Life To the Fullest

_God's Spirit at work in prophecy against the norm and in hope of things to come. _

Isaiah’s poetry does not flinch. It stands in the rubble of kings and dares to speak of hope. His words are forged in a time of collapse, of failed thrones, foreign armies, and the fading memory of justice. And yet, without hesitation or apology, Isaiah imagines something beautiful breaking forth: not a revival of what once was, but new life from a barren stump. “A shoot will come up from the stump of Jesse; from his roots a Branch will bear fruit.”1

Isaiah is not one for theatre. He does not speak in monologues draped in metaphor, nor does he charm the throne with clever turns of phrase. His words are forged from a divine burden, not human ambition. He speaks from the edge, not the center. And that matters, because in Isaiah’s time, prophecy was not a prolific career path. It was risky business. If you found favor with the king, you might dine at the royal table, but if your message threatened the regime, if your vision broke too far from the prevailing narrative, you found yourself in a cistern, or worse.

The life of a prophet was feast or ruin. Jeremiah, for telling the truth, was thrown into a muddy pit and left to sink into silence.2 Micaiah was imprisoned by King Ahab and given nothing but bread and water for refusing to prophesy a favorable outcome.3 Elijah fled into the desert, exhausted from running for his life. He asked the Lord to end his life.4 These weren’t abstract threats; they were the predictable consequences of saying what no one wanted to hear.

Walter Brueggemann reminds us that the prophet’s task is not merely to predict, but to disrupt.

“The task of prophetic ministry is to nurture, nourish, and evoke a consciousness and perception alternative to the consciousness and perception of the dominant culture.”5

And that’s never safe. You can see why kings come to prefer the seers and sages in their courts, those who, knowing the cost of true prophecy, trade in vague warnings, soft enchantments, and flattery. Better to cast a spell than to speak the truth, if it means keeping you ahead… or a head.

So Isaiah’s voice should not be mistaken for that of a mystic or a soothsayer. He is not offering an idealistic dream. He is planting a flag in the wind, showing the change that is coming through hardship and death, but not without hope.

From the chopped-down remnants of David’s line, something green, something alive, begins to push through. This shoot will become a branch, which will not merely restore David’s house but transcend it. “In that day the Root of Jesse will stand as a banner for the peoples; the nations will rally to him.”7 Isaiah’s vision is not just for the near-term; it extends both time and geographic reach. The Spirit of the Lord rests upon this figure, saturating him with wisdom and understanding, counsel and might. He wears righteousness like a belt, to hold the sword of truth, and faithfulness binds up his cloak, readying him for the quickness of war. 8

The tone here is both fierce and tender, like a mother bear who protects her cubs and a gardener who refuses to give up on barren ground. Where the Spirit moves, righteousness is not only restored, it is reimagined. The world, as Isaiah dares to see it, is being drawn back toward Eden, both by might (there will be disruption) and by the slow, rooted work of the Spirit through the one who comes.

We imagine a garden is made plentiful by the disruption of the soil, the sweat of the brow, the breaking of the back, and the calluses of the hand. We imagine a mother bear, nurturing her cubs and yet defending them from any threat with power and ferocious might. This is the image of Isaiah, the vision is both tender and hopeful, while also containing the raw truth of the world, that where there is destruction and death, there is also a path made way for hope.

Brueggemann again, in A Prophetic Imagination, “The prophet does not ask if the vision can be implemented, for questions of implementation are of no consequence until the vision can be imagined. The imagination must come before the implementation.”9

An Active Participant

As seen in Isaiah and repeated throughout the Old Testament and New Testament, the Spirit of God is an active participant in the history of the world, not only as a creator but also as an instigator, a revealer, and a helper. In sending his only son, God allowed the veil to tear, thus giving us (the undignified, the impure, and the profane) access to the sacred. The holy of holies is no longer a place of exclusivity but an invitation to be accepted, adorning its participants with a posture of righteousness and a breath of hope in the hearts of men. In Christ's death, we are given access to the Spirit of God, who can, only in the death of our ego, begin the work of redemption in the lives of those around us.

