“Ready or Not, Here He Comes”

December 10, 2000

Lectionary Text: Luke 3:1-7

 

            In the fourth year of the prime ministership of Sirimavo Bandaranaike, the first woman to ever become a prime minister in the world following the assassination of her prime minister husband, when Lyndon B. Johnson had just become president of the United States following the assassination of John F. Kennedy, at a revival meeting at Nugegoda Baptist Church, Sri Lanka, the word of the Lord came to a young 12 year old boy named Shanta Premawardhana. It would have been easier to say, 1964 – but if I thought I’ll follow Luke’s pattern. The preacher was shouting himself hoarse on the story of Nicodemus, pleading with me – repent, he said, confess your sin, pray a sinner’s prayer. Come forward to receive Jesus as your savior. Softly and Tenderly, Jesus is calling, he sang afterwards. And I got up and went forward. Frankly, I couldn’t think of much sin in my life. I was a fairly decent and good boy. Yes, I got into fights with my sister and brother, and yes, I told a lie or two – but nothing that I didn’t have to own up to and confess to my parents. But the preacher explained that repent meant not just to confess your sin, but to turn your life around. If you are going in one direction, to turn and go in another direction, towards the cross, he said. 

 

Despite all the Christmas music you hear around you, despite all the decorations in people’s houses, the advertising on TV and malls packed with people running around to get their gifts and cards and things, its not Christmas yet. We are still in Advent. Christmas season begins on December 25^th and goes on until January 6^th, which is Epiphany. In the Christian calendar that’s when we are supposed to sing Christmas carols, send greetings, put up decorations and give gifts. But who cares about that – the commercial world has been preparing for this day since Halloween.

 

But today's story is not about shopping, its not even about shepherds, wise men, a baby and angels. Today’s story is about an old fashioned revival. Its about a preacher shouting himself hoarse on the message that Jesus is coming, challenging the audience, pleading with them to come to repentance. As you come in, you hear the revivalist painting vivid pictures of an ominous future, and you see around you, a nervous crowd anxious to repent, just throw in a soloist singing "Softly and Tenderly " and the picture is complete.

           

Luke had already prepared us for this feisty preacher named John. He had told us in chapter 1 about the amazing details of his birth and his relation with the Messiah to come. He also makes enough observations about John to suggest that he had ties with the ascetic community of Qumran. How do I know? Look at the clues. The locality designated "around the Jordan" is where the Qumran community was. John and his message, introduced with the words of Isaiah 40:3, "The voice of one crying in the wilderness, Prepare the way of the Lord," was a very important text to that community. The baptism of repentance by water was the rite of the Qumran community. And that John's conviction that God's judgment upon Israel was imminent was the same as Qumran's. So, he was a part of a prophetic community. Prophets can never be lone rangers. In fact there were always prophetic communities in the Bible, and it is fair to assume that no serious prophet functioned alone.

           

Even so, this was John's unique ministry. And he appeared at the Jordan with this powerful, fire and brimstone message. And people came – they came from the whole Judean countryside and from Jerusalem. Sounds like a pretty substantial crowd. You can just imagine people gathering, lining up to enter the water for the baptism of repentance. Obviously these people had heard the call -- that there was a baptizer calling for people for baptism.

           

Now the preacher gets up to the podium (may be he climbs on a rock or a tree stump), and addresses the crowd. "Dearly beloved, sisters and brother!" No! He starts out yelling, "You brood of vipers?" You snakes! Remember, it is almost like he is preaching to the choir here -- they've already heard the message, or why else whould they have come seeking a fresh start in this baptism? "John, John," I want to say, "you've got to be seeker sensitive, man?" No, he is going on. And then I wonder? Could it be that there is something else going on here? Is it possible that they these people were not moved by sincere repentance? Could it be that they were merely seeking "insurance" against the "wrath to come?" If we get baptized, i.e. go through the ritual, we can make sure that we'll be OK when the Messiah comes -- and we can just continue to live the way we live. You know what? I think that is what is going on -- because I see that going on around me often. People want to do things that will be quick fixes, without wanting to do the long and painstaking work of repentance.

