ox. A toddler will play with the diamond back. And a child the lowest of the low, the most powerless of the powerless will lead us home up the mountain of God
And this beautiful vision of Isaiah, this grand message of Advent forces us to act, doesn't it? We feel the urge to make it real and make it known. Live it out right now, even while we are waiting for it. We can't just do nothing and wait for God to call time on this mad, sad, bad, old order of creation.
Instead of washing our hands of the world's problems and comforting ourselves that the kingdom of God is coming. So there's nothing we need to do except wait. We hear the advent bird and we wake up and we get involved in God's world, we act as if the kingdom were already here because it is just not fully.
Predators will befriend prey, but we don't just wait for God to change the predatory instincts of creation. We go on safari into our own hearts and we spot the predators that lurk there, and we don't wait for the return of Christ to confront those inner predators. We start today, we challenge our inner lion.
That force that overpowers and overwhelms that is full of bluster and aggression, the lion doesn't need to sneak up on its prey. It stays out in the open and kills through sheer power, and we challenge our inner wolf. That predator, of course, is too light to overpower its prey, but kills by slimness and stealth, by planning and strategy, by manipulation.
And we confront our inner viper with its forked lying tongue, and its toxic verbal bite. Its whip sharp instincts and its venomous words. And we follow the child. The baby born in Bethlehem, who grew up to be filled with God's spirit of wisdom and understanding of counsel and might of knowledge and the fear of the Lord.
And we walk in freedom and safety behind this young child, along with all creation as it roars and squawks and barks, and meows, and moves its way up to the heavenly city. Amen.