Grace to you and peace from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen. The text is the Gospel lesson, from Matthew 3.
Boy, howdy. Talk about old-school
fire and brimstone. Apparently, the Baptizer didn’t read Dale Carnegie’s book How
to Win Friends and Influence People when he was at prophet school. I don’t
think he followed Simon Sinak on Instagram or Brene’ Brown on YouTube for
leadership techniques. He apparently was never evaluated for his ability to
understand EQ and how to read a room. I highly doubt he ever attended a church
growth seminar. And his preaching technique? “You brood of vipers!” is hardly
an acceptable introduction. Let me be a little more pointed: which of you who
were on St. Paul’s call committee would advance John past the initial list from
the district president? Who would want the Baptizer to be their regular pastor?
Yet, Isaiah foretold some seven
hundred years earlier that God would send this voice in the wilderness to
proclaim, “Prepare the way of the Lord; make his paths straight.” And to make
sure no one would misunderstand who he was and what it was John was called to
do, Matthew plainly says, “This is he.” It’s as plain as his preaching: repent,
for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.
We speak of repentance as having
two parts. The Catechism teaches that there is sorrow for sin and a desire to
change that behavior, called contrition. That’s common among anyone who gets
caught, though, when doing something wrong. Anyone can feel bad; anyone can say
“I want to do better.” What makes repentance Christian repentance is faith that
trusts that Jesus’ death pays for those very sins for which I am sorry and from
which I wish to turn. Christian repentance says, “Yes = I am a poor, miserable
sinner, and I am sorry to be so, but I have an even greater Savior who rescues
me from what my sins deserve.”
Do not think of John’s preaching
of repentance in this way. John would have a much more radical, severe changing
of heart. A better way to understand the Baptizer’s call is “Be converted!”
It’s the equivalent of Shakespeare’s Hamlet saying, “there is something rotten
in the state of Denmark.”
Imagine, sitting on the hillside
in the Baptizer’s congregation and hearing a sermon like this:
“Both Israel and
Jerusalem are corrupt, spiritually rotten from top to bottom, and that includes
you, Pharisees, and you, Sadducees, and all who are following after you thinking
you are good enough, holy enough, and righteous enough to march into the
Kingdom of God on your own merits. Want to play the “son of Abraham card”?
That’s not going to get you there. Remember, Abraham lived by faith in the
promises of God; you, you all are placing your faith in your own way of
living. You are lost – so lost, you are in danger of eternal
separation from God in the fires of hell. Change your life, change your
thinking, change where you place your trust and faith.
You have
forgotten the commands of God and, more important, you have forgotten the
promises of God and unless you repent, unless you are completely changed in
your hearts, minds, and lives by the Spirit of God, you too shall likewise
perish. Prepare the way of the Lord, you brood of vipers; make His paths
straight, you slithering snakes in the grass, because the Kingdom is at hand
and He is coming with a vengeance, with fire and pitchforks and wrath that
knows no limits. You need to get yourself out to the Jordan. Repent and be
baptized. You need to redo the Red Sea. You need to redo the Jordan. You need
to redo the return from Babylon. You need to re-turn to the Lord your God and
prepare because the reign of God stands near in the work of the Messiah, Jesus
of Nazareth.”
St. Matthew does not tell us know
the message was received. Did John succeed, that is, were there conversions?
Did the Holy Spirit drive the words of his preaching, penetrating their hearts
and minds, to re-turn them to faithfulness? Did they listen? Did they repent?
The text does not say. We are left wondering – wondering why Matthew doesn’t
tell us this piece of information, but also wondering what of the faithfulness
of these being-lost ones. Others were coming; others were repenting; others
were being baptized; others were believing. But these – these, there is no
story and no happy ending. So, the question remains: did they
repent? We don’t know.
There is another question here,
one that lays below the surface. Do you hear the voice of the Prophets that
echoes through the centuries. John and his fore-runner Isaiah continue to call
to God’s people of every epoch, age, eon and generation: “Prepare the way of
the Lord: make His paths straight.” To be sure, unlike Isaiah, we know that
Christ has come. Unlike John, we know that Christ came, not as an axe-wielding,
pitchfork-bearing fire-breathing bringer of damnation. Instead, He bore the
sins of the world into His own body, receiving the wrath of God Himself,
reconciling the world to God with His own death. He was numbered with the
sinners, broke bread with transgressors, touched lepers, forgave prostitutes,
called tax collectors to follow. He even absolved those who killed Him, and the
one who mocked and then confessed faith while hanging next to Him.
But, the words still call us to
prepare. So, if the camel-haired, leather-strapped, wild-haired Son of
Zechariah suddenly appeared, striding down the aisle while picking a
grasshopper’s leg from between his teeth with a dirty fingernail and with honey
glistening from his bushy beard, then ascending the pulpit, and call out to the
wilderness of the 1600 block of East Broadway, Enid, Oklahoma, “Prepare the way
of the Lord: make His paths straight,” what would he mean?
Why, repent, of course. In
Advent, there is plenty to repent of: the materialism of the world around us,
our desire for always more, for not being content with what we have, for being
jealous of what some have, for a bit of arrogance in having more than what others
have. Repent for being too busy to find time with Jesus in His Word, for being
too tired to be present when He invites us to His table. Repent of being
Lutheran, as if that would save, or holding our Baptismal or Confirmation
certificate aloft, as if that would redeem. Repent of pretending to be strong
instead of humble and meek and lowly.
Make no mistake: both our repentance and our being baptized are grounded
in the fullness of our salvation by grace through faith. Because you are
forgiven, because you are redeemed, because you are united with Christ, because
you are sanctified, because you declared holy by the Father, I dare not call
you broods of vipers, nor do I call you snakes, Pharisees or Sadducees. That is,
at best unfair; at worst, it is completely inaccurate. You are God's children - beloved, redeemed, baptized. Yet, the message is still quite similar for you - albeit less viperous than it was for that Judean hillside 2000 years ago.
So, if John were here, what would his
message mean? It would mean this: strip away anything that would get in the way
of Christ’s coming to you right now. Prepare the way; make the paths straight.
Knock down mountains of busy-ness that prevent you from welcoming the Christ
today. Fill in the potholes of foolishness, thinking there’s always time
to prepare. Straighten the curves of arrogance, “He’s waited this long…why the
fuss now?” Get rid of the boulders that trip you up with distractions. Instead,
with faith, with longing, with anticipation, with prayerful mindedness and with
Advent anticipation, know that the Kingdom is here. He is at Hand. Repent. Come
to the Table. Christ is here, Sacramentally present in bread and wine, in body
and blood, to strengthen you on this Advent journey as you await the day He
comes, not merely in bread and wine, but in His risen Glory and you see Him as
He is.
Enriched with that
spiritually-strengthening food and drink, empowered by the Spirit of God,
enlivened by His word, every day prepare that Jesus comes today – not tomorrow,
not next week, month, year, or decade – He comes today. Knock down the
mountains and fill in the potholes that get in the way of you welcoming Him
with faith, hope and love. Amen.
