Sermon Title (if given)
Malachi 3:1-4; Luke 3:1-6
Rev. Laura J. Collins
December 7, 2003, Advent 2
Tiberius is emperor, Pilate is governor, Herod is county executive, Annas and Caiaphas are heading up the religious court system and here comes John, son of Zechariah.
Who? That's the kind of response that such a set-up evokes. Here are all these important people, the powerful ones, the ones in Rome and Jerusalem and the district courts, and now we're going to talk about some average guy named John.
And where is he? In the wilderness. That is, not in Jerusalem, not in Rome, not even in the county seat of Galilee. The wilderness. Not even a specified part of the wilderness, just out there somewhere. Somewhere unknown, unimportant, couldn't even find it with MapQuest.
This opening paragraph in Luke's 3rd chapter intentionally sets up this stark contrast between John and everyone important, between the places of power and the unknown places. And in the middle of the paragraph we get this one little phrase that makes all the difference: "... the word of God came to John."
Not to the Emperor, not to Caiaphas, not to Rome, not to Jerusalem but to John, son of Zechariah, in the wilderness. Note to Washingtonians: if we're looking inside the Beltway for salvation, we might just miss it.
So begins the ministry of John the Baptist. To the astute listener, however, John is not a nobody and the wilderness is not a no-place. John is the son of Zechariah, a priest in the line of Aaron (who, you may recall, was the brother of and spokesperson for Moses). So, a pretty good line for a Jewish kid.
And the wilderness is the place where the Jewish people became the covenant people. It was during forty years of wandering there that they learned to listen for God and trust God; it was there they received manna to eat and the commandments for living. To leave Jerusalem, the holy city, and return to the wilderness is to go back to the place of spiritual formation. John was in the wilderness because the people needed to learn how to listen to God again. His presence there is a not-so-subtle hint that the covenant needed to be renewed.
Advent invites us out into the wilderness with John, back into a period of spiritual formation, to a place where the powerful voices are distanced and we can listen more easily for God's voice.
During seminary I spent one quarter traveling and studying in the Middle East. One weekend I went on a camping trip in the Sinai desert, led by Ahmed, a young Muslim Egyptian man. When he found out that I was a seminary student he told me, "Ah, then you must meet some Bedoin people." The Bedoin are those nomatic people who still live in the desert, wandering from place to place in tents and living off of the land in a place where it looks like the land has absolutely nothing to offer.
"The Bedoin people are the most faithful people in the world," Ahmed told me. "They have no choice. They live here in the desert and so they know every single day that they depend entirely on God. There is nothing to shield them, no security. Faith is not optional for them, it is a necessity."
Going to the desert is leaving behind our securities for a time. Putting aside all those things that make us feel comfortable or safe or normal or more sure of our place in the world long enough to ask ourselves, "Without these things, who am I? Without these props, what do I need? Without all the noise in my life, what can I hear?"
Out in the wilderness, John offered people a baptism of repentance. A cleansing experience in order to prepare them for the possibility of hearing God, too. The prophet Malachi gave us some good images of the kind of cleansing we need to be ready to meet God. A refiner's fire. Ouch. This is no aroma therapy bath we're talking here, this is serious detoxification. All the dross that builds up on us, all the layers that keep us from shining as God intended, all that stuff can't just be washed away with a pleasant little soak. No, that stuff needs to be burned off. There needs to be a process for separating the precious metals from the rest. And sometimes we forget which parts are precious.
A member of my former church had two hip replacements and suffered from debilitating arthritis by his mid-40s. He told me that his disabilities were the best thing that ever happened to him. He had been working for years in a dead-end job which he hated. But it supported his family and it was what he knew, so he stuck with it until he could no longer do the physical labor the job required. His body forced him to stop, mid-life, and ask himself what he really wanted to do. He got into computer banking work, which he loved and for the first time in his life looked forward to going to work every day. Sometimes, getting rid of the dross is a painful process.
John begins his ministry quoting the prophet Isaiah, "Prepare a way for the Lord, make a straight path, lower the mountains and raise the valleys, smooth out the rough places and make the crooked places straight." It sounds like the path to God is not so easy to traverse. Lots of hills and bumps and curves. And isn't that true? I'm always a bit suspicious of people who find God too easily. The wisdom of the church calendar is that every year we have four weeks to prepare for Christmas and six weeks to prepare for Easter. That's 28 days of waiting for every one day of finding God on earth and 40 days of preparation for every one day of experiencing resurrection. Those proportions seem about right to me.
So, we go to the wilderness to quiet the noise, we submit ourselves to a cleansing to burn away the built-up dross, and we set out on a path full of hills and valleys. Sounds like a lot of work. And for what?
That is the real question, isn't it? What's the pay-off? Why bother? Clearly, plenty of people opt out. Sounds too hard, not really clear what the outcome will be, maybe they've done the 27 days of waiting and given up before the pay-off arrived.
But John revives Isaiah's words to remind us of the grace which we seek: "And all flesh shall see the salvation of God."
All flesh, the vision is inclusive, broad and wide and deep. And the vision is of salvation. Salvation, coming from the same root as the word salve. Salve for healing our wounds. And not just ours, but all flesh, all peoples, all nations.
Going out in the wilderness is to listen for where God is calling us. Going through the refiner's fire is to remember what we're made of, the preciousness, the gold, that perfection which our parents saw in us at the moment of our birth. Walking the long path is a way to healing, not only for ourselves, but for the world we inhabit.
This is the point and the purpose. It is no small thing. In fact, it is everything.
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