Making it straight

If you’ve listened to Handel’s The Messiah a few times, you can almost hear in your memory the tenor’s solo from Isaiah 40:3: “Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make straight in the desert a highway for our God.” As the orchestra comes in, the tenor continues with verse 4: “Every valley shall be exalted and every mountain and hill shall be made low: the crooked straight, and rough places plain.”

I’ve long associated these words with the return of our Heavenly King, the Lord Jesus. To the Jewish exiles in Babylon, however, this prophecy stoked their fervent hope to return to Jerusalem, with God leading them back in victory.

But there’s more behind those words. In his Tyndale commentary on Isaiah, J. Alec Motyer pointed out that the exiles may have been aware of a pagan Babylonian hymn that said, “Make [Nabu’s] way good, renew his road. Make straight his path.” This referred to how special processional routes were created for carrying idols during festivals.

These had to be the very best and kept work crews busy for some time. “Exalting” the valleys and “making low” the hills and mountains probably meant a lot of earth moving long before big diesel machines. Straightening crooked places and smoothing rough places again were huge efforts done mostly by manpower.

I think about how much human sweat went into those ceremonial roads whenever we encounter road construction or even go by a train crossing. Especially in railroad construction, there’s little margin for error. The tracks need a strong gravel bed, evenly spaced tracks, gentle curves and easy grades. If something is off, a whole train will derail.

But the message here is more than road construction. It’s about anticipating the glory of the return of Jesus Christ. Again, words from scripture used in Handel’s work: “And the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together; for the mouth of the Lord hath spoken it” (v.5).

I hadn’t realized, until reading William Coleman’s Today’s Handbook of Bible Times and Customs, that one group’s interpretation of the Isaiah passage resulted in one of the most amazing discoveries of the 20th century: the Dead Sea Scrolls in a remote cave at Qumran where the Essenes had once lived. This group had decided to retreat to the desert to escape worldly contamination, and hoped to prepare a society ready to welcome the Messiah, in fulfillment of Isaiah 40:3-5. The community existed about 200 years, from 200 B.C. through the time of Christ. Their plan didn’t work out, but their library stash, preserved in the desert, was an incredible boon to Bible scholars.

So much for history! But what does that passage mean for us today?

William MacDonald, a Bible teacher whose commentary has a strong devotional slant, says the preparation for our Messiah is not topographical, but moral and spiritual. He said the mountains and hills represent proud, arrogant people. The valleys are people “of low degree” (those suffering hopelessness and self-pity). All uneven and rough character must be smoothed out in preparing for the Messiah’s coming. This was the message of John the Baptist, who was connected with Isaiah’s prophecy as he called people to repent because the kingdom of God was near (Matt. 3:3). Indeed it was. Jesus soon stepped into the river before his baptizing cousin.

You may be quite aware of the rocks and holes in your life’s road that need repair. Maybe there’s hidden sin, pride, addiction, hypocrisy, laziness or greed. Continuing along those “roads” only keeps you from being ready to welcome the Messiah. Don’t forget: He is coming again.

So this Christmas, with fresh bomb rubble in the Holy Land, don’t forget Isaiah’s refrain of hope: “The glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together!” As someone who grew up hearing and playing classical music, I never weary of hearing The Messiah—for its Biblical text shouts glory and hope, no matter what time of year it’s presented.