And what can cause the death of our ego but the grief of loss? Loss of our livelihood, our shelter, our friends, or loved ones. Personal loss of physical faculty, mental fortitude, or confidence in thought. It is our ego that protects us, projects us, and can also propel us forward in a world of ambiguity, but it can also put us on a pedestal, creating a false premise of perfection, which can be quickly brought low by the pressures of performance.

And yet, this loss and collapse of confidence, capacity, or control is not the end of the story. If anything, it is the only place from which hope can grow.

As Walter Brueggemann writes, “Naturally kings think the door of anguish must not be opened, for it dismantles fraudulent kings. Kings know intuitively that the deception, the phony claims of prosperity, oppression, and state religion, will collapse when the air of covenant hits them. The riddle and insight of biblical faith is the awareness that only anguish leads to life, only grieving leads to joy, and only embraced endings permit new beginnings... Jesus had an understanding of Jeremiah. Ecclesiastes said only that there is a time to weep and a time to laugh; but Jesus sees that only those who mourn will be comforted. Only those who embrace the reality of death will receive the new life.”10

Only grief permits newness… The prophetic task is to penetrate despair so that hope can surface. The ego must die before the Spirit can breathe, not because the Spirit demands our diminishment, but because grief clears the room of any illusions. It makes space for a different imagination, one not driven by the need to prove or perform, but by the willingness to trust and to believe.

Grief is not the absence of God. It is often the very evidence of the nearness of the Spirit, an active participant in the process of transformation. Many of the Old and New Testament prophets are royal born, rather they come from the wilderness, from outside the city gates; they are wanderers or warriors, who weep as they bare witness to the devastation of false prophets and pompous leaders.

Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Ezekiel were not spared the ache of exile, of separation, of loneliness and pain; and yet they are the ones entrusted with visions of renewal.

Perhaps because only those who know loss can speak honestly of hope. Loss leaves room for the Spirit to become an active part in the story of renewal in your life.

The Broken, Made Right

Again and again, we see that the Spirit of God, ushers in righteousness not by the piety of His people but by their brokenness. With this perspective, the Church, that is the Bride of Christ, participates with the Spirit when it fastens on the belt of righteousness, not to hold up our pants, but to carry the sword of truth.

Maybe a dive into the metaphor of the Sword of truth, might be a helpful exercise.

Some, wrongly assume, the Sword of Truth is a weapon, meant to strike down the lost, drenching our cloak with the blood of the those who have not accepted Jesus as their Lord. They misapply the poetic call of Revelation, as a literal projection of Jesus as a warrior God, striking down the afflicted.

With deeper study, we can actually connect some of these literary devices towards a more aligned telling, one that portrays Jesus as the Lamb of God, and not just the Lion of Judah.

The Rider on a White Horse

Then I saw heaven opened, and behold, a white horse! The one sitting on it is called Faithful and True, and in righteousness he judges and makes war. His eyes are like a flame of fire, and on his head are many diadems, and he has a name written that no one knows but himself. He is clothed in a robe dipped in blood, and the name by which he is called is The Word of God. And the armies of heaven, arrayed in fine linen, white and pure, were following him on white horses. From his mouth comes a sharp sword with which to strike down the nations, and he will rule them with a rod of iron. He will tread the winepress of the fury of the wrath of God the Almighty. On his robe and on his thigh he has a name written, King of kings and Lord of lords. <sup>11</sup>

This passage conveys that Christ’s return brings about the ultimate triumph of good over evil, not through conventional warfare but through the authoritative and transformative power of His word. His word is, "sharper than any two-edged sword," 12 and what then is his word? What did Jesus say that can penetrate your heart and bring about death, and a chance at a new beginning?

I can't help but think of the Sermon on the Mount, which is Jesus' seminal teaching, his most repeated words, blessed are...

