The Holy Gospel According to Matthew 3:1-12
In those days John the Baptist appeared in the
wilderness of Judea, proclaiming, "Repent, for the
kingdom of heaven has come near." This is the one
of whom the prophet Isaiah spoke when he said, "The
voice of one crying out in the wilderness: 'Prepare the
way of the Lord, make his paths straight,'" Now
John wore clothing of camel's hair with a leather belt
around his waist, and his food was locusts and wild
honey.
Then the people of Jerusalem and all Judea were going
to him, and all the region along the Jordan, and they
were baptized by him in the river Jordan, confessing
their sins.
But when he saw many Pharisees and Sadducees coming
for baptism, he said to them, "You brood of vipers!
Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come? Bear
fruit worthy of repentance. Do not presume to say to
yourselves, 'We have Abraham as our ancestor'; for I
tell you, God is able from these stones to raise up
children to Abraham.
Even now the ax is lying at the root of the trees;
every tree therefore that does not bear good fruit is
cut down and thrown into the fire. "I baptize you
with water for repentance, but one who is more powerful
than I is coming after me; I am not worthy to carry his
sandals. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and
fire. His winnowing fork is in his hand, and he will
clear his threshing floor and will gather his wheat into
the granary; but the chaff he will burn with
unquenchable fire."
The Gospel of the Lord
Visions
and Expectations in Advent
A voice cries out in the wilderness, "Prepare
the Way of the Lord! . . . Make his paths
straight!" Alleluia!
On this second Sunday of advent, we recognize that
we're on a similar type of journey as those pilgrims who
ventured out to see and hear John the Baptist in the
Judean Wilderness. We are as they were, Filled with
anticipation about what this wild desert prophet was
preaching about.
And today we also bear witness to the "new
thing" God is about to do and our anticipation is
converted to actions as we listen to John the Baptist
and we are moved to prepare ourselves and our world for
the coming of Christ.
We are at the beginning of a new year for the church.
We can feel our sense of joy rising as an additional
candle is lit on the Advent wreath each Sunday, and we
hear more about the coming of Emmanuel, the Christ,
the chosen one of God – come to be our Savior. Perhaps
you also sense that something is getting ready to happen
. . . but there is a subtle energy that is
building "out there". It goes
beyond us, we cannot really place where it comes from,
but we know that it is happening. It is the mystery of
the ages that is about to unfold in a way that none of
us could have imagined. "The Dawn from on high
shall break upon us" -- it is coming, the Dayspring
of God lies in wait, it is just beyond our sight.
And John is telling us to get ready for the culmination
of this Energy while the Church calendar simultaneously
reminds us that "It has come". Yet our
understanding of this wonderful event is to be renewed
during this season of Advent.
Another way to describe this Energy is in the
power of longing for something. Longing for
something different; longing for something new; or
longing for something better than what we have known.
"Behold, I am about to do a new thing, now it
springs forth. Do you perceive it?" (Isaiah 43:19)
The Advent season reminds us of that time when we
enter into an auditorium where a great orchestra is
about to perform. We can hear the sound of the musical
instruments and we can feel the tension of the
musicians as they anxiously prepare themselves for the
opening volley of the concert. Listening to the chaotic
notes played as different musicians rehearse various
measures of a piece, we catch small glimpses of the
great work soon to be played by all. Through the
movement of bows and the trill of silver instruments we
prepare our ears to listen for the glad sound of the
harmony to come.
This is like Advent, when we prepare ourselves
for the coming of Christ. There's a nervous
excitement in the air, and it keeps building
in a crescendo that will peak when we hear the good news
of the Savior's birth. When God's peace comes to earth
and all is at rest in the earth. But before the sweet
sounds of the symphony reach our waiting ears, we
must wait out the time of preparation. For each of
the musicians, this time has been long in coming -- the
years of rehearsals and study may have seemed like an
eternity and in the midst of warming up, there is discord
and even chaos . . . .
John's rugged presence at this time of the Church
year reminds us that there are still many rough places
needing smoothing, not just in our personal lives, but
rough places in the very structure of what we name as
our society . . . "our way of doing things".
And certainly the world is not in harmony. "Why do
the nations rage so furiously together??!" When will the peaceful vision of Isaiah
be fulfilled? That time when the lion shall lie down
together with the lamb and the children shall play over
the snake's den without harm or danger. (Isaiah 11:6-9)
"How Long O Lord??"
We're in a season of preparation, we are to cleanse
ourselves, we are to get ready for the coming of God's
kingdom.
I remember when I was a teenager, how the excitement
of seeing an old friend who lived in Rhode Island filled
me with anticipation. For me, there was a special form
of energy that was connected with the excitement of
seeing a friend who had moved far away from the
neighborhood where I grew up -- once a rural countryside
in Montgomery County Maryland. Those days of growing up
left me with good memories about my childhood buddies. I
would ride my bike about a half mile to David and Karl’s
house, mostly uphill.
