Today is the second Sunday in Advent and, well, I think I’m ready for the big day. I’ve considered all the things I could possibly need to consider. Surely I haven’t missed anything. We know about being prepared, don’t we? It’s just Christmas, after all. It’s not like we haven’t done this before. You have done this before, haven’t you? Well then, we may be just about ready for the big day.
Of course, my saying it doesn’t mean we really are. Could we just let today, a small step to the manger, be one day when we aren’t so, well, distracted? One can try, I suppose.
Here is perhaps the real story. We attempt to balance a number of things this time of the year. We have invitations to parties; we schedule shopping trips, we deciding on where we will be Christmas day, New Years day, that sort of thing. These are all good things.
One of those many invitations has come to us in our reading this morning. At first, we may think of it as a last minute, unexpected invitation. But, it is an invitation from God. Regardless of the timing, this should excite us!
Perhaps it is, especially when we remember this invitation is not for us to come to a place for an event. It is an invitation to come to a person, to a baby, the baby Jesus, who will be our savior, our Messiah, our Christ.
This reason for the season should not surprise us; the fact that the Holy Spirit has worked up an invitation to us, to you and to me, well, that should surprise us.
Do we expect anything less from God? God surprises us with Gods radically different approach to life. In this case, the Holy Spirit is promised to arrive into the midst of our lives bearing the Christ Child. Surprise!
Let me not distract us. We don’t stand much of a chance missing the world’s mixed messages this time of the year. There is the message from the world out there saying buy me, you deserve it; and the other, from the world in here, with scripture and the Holy Spirit saying, come to Jesus, get ready, be prepared, the day is nearing, and we are running out of time.
The vast differences are evident in how we respond to each charge. The one, out there, may draw us in to consumer consumption hell. The sort with dire consequences, for we may run out of money and have presents yet to buy. To debt we will go, unless we make Black Friday or Cyber Monday our particular savior that is.
The other, in here, may draw us also into hell, hell of another sort. The sort with dire consequences, for we may miss our savior and loose our very soul. We just may be perpetually lost, unless we consider a radically different way to journey through this time of preparation. This time of preparation to a significantly different promise; forgiveness, salvation, redemption.
Consider this morning a radical invitation of our own, a different approach to our usual Christmas preparation for sure. Consider that each of us were to invite Jesus to our house to share a meal and visit and exchange gifts. To invite Jesus to bring us to a time freed from urgency.
If Jesus were to be a guest in our homes, what would we want to do before he came? Sit still perhaps and pray? If Jesus were to be a visitor where we work, what would we want to be sure we fix up before the visit? Nothing perhaps, letting our past work speak for itself. If Jesus were to come to a special called family gathering, who would we invite and what sort of celebration would we prepare; a celebration of our fully revealed humanness perhaps. If Jesus called and asked if he could come by and sit on the porch with just you or me, what would we talk about? Jesus alone?
The possibilities may make us feel a bit nervous. I wonder, how anxious should we be about Jesus coming so up close and personal?
At the risk of creating mass panic in the pews this morning, this sort of invitation gets hung up, particularly this time of the year, by our considering who’s been naughty or nice. We might then think twice, am I really ready to have Jesus sitting down for a visit? Some times I might not be so inviting a host, even for Jesus. We aren’t always the easiest folk to be around, are we?
And Jesus, well, Jesus knows us all too well. There is nothing on earth, in our past, in our future, in our minds this very moment, that Jesus doesn’t already know. It isn’t our parents, friends or children we should worry about, Jesus knows all our secrets!
Well wait, this is the baby Jesus. This is a new birth, a new beginning. Surely that makes a difference. Surely we can slow down and breathe again. It’s like we have a new start and we can begin a new list, a new list of the things to do or not do again, and to get ready for yet another chance with Jesus. Truly, Jesus has given us so many chances. This week and the next few weeks will be no exception. So, how will we fill that time?
One way is to realize the obvious. We are expecting a baby! Whether we have children or not, we can imagine that feeling. We are expecting a baby, the time for fear and trembling is now.
With our sense of mature expectation, we should also have a strong sense of hope. Hope that with new life come new possibilities for ourselves and for the world.
Matthew’s reading this morning is perhaps the worlds greatest story of expectation and hope. “In those days, John the Baptist appeared in the wilderness of Judea, proclaiming, ‘Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near’”.
