The Peaceable Kingdom (Day 20: Roots & Shoots)

• The Ornament: The Wolf and the Lamb / The Stump
• The Scripture: Isaiah 11:1–9

Timeline Check: The Shadow of the Wolf

Where we are: We have moved south to Jerusalem (The Kingdom of Judah).

The Context: The Northern Kingdom (where Amos preached) has been crushed. The superpower of the day, Assyria, has swept through the region like a pack of wolves.

The Vibe: Terror. The people of Jerusalem are looking over the city walls, knowing they are next. They are wondering if God has abandoned the line of David.

The Surface Reading

This is the classic Advent scripture. We hear it in Handel’s Messiah. We see it on Christmas cards: a wolf lying down with a lamb, a leopard with a goat, and a little child leading them.

On the surface, we read this as a poetic description of Heaven. We treat it as a lovely, impossible dream of a future paradise.

A Closer Look

Guide: Pete Enns (The Bible for Normal People, Ep. 178)

To understand the punch of this poem, you have to know who holds the axe.

This text comes from the era of the Assyrian Crisis. Assyria was the “Wolf” of the ancient world—a military machine famous for its brutality.

When Isaiah writes, “A shoot shall come out from the stump of Jesse,” he isn’t being abstract. His audience had watched Assyria cut down nation after nation, leaving nothing but smoking stumps behind. They were terrified that the “Tree of David” was next.

But Isaiah refuses to despair. He sees a green shoot growing out of the ruin. He envisions a new king who doesn’t rule by military might (like the Assyrians) or by “what his eyes see” (empire logic), but by righteousness.

The peaceable kingdom isn’t a picture of the afterlife; it is a counter-narrative to the Assyrian way of life. It is a vision of the world returning to the “Very Good” state of Genesis 1.

The Lens of Shalom

Guide: Lisa Sharon Harper

Lisa Sharon Harper points out that Shalom isn’t just the absence of conflict; it is the absence of predation.

In our fallen world, the operating system is “Eat or be eaten.” The strong devour the weak. The Assyrians eat the Israelites. The rich exploit the poor.

But in Isaiah’s vision, the very nature of relationship is healed.

• The wolf (the empire) shall live with the lamb (the victim).
• They will not hurt or destroy on all my holy mountain.

The vision of the Jesse Tree is a world where security doesn’t come from killing your enemies; it comes from converting them into neighbors. It is the end of the “predatory economy” and the beginning of the “kinship economy.”

The Question

We live in a “dog-eat-dog” world. We are taught that to get ahead, we have to be the wolf—aggressive, dominant, and protective of our turf.

Where are you operating out of a “predatory” mindset—at work, in politics, or in your finances?

What would it look like to practice the way of the Lamb today, trusting that God’s mountain is big enough for everyone?