Dead Ends

The following video transcript has been lightly edited

     Yesterday I found myself doing a small plumbing project. Our bathroom sink had gotten clogged, and you know, that happens. There's a lot of women in the house with long hair, and that's how those things go. And so it just needed to be taken apart and cleaned up. Not a big deal. So for me, I get it all done.

I get it all put back together, and of course you have to test it to make sure that it's not leaking and I turn the water on. And unfortunately it's leaking, and I'm like, ah, I can't figure this out. I'm like, oh, it must just be, I need to tighten things up. And so I'm in there trying to tighten these plastic fittings.

Now you can imagine me under a sink is sort of like Chris Farley in a coat. It doesn't go well. That's just not quite enough room. And I'm doing it and I, you know, re-tighten everything. I turn the water on and it's leaking again. I'm like, what the heck? And it was coming in this one spot. And I looked at it and I thought, well, the seal must be dead, but it doesn't make any sense.

And so I am about to go to the store and I'm thinking to myself, there's maybe there's something else. 'cause I felt like there was a dead end. I had done all the things and it just kept leaking. Well, I got a light and it turned out that I had forgotten to put the drain stopper rod back into the pipe.

And so it was actually leaking outta the top and then looking like it was leaking at the bottom, but it was actually leaking at the top. And once I was realized that I was able to fix it, you know, I tell you that story because for all of us in our lives, we run into these dead ends or these apparent dead ends where it doesn't look like we can move forward at all.

And I think for us in those situations, in order to find a way forward, we need three things and three things that I think our faith helps us with. The first is that we need to remember what God has done. Two, we wanna look for a new way. And three, we want to trust in God's goodness. And this is the outline of what the prophet Isaiah is saying to Israel because they find themselves at a dead end as well. They are in captivity in Babylon because the Babylonian Empire, Nebuchadnezzar took over Israel and then deported all of them into Babylon. And so they're stuck. They've reached a dead end. It doesn't look like there's any way forward.

You and I hit dead ends in our life all the time. Maybe it's a loss of a job. Perhaps it's a relationship that you just feel like is stuck or broken. Maybe it's a health or financial setback of some sort, and you just feel stuck and you're like, okay, I don't know where to go from here. And when that happens, we want to do these three things that we're gonna talk about today.

So the first thing that Isaiah does is the prophet tells them to remember how God freed them from Egypt, the water spart, and they defeated Pharaoh in his mighty army. You know, for us, a lot of times when we can't see a way forward, we begin to think that our life and the world is closed. That there's no new way, there's no further potential.

And one of the things that our faith can help us do is see that, and we can see it in two ways. One, we can look into history. So when we think about celebrating Easter here soon, it's about celebrating the resurrection. Celebrating this reality that God made a way when there appeared to be no way. And so for us, we wanna remind ourselves that that happened in history, and so we can anchor ourselves to that.

Second, we wanna remember how new ways have arrived in the midst of our personal stories. Because for all of us, we've run into these dead ends and we've felt like there's no way forward. But we've had these experiences of grace and mercy. And new beginnings that help us take that next step to help us see that there is a way, even though we thought there might not be.

The second thing that Prophet Isaiah does is he actually tells them to not look too much or remember too strictly the ways of the past that there's something new that's going on. And he says, can you perceive it? You know, I think in our lives a lot of times we get boxed in by our own expectations or the way things have gone before.

Perhaps you've been at work and somebody says to you, well, but we've always done it this way. And you say, well, how about this new way? Well, no, no, no. We've always done it this way. And as human beings, we get stuck in that place. We've always done it this way, and so we have to do it that way again. And whether it's an expectation or a perception or a rhythm or a habit or a reality or a process at work, when we're stuck in that mindset of, we've always done it this way, it's gonna block our vision of being able to see a new way.

In Christ's life, death and resurrection, God offers up a new way. In the history of the Scriptures, Israel was to be a people for the whole world, and in their failure of that God comes in, the person of Christ fulfills all the promises to Israel and opens up a new way through his life, death and resurrection for all of humanity. But Israel is having a hard time perceiving that new way.

And you and I can have a hard time perceiving a new way too, because we're locked in to a hope, a dream, an expectation. We've always done it this way or it, it should be this way. And so when we find ourselves at these dead ends. Rather than holding onto, well, it should be this way, or it's always been this way. We wanna open ourselves up. And what we want to do is we wanna look for something new. We wanna look for the new way that God might be offering us a path, a way where there doesn't seem to be a way.

Okay, so we run into a dead end. We feel like there's nowhere to go. We wanna remember what God has done in history and in our personal story, and we wanna not allow ourselves to be boxed in with our vision. We wanna look for something new.

And finally, number three, we want to trust in God's character. So what the scriptures say is that God brings water in the desert, that God brings water in the wilderness. Now, I think as Americans, we don't have a full sense of this metaphor because you and I have water everywhere we go.

The question for us is, do we wanna buy bottled water or do we wanna drink water from the tap? But what we wanna remember is that God is the kind of God that brings new hope, new life in the midst of barrenness, in the midst of a place in which we don't think we can go any further. And so what does it mean for us to operate with that kind of character?

Well, it means that we want to persevere in love because that's who God is and that's who God calls us to be. And so what we want to do is in the midst of that dead end, we want to persevere in love. That's what it means for us to trust God. In the midst of a world that works based on power and prestige and wealth and scarcity, you and I are gonna refuse that, even if it looks foolish.

And the way we're gonna find that new way is by persevering in love. And I think this is the great part of what prayer is about. I think prayer tunes us into the way of love to the way of God. To peace and patience and kindness and gentleness and self-control, and enduring all things and bearing all things and hoping all things. Prayer for us will tune us into that, and as we're tuned into that, we'll see that new way.

What I also like about this part of Isaiah as we're reminded that God brings water in the desert and in the wilderness. It's this reminder that part of this life is indeed walking through wilderness and deserts. All of us will travel through it, and so in that sense, it's not a surprise. We don't have to recoil from it, but it's a part of life and God arrives in the midst of that. Bringing a new way even when we can't see that way.

So if you find yourself in this place in which you are in the wilderness or the desert, you've reached a dead end. You're not sure where to go do these three things. Remember that God makes a way when there is no way. Look for that new thing that God might be doing and trust in the character of God, that God is a God who brings restoration.

And water in the midst of the desert and the wilderness. And as you pray, tuning yourself to love, you'll find that new way forward. Hey, hope you have a great week, and look forward to celebrating Palm Sunday with you next Sunday. Take care.