We had many adventures -- we shared camp outs, mud
battles, river adventures, and old bottle collecting
around the old farmsteads nearby where we lived.
However, by age eighteen, I was riding my bicycle to
David's house in Rhode Island from Maryland. It was
about the fifteenth day of the bicycle trip. Karl and I
had planned this trip for months in advance, and now we
were almost to David's house -- an important
milestone for the 2.5 month journey we were on. As we
got to within seventy miles or so of Kingston, Rhode
Island . . . we were so filled with anticipation that
the pedaling seemed unusually easy.
We were proud of ourselves that we had the energy and
stamina to make it this far on our journey . . . or
was it really our doing at all?? Did we actually
develop the motivation within ourselves to pedal all
those miles? Maybe, maybe not . . . because it was the longing that motivated us, and the anticipation
of the joyful reunion that was about to take place that
kept us pedaling. Our exertion was literally powered by
the thoughts of seeing our old friend, David, and that
he would be glad to see us.
This type of Motivation was founded in a
relationship, the energy came from our knowing that the
friend that we would see was also waiting with
anticipation of our arrival. Through relationship
with God, we are spurred on to "prepare the way of
the Lord" because we know his coming brings peace
to the world -- and in our preparations, by the Spirit,
we make the way for peace and for love to come and
thrive on the earth.
About Patience
In this Advent Season of anticipation and longing,
our hearts now yearn for the renewal of God's grace and
mercy to the brokenness of the world today. Yet, like we
were told when we were young, we have to wait.
"PATIENCE" is a virtue and is the word of the
day!
"The value of the gift is in the
waiting." Gifts given before their time are
less valued, and not given at the proper time a gift
will lose the significance of the event that we are
celebrating. So how do we wait?
On waiting/anticipating
Perhaps you have known the feelings of anticipation
that accompany times when a particular gift is expected
to arrive, especially when you’re a kid or maybe it’s
a romantic gift that comes later in life. Actually we
adults like a surprise gift now and then and may even
buy something for ourselves--after all, these days its
our patriotic duty. (Thank you Mr. Bush!) Just don't
overspend! Our minds can run wild with thoughts of
specially wrapped packages, or a UPS delivery person
wrestling with a large package with your name on it.
Maybe you have gotten so caught up in anxious thoughts
about the arrival of something that you dreamed of
"Doug", the UPS man on TV (Bigger-than-life!) "Doug!"
bounding up your side walk with that special something
that has your name on it!
There are also feelings of excitement for the sender
of a gift. In the careful preparations for gift-sending
-- we may imagine each moment of gratitude and emotion
that will be felt by the recipient -- this is also an
expression of the wonderment and anticipation of the
special moment when God comes, Emmanuel, and
serves to illustrate for us about preparing
ourselves for the coming of Christ, God's gift for
all.
However, we all know what its like to get that
"unexpected gift" . . . the one we "did
not" ask for -- or were not "prepared
for". Our preparations for the coming of God in
Christ must be made carefully -- with great
consideration. Its GOD that we're talking about here!
Will we welcome Christ when "one of the least of
these my brethren" is standing in front of us
asking for help? Will we recognize God’s presence in
our homes beyond the Christmas tree and the bows and
cards?
A voice cries out in the wilderness, 'Prepare
the way of the Lord! Make his paths
straight!" Notice how these words, PREPARE and
MAKE, do not leave any room for questioning as to
what is we're being told to do.
The people hearing John's preaching are being clearly
instructed to do things as they had not been doing
before, high places would need to be brought down low
and low places needed to be exalted. These are poetic
words that speak of Justice and Equity being practiced
in religion as well as in political institutions. ** If
God is coming to dwell among us, we have got to make a
better world. We have got to treat people as
brother, sister, mother and father. We have got to treat
God's Creation as though we were planning for Christ to
grow up as a child in this world. He might live in the
lot next door, or he might be living in China, or
Russia, or Palestine (can you imagine?!). There is much
preparation to be done.
Our task is to Listen for the Voice of God -- God's
voice can break through to us, and can carry us beyond
the wilderness where we so often find ourselves. And
so whether we are in need of going to the wilderness to
receive a baptism of repentance or if we are presently
lost in a wilderness were we cannot hear the voice of
God . . . we are called by God to be patient and to
learn to trust. Waiting is part of the plan.
The Christ who has come and the Christ who
will come tests our faith with fire. This same fire
will burn away our fears and the falsities that would
separate us from God's love and goodness. The Messiah is
to come and we will know God. For the Creator of the
universe will be revealed by His Son, Jesus Christ, come
to earth as a tiny baby. Amen
May the Peace of God be born in us as we wait
patiently for his coming.
Amen