Preparing the Way

Luke 3:1-20

3 In the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar—when Pontius Pilate was governor of Judea, Herod tetrarch of Galilee, his brother Philip tetrarch of Iturea and Traconitis, and Lysanias tetrarch of Abilene— 2 during the high-priesthood of Annas and Caiaphas, the word of God came to John son of Zechariah in the wilderness. 3 He went into all the country around the Jordan, preaching a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. 4 As it is written in the book of the words of Isaiah the prophet:

“A voice of one calling in the wilderness,

‘Prepare the way for the Lord,

make straight paths for him.

5 Every valley shall be filled in,

every mountain and hill made low.

The crooked roads shall become straight,

the rough ways smooth.

6 And all people will see God’s salvation.’”

7 John said to the crowds coming out to be baptized by him, “You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the coming wrath? 8 Produce fruit in keeping with repentance. And do not begin to say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham as our father.’ For I tell you that out of these stones God can raise up children for Abraham. 9 The ax is already at the root of the trees, and every tree that does not produce good fruit will be cut down and thrown into the fire.”10 “What should we do then?” the crowd asked.11 John answered, “Anyone who has two shirts should share with the one who has none, and anyone who has food should do the same.”12 Even tax collectors came to be baptized. “Teacher,” they asked, “what should we do?”13 “Don’t collect any more than you are required to,” he told them.14 Then some soldiers asked him, “And what should we do?”He replied, “Don’t extort money and don’t accuse people falsely—be content with your pay.”15 The people were waiting expectantly and were all wondering in their hearts if John might possibly be the Messiah. 16 John answered them all, “I baptize you with[b] water. But one who is more powerful than I will come, the straps of whose sandals I am not worthy to untie. He will baptize you with[c] the Holy Spirit and fire. 17 His winnowing fork is in his hand to clear his threshing floor and to gather the wheat into his barn, but he will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire.” 18 And with many other words John exhorted the people and proclaimed the good news to them.19 But when John rebuked Herod the tetrarch because of his marriage to Herodias, his brother’s wife, and all the other evil things he had done, 20 Herod added this to them all: He locked John up in prison.

“Preparing the Way”

This week’s gospel reading in our Advent journey brings us to the story of John the son on Zechariah, the cousin of Christ, the one who baptized before Christ, the one who promised that Christ was coming to follow. Luke brings us a unique description of how John appeared, not using the words found in other parts of the gospel of his clothes made from camel’s hair, his meals of locusts and honey. Instead, Luke describes John’s political and social context, describing the governors and rulers of his time, naming Herod as one of the leaders. Herod was a notoriously brutal ruler, taxing people to their last dollar, sending his sons and flunkies to threaten the lives of the folks in the community, causing people to live in uncertainty and sadness and fear—fear of their ruler, fear of each other, fear of the world, fear of the unknown. This fear caused the people to sin themselves—to hoard what they had, closing off their homes and their lives, not sharing with others, not welcoming and loving them as sisters and brothers in love.

It was dark and fearful and scary time, a time when rulers used their people, a time when the people reacted themselves in dark ways. Knowing that he would be seen as a threat to the rulers of the day, John appeared anyway, hanging out with the folks who were scared, giving them hope for the future, preaching to them about the right way to live, baptizing them—asking them to repent for their sins, while also giving them hope for the future. During this Advent time, we tend to focus mainly on John’s hopeful words, echoed from the prophet Isaiah, about the one who will soon follow after him, the one who is to come:

The voice of one crying out in the wilderness: Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight. Every valley shall be filled, and every mountain and hill shall be made low, and the crooked shall be made straight, and the rough ways made smooth; and all flesh shall see the salvation of God.

We focus mainly on these words because we are Advent people, preparing ourselves to welcome Christ, getting ready to welcome into our lives once again as our Savior. The people gathered around John as he preached, clamoring for some good news, yearning for a word of hope. And what hopeful words they heard—in a world of deep darkness and fear and sadness, John reminds all of us, those gathered that day so long ago, those sitting here today, that, with Christ, every deep valley will be filled, that the crooked sins and sinners of the world will be made straight, that every one of us will see the salvation of God. That is the hope of this Advent time, the hope of our Advent journey together—that Christ will be coming to make the world right again, to make us feel whole again, to bring us peace in a time that seems so dark.

It is right that we should focus on this message of preparation, this promise of hope for which John prepares us, but we also need to notice and celebrate that his message doesn’t end there. In his message of preparation, John reminded everyone gathered there that day that they were sinful and broken people, that they couldn’t simply blame the darkness on the world on their rulers, that they were just as responsible for the sadness and fear and chaos that seems to reign in their lives. He reminded them that the one who is coming to save the world is not simply coming to save the rulers from darkness and chaos, but coming to save them from it, too: “You brood of vipers,” he yelled at them, “who warned you to flee from the wrath to come? Bear fruits worthy of repentance…every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire.”

To the crowds, he said, “Whoever has two coats must share with anyone who has none; and whoever has food must do likewise.”

To the tax collectors, “Collect no more that the amount prescribed for you.”

To the soldiers, “Do not extort money from anyone.”

To the ones asking if he were the Messiah, “…the one who is more powerful than I is coming.”

For John, the preparation for the coming of Christ meant then and means today that hope must be mixed with repentance. It meant that baptism was not simply a sign of the entrance into community, but a true cleansing of sin. For John, the preparation for the coming of Christ meant that they must truly examine the chaos and disappointment and sin that pervade their own lives. It meant that they must examine the fear that kept them from loving and accepting each other.

