“The wilderness and the parched land shall be glad; and the desert shall rejoice, and blossom as the rose. It shall blossom abundantly, and rejoice, even with joy and singing; the glory of Lebanon shall be given unto it, the excellency of Carmel and Sharon; they shall see the glory of the Lord, the excellency of our God.” (Isaiah 35:1-2)
We associate devastation and desolation to qualities of the wilderness and the desert. The Prophet refers to these as part of the same reality. In our consciousness these represent not only a situation of deprivation and abandonment, but the outcome of a negative state or condition. This is about our exile from the Promised Land, our separation from God's ways where we find ourselves in a desert in which we are deprived from our freedom.
In this predicament we are compelled to return to our Essence and true identity -- as our common bond with God -- that He bestows as our own Redemption. In this context we understand what our mystic Chassidic Sages mean when they say that exile is the premise for Redemption. Likewise, darkness is the precondition to recognize the Light, and evil the reference to choose goodness.
We turn lack into the field that is destined to be filled with the abundance we have denied ourselves during the exile from the goodness of Love's ways and attributes. Hence the wilderness shall be glad and the desert shall rejoice before the endless abundance in goodness. The latter comes with the complete awareness of our permanent connection with God, which is the glory of the Lebanon (one of the names of the Temple of Jerusalem). In this awareness we realize the traits and qualities of goodness, represented by the greenery and fertile qualities the Carmel and the Sharon regions as metaphors of God's glory and excellence.
“Strengthen ye the weak hands, and make firm the tottering knees. Say to them that are of a fearful heart: 'Be strong, fear not'; behold, your God comes with vindication, with the recompense of God He comes and redeems you.” (35:3-4)
We must come to the awareness that all comes from God:
“Yours, O Lord, is the greatness, and the power, and the glory, and the victory, and the majesty; for all that is in the heaven and in the earth is Yours. Yours is the kingdom, O Lord, and You are exalted as head above all. Both riches and honor come of You, and You rule over all. And in Your hand is the power and might, and in Your hand it is to make great, and to give strength unto all.” (I Chronicles 29:11-12)
Hence our strength and determination come from God. In this sense fear is an illusion we create to deny ourselves our Essence and true identity. Fear is usually the outcome of ego's fantasies and illusions when we get caught in the emptiness and desolation of envy, greed, lust, coveting, arrogance and indifference. Fear becomes the final judgment, the sentence we impose on our consciousness after we lose the most precious possession of all, which is the full awareness of our permanent connection with God.
All fears that appear in the separation from our Creator we see reflected in our separation from the goodness of Love's ways and attributes. The farther we are from Love, the closer we are to fear. Thus we realize that one of the opposites of Love is fear.
Fear is our prison, and Love is our freedom. Our true freedom is living in the land of goodness that is our Promised Land. God promises to brings us back to our land, and asks us to take the first steps in that direction by overcoming our fears and regain our strength. By choosing goodness and positive thoughts, emotions and feelings every moment, we also invite the goodness of God's Love to redeem us from the desert and desolation of ego's fantasies and illusions.
“Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf shall be unstopped. Then shall the lame man leap as a hart, and the tongue of the dumb shall sing; for in the wilderness shall waters break out, and streams in the desert.” (Isaiah 35:5-6)
God will open our consciousness to full extent, so we will see clearly without the darkness of evil and negative traits and trends. We will see what we hear, and hear what we see. In this awareness we move forward towards the knowledge of God in fast and long leaps. All the expressions of our consciousness will rejoice as we utter God's Love in what we are, have and do. This awareness becomes the breaking waters and streams that remove forever the negative aspects in consciousness, turning it from a desert into an abundantly blossoming field where Love's ways and attributes are the seeds and the harvest.
“And a highway has been there, and a way, and the 'way of holiness' is called. Not pass over it does the unclean, and He [God] Himself is by them, Who so is going in the way, even fools don't err. No lion shall be there, nor shall any ravenous beast go up thereon, they shall not be found there; but the redeemed shall walk there.” (35:8-9)
The Prophet is telling us that the way is God's way as a broad road where only holiness leads the journey. In the cleanliness of our goodness along with God's goodness there is no room for the unclean, for God Himself is by us all the way. Even the most innocent or naive won't err, for there are no mistakes in Love's ways and attributes as the material manifestation of God's Love. These are the qualities of the Final Redemption and the Messianic Era, where nothing negative exists.
“And the ransomed of the Lord shall return, and come with singing unto Zion, and everlasting joy shall be upon their heads. They shall obtain gladness and joy, and sorrow and sighing shall flee away.” (35:10)
We become the ransomed of God when we make the choice to return to His ways and attributes as the goodness we want to make prevail in all dimensions of consciousness, and make them rule over all aspects of life. We all rejoice as we begin to manifest Zion as our permanent connection with God, for this bond is the everlasting joy in our heads. In this complete awareness there are no sorrow or sighting, for God's Love is fully reveled.
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