Dai­ly Reflec­tion
Decem­ber 7, 2014

The road imagery in the first read­ing res­onat­ed with me as I just came off two 20-hour bus rides from Oma­ha to Wash­ing­ton, D.C. and back. The trip took a group of  near­ly 60 Creighton stu­dents, fac­ul­ty and staff to the Igna­t­ian Fam­i­ly Teach-In for Jus­tice, a social jus­tice con­fer­ence of peo­ple from Jesuit col­leges and high schools across Amer­i­ca and from Mex­i­co and Canada. 

The bus rolled through the plains of Iowa, past cities in north­ern Illi­nois and through beau­ti­ful hilly coun­try­side of Penn­syl­va­nia and Mary­land. We saw the val­leys, moun­tains, hills and rugged land Isa­iah describes. I can pic­ture it as I smile at the joy­ful way Isa­iah spreads the mes­sage of good news, of glad tid­ings and the men­tal pic­ture of the road becom­ing straight to wel­come the Lord.

Now is the time to pre­pare for the arrival of Jesus, though we don’t have to wait for Advent. How can I straight­en the paths in my own life, the roads that take me to places of self­ish­ness and self-absorp­tion?  I want to, as Isa­iah says, “Make straight in the waste­land a high­way for our God.” How can I make my way to the top of the moun­tain and have my voice and my actions declare the glad tid­ings of God?

I am glad for peo­ple like John the Bap­tist who remind us when it’s time to get to work. While the Lord may make straight the paths, we have heavy lift­ing to do to make sure we are ready to follow.

Our long bus trip to Wash­ing­ton was just a reminder that jour­neys along wind­ing roads can help us pre­pare for what’s ahead. Though long, the jour­ney there and back allowed us to focus on what we could do in our own ways to make the world a bet­ter place for all of God’s people.