Return to the Lord
For perhaps all of human history, people have focused on and obsessed about those who are in positions of power. The pyramids after all weren’t built for commoners. It is worse today than it has ever been with photographers and media people invading people’s privacy and stalking and harassing people like the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge who are expecting their first child.
Why people are so obsessed with the rich, famous, and powerful is frankly something I’ve never understood, but too many times it leads to tragedy including people dying like John Lennon who was shot and killed 32 years ago yesterday, or Princess Diana who died in a car accident trying to get away from photographers, or the nurse at a British hospital who tragically took her own life this week after being the victim of a prank call by a couple of Australian radio DJ’s trying to reach the Duchess of Cambridge in the hospital. It is sad that there is such a lack of decency and respect for other people.
I find it interesting that from beginning to end, the Gospel of Luke stands this human obsession with the powerful on its head. Listen to how Luke 3 begins:
December 9, 2012
Luke 3:1-6, Return to the Lord
Doug Scalise, Brewster Baptist Church
[vimeo 55274325 w=500&h=375]
[powerpress]
“In the fifteenth year of the reign of Emperor Tiberius, when Pontius Pilate was governor of Judea, and Herod was ruler of Galilee, and his brother Philip ruler of the region of Ituraea and Trachonitis, and Lysanias ruler 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 region around the Jordan, proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins, 4 as it is written in the book of the words of the prophet Isaiah, “The voice of one crying out in the wilderness: “Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight. 5 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; 6 and all flesh shall see the salvation of God.’ “
This passage begins with those in power politically and religiously, what the British call the big wigs; the Roman Emperor, the Governor of Judea, and the other rulers in the region are named as are those holding the most religious power in Jerusalem– Annas and Caiaphas. But Luke quickly makes it clear that the word of God wasn’t revealed to any of them. The word of God wasn’t given to an Emperor in Rome or a Governor in Judea, or even to a high priest in Jerusalem. The word of God came to someone those powerful people had never heard of – John the son of Zechariah and Elizabeth, in the wilderness of all places. God’s ways are not our ways, as Isaiah tells us, and frequently in the Bible and in life God works not so much through the powerful in capital cities like, Rome, Jerusalem, or Washington D.C. God often works through those who are less well known in more obscure places. So it was with John the Baptist.
Luke likes to place the Good News within the historical landscape (see Luke 1:1-5). The arrival of the word of God to John is not just “in the wilderness” around the Jordan, but in the wilderness of the political world: during the reigns of Emperor Tiberius, governor Pilate, and “ruler” Herod. Luke’s use of all these names helps us identify the time within the years 27-28. Luke’s purpose is to situate the advent of the revelation to John in the context of the native ruler Herod, the local but foreign governor Pilate, and the final authority who sits above all, Tiberius way off in Rome. This is a top-down look at the political reality of the day. In a sense, this would situate the word, which comes to John, and the Messiah whose path John prepares, in very bottom-up terms; the small, the unexpected, the apparently trivial comes as the answer to the problems of the hierarchical political and religious structure under which it is apparently pinned.
The word comes to John in the midst of the messy reality of a world defined by both secular and religious powers. In the Old Testament books of Haggai and Zechariah, the re-building of the Temple in Jerusalem is set in a similar context of secular and religious leadership, but in a positive and hopeful way. The tension here feels quite different. Like a two-edged sword, the word comes to John, dividing religion and politics, and speaking directly to a wounded world. So what is the word, which comes, interjecting itself in both the political and religious realms? Two things stand out.
First, is the quotation of Isaiah 40:3-5. This quotation, in Isaiah, has to do with a promise of return from Exile. God will make straight paths through the wilderness, a smooth and easier return — in essence a new “exodus” — bringing the people of Israel out of bondage and back to the Promised Land. The path is for the people. This is the proclamation the prophet Isaiah, made to the people; it is promising and hopeful. In Luke the quotation works somewhat differently. Here, the promise is re-interpreted to apply to John. John is the one who is out in the wilderness, preparing the way of the Lord. The path is made by the people, who are called to repentance, to return themselves to their Lord. This is the promise of the prophet John who calls for a different kind of return to God; his message is exhortation, challenge, and command.
John is the one promised who will make the paths straight, and prepare the way for the advent of Jesus — who comes to empower and finish the return of the people to their God. In the midst of a world divided by politics and religion, much as our country and the world still are today, the word that comes to John is a call to return to the Lord.
A second key aspect of the word to John is the summary of the content of John’s preaching, as a “baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins.”
The word “baptism” (Greek baptisma) is found only in early Christian literature, and comes from the verb baptizo, meaning to “dip, immerse.” The origins of John’s baptism are difficult to discern precisely. We know that the Community at Qumran (in John’s desert “territory,”) practiced repeated ritual washings, but John’s baptism seems different — an act of purification and forgiveness that can be looked back upon as a single event (see Acts 19:3-4). Probably, the precursor for John’s baptism is the First Century Jewish practice of a ritual bath by which a Gentile convert to Judaism was cleansed from moral and religious impurity. John’s invitation is to a baptism which is a ritual action, a cleansing, that is symbolic of a turning from sin and a returning to God. It represents a re-orienting of lives toward God.