           

Repentance is a difficult word. It is difficult because it requires hard work. I want you to know, that repentance is not just confession, when you go to God and confess your sin and seek God's forgiveness. That's one part of it -- but certainly not all of it. Repentance (metanoia) is turning around. Its like you are going in one direction and because of God's grace at work in you, you turn around – 180 degrees. You go in an entirely different direction -- in the direction of the cross. Turning a life around is a very hard thing. If you've never really tried to do that, you can't imagine how hard it can be. Obviously most of us would prefer if did not have to do that. And we can go on living our nice respectable Christian lives. And there are lots of people who make their professions of faith and are baptized and there has never been any real repentance. And then much later in the Christian lives they come across issues of sin and they get immobilized and are unable to change, because repentance is so hard. So they say, well, I made a profession of faith, I was baptized, once saved, always saved, so I am Ok.

           

"You brood of Vipers!" screams John. "You snakes! Don't just come slithering down here to be baptized thinking its your insurance policy. Repent! Turn around! Change Course! Head toward Christ." There is only one way to avoid the coming judgment --Vs. 8 "Bear the fruits worthy of repentance.” Talk is cheap, he is saying. If you have truly repented, there will be ways to see how your lifestyle, the things you do, the decisions you make, the relationships your build will yield fruit for the kingdom. Now, they are stunned by this, you see. Religious people often do this. They come to church to participate in the worship and ritual, just so that they would have an insurance policy – we do this, and the church let’s us do that! John does not mince words.

 

And then he whacks them another one. He denies them an esteemed, long-standing, ethnic perk. "Do not again say to yourselves, We have Abraham as our ancestor." No matter what one's pedigree, or how conscientious or "by the book" one's behavior, without fruits God's judgment is imminent. You think being Abraham's child can save you, think again, "I tell you God is able from these stones to raise up children."  Now the message takes on a seriously ominous tone. "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." The judgment process has already actually begun.

           

"What then shall we do?" the crowd asks. The anxious crowd is given several examples of "fruits" worthy of repentance. For instance, sharing bare essentials of life -- food and clothing -- are basic "fruits," but things any religious Jew would normally do. Tax Collectors and Soldiers, two universally vilified groups voluntarily approach John seeking specific instructions from him on how to bear fruit in their corrupt lives. Again, the answers are pretty basic. -- to collect only what is owed (no "extra" taxes for the tax collector!) and to resist the temptation to add to the low military wages by shaking down the people. What's going on here, the answers are pretty anti climactic?

           

Let me offer you a suggestion. When the people ask "What then shall we do?" the focus of what John is saying is beginning to shift already from the content of the message to the identity of the messenger. Those examples of fruits were important, useful perhaps for many to root them in the tradition of caring for people, but John is keen to move on to his real focus here, his successor. The one yet to come is much more "powerful" than John, capable of offering baptism not just of water, but of the Holy Spirit and fire." Steeped in repentance, John insists he is not worthy even to untie the sandals of this Coming One. And when that Messiah comes, he will have a winnowing fork in his hand, "to clear his threshing floor and to gather the wheat into his granary, but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire."

           

Now let's bring this to our context. If you were to imagine yourself in the revival meeting this far, I know most of you, perhaps all of you would find yourselves in the audience. Many of you, good Baptists that you are, will imagine yourselves as standing in the baptism line! But what if Luke were to write this words in his inimical flair for historical detail, about us. "In the final year of the administration of President Bill Clinton, when we don’t yet know who the next president will be, and George Ryan was governor of the state of Illinois and Richard Daley was mayor of Chicago, and Toni Preckwinckle was the alderman of the 4th Ward, during the time when Jim Queen was the Executive Director of the Chicago Metropolitan Baptist Association, the Word of the Lord came to (substitute your name here). And you went out into your neighborhood, appeared before your city council, proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins." Now you know, with all my preaching and teaching about all of us being ministers and prophets, this is where I want to imagine each of you.