The Beatitudes

And he opened his mouth and taught them, saying: “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted. Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth. Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied. Blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy. Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God. Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God. Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are you when others revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account."<sup>13</sup>

The most penetrating, the most dangerous, the sharpest word, is to tell the self-righteous, the ego-driven, the self-made: blessed are the poor, those who are grieving, the weak, the starving, the pure and the peacemakers, that theirs is the Kingdom of God.

And what is the Kingdom of God, not some utopian construct with gates of pearls, streets of gold, and personal mansions, but something else, something accessible to us, here and now.

The Kingdom of God is not a gate to enter, a treasure to accumulate, or a mansion to be built. The Kingdom of God is to be present. It is grace, unfolding; mercy, extended. It is justice that restores, and joy that surprises. It is here and now, in the Spirit-breathed moments when we live as if Christ is truly among us. To walk in the Kingdom is not to wait for heaven, but to let heaven break into our grief and our wounds. The Kingdom of God is made real around our kitchen tables, in our interactions within our neighborhoods, and among the crowds throughout our cities.

It is to be present with Him—by His Spirit—creating Kingdom with every act of love, every surrender of ego, every turning toward the least and marginalized. It is not something we build, rather it is something we join; and in the ruins and rubble of the destruction, the Kingdom moves, and hope prevails.

An Active Participation

In conclusion, I've made an argument that joining the movement of the Spirit is an active endeavor; we are walking with the Spirit, walking with Jesus on the road to Nazereth, it is not a passive acceptance or static belief. I desire an orthodoxy (right belief) that creates an orthopraxy (right practice), a movement towards hope. In which we allow our bodies to be the acting agent in the cleansing of this world. Not out of our strength but out of our weakness. Bloesch is right when he says:

Theology at its best will be integrally related to practice. “Knowledge of God,” Barth pointed out, “is not an escape into the safe heights of pure ideas, but an entry point into the need of the present world, sharing in its suffering, its activity and its hope.”14

The generous orthopraxy of a Spirit-filled believer is more likely like a holistic hospital than a spotless church-house.

In The Walking Dead, there is a scene where Rick enters a church filled with Zombies, silent and staring at the crucifix, Jesus crucified on the cross. The metaphor couldn't be more perfect: lifeless attendance without genuine engagement.15

Whereas a Hospital is active. The ER handles the most traumatic, the upper floors operate on the acutely affected, and the rest of us work towards holistic health, of body, of mind, and of heart.

As its operators, we might, in a day, triage an emergency, sit at the bedside of a recovering patient, sing hymns in the room of someone transcending, speak in a circle of equals re-hashing our failures, eating alongside those who are hungry, and always helping, coaching, moving with those chasing the hope of life to the full, in body, mind, and spirit.16

Endnotes

  1. Isaiah 11
  2. Jeremiah 38:6
  3. 1 Kings 22:26–27
  4. 1 Kings 19:1–4
  5. Walter Brueggemann, The Prophetic Imagination, 2nd ed. Fortress Press, 2001, p. 3
  6. Isaiah 11:1
  7. Isaiah 11:10
  8. Isaiah 11:2-5: To gird one's loins is to tie up your cloak, to give you maximum versatility in combat, or to allow you to run without encumberance, to keep you from tripping over the tails of your cloak.
  9. Walter Brueggemann, The Prophetic Imagination, 2nd ed. (Fortress Press, 2001), p. 40.
  10. Walter Brueggemann, Hopeful Imagination: Prophetic Voices in Exile (Fortress Press, 1986), p. 12.

  11. Revelation 19:11-16

  12. Hebrews 4:12; also see Isaiah 11:4, and Psalm 2:9

  13. Matthew 5: 2-11

  14. Donald G. Bloesch, A Theology of Word and Spirit (InterVarsity Press, 1992), p. 125.

  15. The Walking Dead. Season 2, Episode 1. https://youtu.be/9JlIm5Loaeo?si=_jdFf6ZHWxiLtr4H&t=16

  16. Greek: zōē aiōnios, which is translated, "life to the end of the age," not eternal life, or life after you die, but a full life here, now, rooted in Jesus, sustained by the Spirit, and shaped by the Kingdom.