Matthew tells us there is a crowd of folk who have come to see John. Some are there to see him because he has a severe reputation. He dresses odd, eats strange things and does the most curious thing he calls baptism. Others have come for serious reasons. They struggle with their life, they are not so happy the way the world has treated them and they come looking for change, for the hope of a better life.
John’s message does not disappoint, it is for everyone. “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near”.
Part of John’s truth telling is that God is coming to lead the Jews safely home from their captivity. For that journey home, they must prepare themselves. They must prepare the way of the Lord, by God’s grace and God’s power, they were to change their mind and their hearts, they were to make an easy path, not for themselves, but first for God, so God might enter their lives and make life straight were there is crooked living.
The people began to make a way possible for right living by first confessing their sins. Without confession, there can be no baptism. Romans 4:11 teaches us, baptism is a visible sign and seal of God’s invisible grace. Baptism is the beginning point for a true conversion of our inward change expressed outwardly in living that glorifies God, a life that is generous, fair, and thoughtful, showing justice, mercy, and faith.
John baptizes with water, Jesus, however baptizes with the Holy Spirit.
It is for this reason that John baptizes one person after another, all day long, day after day, giving hope that indeed the kingdom of God is near.
I have read that hope is a precious commodity, and one that can be quickly lost, or given up. There are so many ways we can fall; we are easy prey to the twists and turns of life’s circumstances. Falling takes away any chance we may feel to have hope.
I have read hope can be very powerful at first, but somewhere along the way from where we have been to where we are going, we give up on hope in discouragement and frustration. What we encounter in life makes it difficult at times to sustain hope, the weight of the world and of our lives is for most of us, more than we can endure. It’s easier it seems to have no hope.
Folk who have no hope do not come to John for baptism. Why should they? If life has no chance for hope, there really is nothing to look forward to, no reason to get close to the River Jordan. What happens there makes no difference.
Folk who see their life as being perfect do not come to John for baptism either. Why should they? Life has been perfect for them. Why mess things up being dunked in a river. For what?
John warns these brood of vipers that their comfortable little life is on the way out. A new world, a very different one, the Kingdom of God is going to come!
John is placing a critical choice before us. Depending of course on which group we belong to. Have we given up on hoping for anything out of life that would be good? Have we become senile and hardened our hearts and refuse to change any iota of our life?
Or are we longing to make the journey to the Jordan, are we expecting and hopeful, that hearing God’s voice speaking through John and scripture and our own lives, we are looking for a new life, a fresh start.
Be alert then this Advent time, as we prepare to accept this life changing invitation to the birth of this baby Jesus, to the hope he brings that can be seen all around us. Be alert to where you might see proof of a visible sign and seal of God’s invisible grace.
Be alert to see hope in an outing at the park, seeing the diversity there as part of one glorious thread of God’s good creation.
Be alert to see hope in a shopping trip, I cannot believe I just said that, seeing the mass of shoppers, and those brought along despite their enthusiasm for shopping, as part of one continuous life force of preparation for a joy to come.
Be alert and see hope at work, in school, or at home, seeing there not right or wrong, good or bad, joy or disappointment, fair or unfair, but a common spirit that moves in the midst of the ordinary fabric of our everyday lives, a spirit that works at sorting out, in the sometimes murky interior of the human heart, where and how God calls us into the fullness of our being.
Being alert to these movements in life is part of the way we prepare for the coming of the Christ child and our life of faithful discipleship.
John the baptizer’s message is to remind each of us this morning, “Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight”
We do prepare, don’t’ we, we do repent, we do desire to bear good fruit, we do come to the River Jordan to be baptized with the Holy Spirit, we truly do pray for hope this season of preparation.
Our good news this morning is, we have been promised a fresh start, an expectant and hope filled Advent that God’s kingdom is coming.
This Christmas day, a babe will be born. A baby we rest all our hope with, a baby we give our entire lives to, a baby who has come to fill our hearts with a fresh start.
Here is our most cherished invitation this year, prepare the way, there is life giving hope just a few days away. And we will call him Jesus.
In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen
Additional help:
Christian Century, November 27, 2007, pg. 20.
Pulpit Resource, Volume 35, Number 4, October-December 2007, pgs. 49-52.
The Minister’s Annual Manual, 2007-2008, pgs. 166-168
The Presbyterian Outlook, November 26, 2007, pg. 14.
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