           

Oh, but, you say, such raspy, rugged Baptizer-type figure were needed in those days because it was a pre-Christian era, as yet untouched and unmoved by the Good News of the gospel. That culture was organized around the worship of pagan gods or simply designed around the political and economic powers of those who were rich and powerful, those who lived by different rules and standards than common people, those with money and status who became themselves popular cult figures. We live in an enlightened, post-Christian culture we say. Uh-huh! Leonard Sweet suggests in these post-modern times, we are in fact living in a pre-Christian culture. It's not a post-Christian culture, he says, because "post" implies that Christianity was something we had so absorbed that it became part and parcel of popular culture. Can we look honestly at ourselves and our culture and claim it to be post-Christian? Did we ever make it "Christian" in the first place? Can we look at the gangs of empty-hearted youth that exist on violence and despair, and claim we are post-Christian? Can we can look at the greed and gluttony of corporate land-sharks, and claim we are post-Christian? Can we look at the wealth and waste of Gold Coast standing next to the utter poverty of Cabrini Green or the concentrated poverty the streets and communities surrounding Hyde Park and claim we are post-Christian? Can we look at the way we steward our resources of air, land, water and fellow creatures, where although we are 5% of the earth's population, that we emit 20% of its greenhouse gases and claim we are post-Christian? Can we look at Christmas creches that feature Frosty the Snowman, Rudolph the Red-nosed Reindeer and the Santa Clauses of all sorts and claim we are post-Christian? "Don't be fooled," says John the Baptizer. The truth is, like John the Baptizer, we are still living in a pre-Christian age." John's message is still the precise one this culture needs to hear proclaimed: "Prepare the way of the Lord."

           

What lessons can we take from John? First that he is a member of an ascetic community. Such communities do two basic things for each other: they support each other with a prayerful and supportive community that also holds each other accountable. They want each person to be the absolute best that God has called that person to be. They want nothing less. So they will push them towards those goals. Now we are not an ascetic community, but hopefully we are a prophetic one and I believe this is true for us as well. As a member of your church family, I want you to be very best God has in mind for you, as you do for me. Now, we both know that we have all kinds of blocks and difficulties that we put in the way of that progression. Sometimes moving those is very hard work. You have to push and prod then you got to stop and hug and support and pray. Then you have to push and prod again. Then you stop and pray again. Sometimes with faith mountains do move.

           

Second, in order to be able to go out and call out people to repentance with such authority, he had to have experienced a deep repentance himself. The best evidence of that is the clarity of his mission, to proclaim his successor. "I am not worthy to untie the thong of his sandals,” he said. Calling people to repentance, and faith in Jesus Christ is an essential part of our bearing fruit. But our witness would seem hollow, if we haven’t done the work of repentance ourselves. I want to assure you, that it is not a one-time deal. Our sins and our spiritual blocks are so strong that they need continuous work. The more we do that, I find that the clearer we become about who we are and what God has called us to be. We become clearer about our mission in life. John the Baptizer was very clear. This was not about him. It was about Jesus.

           

Third, keep the focus on Jesus. Some people may simply need to know basic things about how to share their food and clothing or need to be reminded that they must not extort from people, or push people around. While its good to be reminded from time to time, this is not really our problem. We are good people, we can handle those and we can tell people those. No, our problem bigger. Our problem is Jesus. And this is not whether he will baptize with more water or with dunking as against sprinkling. Jesus is going to baptize with Holy Spirit and fire. That a radical paradigm shift. Its a completely new thing. You've heard me point to the images in the Bible, like the Kingdom of God, and the New Jerusalem, and the mustard seed that grows into a large bush, that give glimpses of what it will be like when Jesus comes. But even those pictures, glorious as they are, are incomplete. We don't know what it will be like when Jesus comes. But one thing is for sure. Everything will change, and God's rule will be established, because that is what Jesus is about.

           

So, here's the first message of Advent. "Jesus is coming, are you ready?" So what do you do to get ready? Frantically run around buying gifts for everyone, getting a Christmas tree and waiting for Santa Clause? What if getting ready means getting your heart ready for a complete turn around, a paradigm shift, a baptism by the Holy Spirit and fire? Then comes the second message of Advent, "Ready or not, here he comes" Oh, boy, and did you notice how he comes: "His winnowing fork is in his hand, to clear his threshing floor and to gather the wheat into his granary, but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire." Advent is God’s opportunity to repent – again, to turn around, to make a course correction, to set our hearts of Jesus. So let me be the raspy, fiery preacher today, to encourage you, to plead with you, to invite you, to repent so you will be ready, because ready or not he will come.