I wonder what John would have to say to us today, to our world today. I have a sinking feeling that his yell of “You brood of vipers” would be just as loud and just as convicting. I don’t know about you, but I feel like we’re a world right now that is enveloped in chaos, a world run by selfishness and suspicion, a world overcome with fear and brokenness and sin. I feel like we are a people who judge each other without first getting to know each other, a people who hurl insults at each other over social media because then we don’t have to look into each other’s eyes and see that they, too are a child of God. I feel that we are a people who are living lives of fear, closing our doors to strangers and neighbors alike, closing ourselves off, ignoring Christ’s command to welcome and love. We are living in a time when, sadly, it doesn’t shock us to turn on our tvs to see what’s happening around the world--that concert goers in Paris have been ambushed and murdered and teenaged school children in Africa have been kidnapped to be raped and sold. It no longer surprises us to see in our country that worshipers have been gunned down in a Bible study, to see that folks in California attending a Christmas party have been murdered, to see that 5 and 6 year olds have been slaughtered in their classroom. Thank God is still saddens us, but in so many ways, we have become numb to it.

We are living in a world where chaos and fear and sin run our lives and overtake our souls. Sure, we can blame it on our rulers and our governments like those gathered around John that day wanted to do, but doesn’t the blame fall at our own feet? Aren’t we, ourselves, living as a brood of vipers? Aren’t we the ones who refuse to stand up and say, “I’m tired of this chaos?” Aren’t we the ones who refuse to stand up and say, “God created every single one of us as God’s children—and called us to live as brothers and sisters together?” Aren’t we the ones who create bigger and more dangerous and more deadly weapons instead of creating new roads to peace? Aren’t we the ones who judge based on religion or preference or skin color or belief instead of listening the stories of people’s lives? Aren’t we the ones who close the doors and borders of our homes and our lives, instead of extending a welcome? Aren’t we the ones who choose to live in fear instead of hope?

Our Advent journey together is a paradox—during this Advent time, John calls us to both live in the hope of the one who is coming, AND to examine the sin and brokenness in our lives that we have caused. And he calls us to do something about it—to repent. The Greek word used for “repent” in this text is “metanoia,” which means to reorient oneself, to change one’s mind, literally to turn around. John calls us to turn our lives around, turning the world around in the process, while hoping at the same time for Christ to come into our lives and help us and celebrate the newness.

If all of this feels hard for you, it should. It sure feels hard for me to literally turn my life around when I am scared about the chaos of our world, scared of the hatred and hostility, scared for my own life when I never know what’s coming from minute to minute, day to day. I won’t stand here and pretend that any of this is easy. As I sat in front of the tv in our student center this Wednesday watching the brutal, horrific news that seems to hit us each day, news that 14 people were killed in a center where folks with developmental disabilities are offered help, I wept, feeling scared for our world, feeling hatred for someone who would take so many lives without thinking twice about it, and I wondered when it would inevitably happen again. I sat there wondering if there was any hope left in our world. I went in my office and reached for something that I have turned to in other times of chaos, a poem called “A Christmas Peace,” written by the fabulous Maya Angelou for a lighting of the White House Christmas tree. I’ll read her words, hoping that they offer you the hope they offered me:

Thunder rumbles in the mountain passes, and lightning rattles the eaves of our houses. Floodwaters await in our avenues.

Snow falls upon snow, falls upon snow to avalanche, over unprotected villages. The sky slips low and gray and threatening.

We question ourselves. What have we done to so affront nature? We interrogate and worry God. Are you there? Are you there, really? Does the covenant you make with us still hold?

Into this climate of fear and apprehension, Christmas enters, streaming lights of joy, ringing bells of hope and singing carols of forgiveness high up in the bright air. The world is encouraged to come away from rancor, come the way of friendship.

It is the Glad Season. Thunder ebbs to silence and lightning sleeps quietly in the corner. Floodwaters recede into memory. Snow becomes a yielding cushion to aid us as we make our way to higher ground.

Hope is born again in the faces of children. It rides on the shoulders of our aged as they walk into their sunsets. Hope spreads around the earth, brightening all things-EVEN HATE-which crouches breeding in our dark corridors.

In our joy, we think we hear a whisper. At first it is too soft. Then only half heard. We listen carefully as it gathers strength. We hear a sweetness. The world is Peace. It is loud now. Louder than the explosion of bombs.

We tremble at the sound. We are thrilled by its presence. It is what we have hungered for. Not just the absence of war. But true Peace. A harmony of spirit, a comfort of courtesies. Security for our beloveds and their beloveds.

We clap hands and welcome the Prince of Christmas. We beckon this good season to wait awhile with us. We, Baptist and Buddhist, Methodist and Muslim, say come. Peace. Come and fill us and our world with your majesty. We, the Jew and the Jainist, the Catholic and the Confucian, implore you to stay awhile with us so we may learn by your shimmering light how to look beyond complexion and see community.

It is Christmas time, a halting of hate time. On this platform of peace, we can create a language to translate ourselves to ourselves and to each other.

At this Holy Instant, we celebrate the [coming] of Jesus Christ into the great religions of the world. We jubilate the precious advent of trust. We shout with glorious tongues the coming of hope. All the earth’s tribes loosen their voices to celebrate the promise of Peace.

We, Angels and Mortals, Believers and nonbelievers, look heavenward and speak the word aloud. Peace. We look at our world and speak the world aloud. Peace, We look at each other, then into ourselves, and we say without shyness or apology or hesitation: Peace, my brother. Peace, my sister. Peace, my soul.

We speak the word aloud. Peace. Let it be so. Thanks be to God.