“Repentance” is the English translation of the Greek word metanoia, which means “a change of mind, turning about, conversion.” Repentance is much more than a sense of guilt. Guilt doesn’t save us. Unresolved guilt can beat a person down and forgiveness is the only real antidote. Repentance is more than sorrow for getting caught or for doing something wrong. Repentance is an actual change of mind, an action, a step away from a sinful pattern or habit or act. It is change. God’s call isn’t to guilt or to sorrow, but to change. This was John’s message: repent!
The third important word in verse 3 is “forgiveness,” (Greek aphesis), which means “‘release’ from captivity; ‘pardon, cancellation’ of an obligation, a punishment, or guilt.” John declared the existence of sin, the necessity of repentance, and God’s offer of forgiveness. The powerful and the common, he insisted, had committed sins needing forgiveness. But John didn’t leave them there; he offered God’s forgiveness, but he did it in a radical way. When John called on people to be baptized for the forgiveness of their sins, he called them to submit to the same kind of cleansing bath required of Gentile converts. What Jews, would so humble themselves to do something that only “unclean” Gentiles had to do? The common people repented and were baptized gladly, but we’re told in Luke 7:30 that “the Pharisees and experts in the law rejected God’s purpose for themselves, because they had not been baptized by John.” Spiritual pride prevented the religious elite from experiencing God’s grace for their lives. We need to be careful that we don’t repeat their mistake and allow any spiritual stiffness or pride to block the blessing the Lord desires to give us.
One of the things most of us dread when we’re driving long distance is getting stuck in traffic due to construction. It’s amazing though to see how major roads are built. Jill’s grandfather worked in Pennsylvania a long time ago carefully calculating how much dynamite was needed to blow up the rock that needed to be cleared so roads could be built and tunnels constructed to help traffic move smoothly and safely. In a spiritual sense, that is what the John the Baptist does, he comes in like dynamite and seeks to clear the way for Jesus to come into the hearts and lives of people by enabling them to repent, be forgiven, and baptized to be cleansed from their sins. “Make his paths straight. 5 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; 6 and all flesh shall see the salvation of God.’ ” All this is spiritual preparation so that people will return to the Lord and make room for Christ in their lives.
If we wish to see the salvation of God in Jesus, Emmanuel, God with us, then our task is to prepare room for Christ to dwell in us at Christmas and all through the year. Next weekend is the start of the Cape Cod Christmas bird count and hundreds of people will go traipsing all over trying to see and identify as many kinds of birds as possible, it is possible one might see 125 to 135 species of birds. While I’ve never done a bird count, when Jill and I are walking this time of year I do enjoy looking into the trees and seeing all the nests that have been hidden among the now fallen leaves. Joyce Rupp is a spiritual writer whose prayers, poems, and writing is engaging and vivid. In her book Fresh Bread she writes the following about Advent and preparing a place for Jesus in the nest of our hearts.
“If you look high into the trees on December days can you see little nests everywhere? They remind me of Advent. Instead of getting a nest ready that will be round and welcoming for an egg, and the future young life, I am getting a Christ-home ready within my life. I am trying to prepare a dwelling place for the Lord, a warm, well-hollowed place where the life of my God will deepen and mature in me.
I believe that the word comes ever so quietly and in ever so ordinary a way. The twigs of our trials and tensions, the soft down of our love and fidelity, the pebbles of our patience and pain, the straw of our struggles and strivings, the mud of our humanness and growing, the dry grass of our surrender and our daily dyings. These are the content of our nests where God asks us to hollow out a welcoming place. Jesus comes to us in the midst of everyday fragments and asks us to create space for him where he has never been before, or places where he is no longer welcome. All the bits and pieces of our lives, like those bits and pieces that form bird’s nests, are where he awaits a birthing. All of us are meant to know and to deeply appreciate the joy and privilege of this nesting, of this homing of the God who waits for us to openly receive the life offered to us.
Advent, then, might be called a season of nesting. Human hearts are asked to prepare a way for the Lord. Just as Christmas celebrates the coming of Emmanuel so many years ago and how he continues to come and dwell among us, so Advent is the time to prepare each year for the coming of God-with-us. Emmanuel comes, filling the nests of our hearts repeatedly with a special presence that we sense and know, a presence which we can quickly disregard because of the inner traffic and noise of our daily activity.
Advent beckons to us. Be still. Be alert. Get into the spirit of the Old Testament and yearn for the Savior. Cry out to God. Cry out to be open and receptive. Sharpen your awareness of the God who dwells within. Open up. Hollow out. Receive. Welcome the one who comes.
In these next few weeks of Advent I invite you to prepare a dwelling place for Christ in your life. Prepare your heart daily. Develop a deeper awareness of how the Lord dwells among us. Each morning pray a simple prayer of “Come Lord Jesus, dwell with me this day.” Each evening take a few minutes to think about the nest you are preparing for the Lord; reflect on how God has been in your life that day and how you’ve been open to his dwelling. You might look at the trees more often, even take a walk to do so. Stop to look at the nests. Ponder the message that is there for you. Think about returning to the Lord as birds do to their nests. Keep welcoming Emmanuel into your heart-nest this Advent season, remembering that it is there that Jesus continues to be born and desires to make a home.”
Prayer:
Loving God, help us hear the message of your salvation and to live as your people, always ready to seek forgiveness and to return to you. May we always have a heart nest with room for you to dwell and live within us.