08 December 13 “Repent” Matthew 3:1-12

08 December 13 “Repent” Matthew 3:1-12 Last Sunday we were admonished to “Stay Awake.” This morning we are to “Repent,” and “Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight.” Someone is trying really hard to help us this Advent season. I realized the other day the change coming about at our house as we sat to plan for the holidays. With family coming, cleaning came up. We could not seem to get beyond the need to make sure the house was clean. Then I thought, what an appropriate way to jump-start our Advent preparation. What if Jesus were to be a guest in our homes? What would we need to clean before he came? Then things sort-of spiraled out of control. If Jesus were to be a visitor where we work, what would we want to be sure we fix up before the visit? If Jesus were to come to a special called family gathering, who would we invite and what sort of celebration would we prepare? If Jesus called and asked if he could come by and sit on the porch with just you, what would your talk about? We are not always the easiest folk to be around. And Jesus, well, Jesus knows us all to well. Jesus’ coming may create so much anxiety we RSVP and decline the invitation. I suppose we can try to decline the invitation. But Jesus is persistent. Here he is extending another invitation this morning. Now, before we begin to suspect these are last minute unexpected invitations we must not forget, this is an invitation from God. There is nothing last minute about God and regardless of the timing, these invitations should excite us. And perhaps we are. Especially when we remember this invite is not for us to come to a place for an event or even to have someone come to our house. This is an invitation to come to a person, to a baby, the baby Jesus. He is the only one who will be our salvation, our Christ, our Messiah. This reason for the season does not surprise us. The fact that the Holy Spirit has worked up an invitation for you and me, well, that surprises us. But, do we really expect anything less from God? God often surprises us with Gods radically different way to see life. This case is no different. The Holy Spirit has promised to arrive into our lives bearing the Christ Child. Surprise! So let’s not be distracted by the world’s booming noise this time of the year. The one saying buy me, you deserve it, go ahead, it is a small price to pay for such deep and abiding pleasure. Let’s not be distracted and miss the critical call from the word in our heart, with scripture and the Holy Spirit saying, come to Jesus, get ready, be prepared, the day is nearing, stay awake, make straight the path. Vast differences are evident in how we respond to our distractions. The ones out there may draw us in to consumer consumption hell. The sort with dire consequences. For we may run out of money and have more presents to buy. To debt we will go. Unless we make Black Friday or Cyber Monday our particular savior that is. The others, in here, may draw us also into hell. Hell of another sort. The sort with equally dire consequences. For we might not pay attention to Advent and miss our savior, lose our soul, and be perpetually lost. Unless, that is, we consider a radically different way to make it through this Advent time to move our body, mind, and soul closer to God. Consider again that invitation I mentioned earlier. One of our own making. A different approach to our usual Christmas preparation, for sure. Consider we seriously were to invite Jesus to our home to share a meal, and visit, and exchange gifts. Consider you were bold enough to invite Jesus to bring you to a time freed from each day’s urgency. Or, can we not let go of our need to clean, and fix, and prepare our external world at the expense of our internal spiritual world? If Jesus were to be a guest in our lives what would it take to not run screaming into the night and instead be comfortably sitting on the couch ready, eyeing the front walk, so we can be there at the door when he knocks? If Jesus were to be a visitor where we work could we be calm, letting our past work speak for itself. If Jesus were to come to a special called family meeting, would we be at peace and celebrate our deep sense of love for one another. If Jesus called and asked if he could come by and sit with us on the porch, would we anticipate his great gift of grace in humble thankfulness and let the gentle porch swing direct the conversation. Or will we sit in our new gentleness and all of a sudden be so distracted the old panic returns and we start thinking, in the presence of God, have I been naughty or nice. It is true! We cannot help ourselves. So we look for ways out. Ways to decline the invitation to move closer to God. But wait. Advent leads to Christmas and it is the baby Jesus who is coming. Oh, thank goodness, the adult Jesus, the one who teaches the right way to live and then judges how we do on the exam is not coming to our house yet. It is the baby Jesus. Why he is still in diapers. What could he ask? “In those days, John the Baptist appeared in the wilderness of Judea proclaiming, ‘Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near.’” There is a crowd of folk who come to see John. Some are there to see him because of his severe reputation. He dresses odd, eats strange things, and does the most curious ritual he calls baptism. Others have come for serious reasons. They struggle with their life. They are not happy the way the world has treated them. They are looking for change, for the hope for a better life. John’s message does not disappoint either group. It is a message for everyone, “Repent, for the Kingdom of Heaven has come near.” Part of his truth telling is that God is coming to lead the Jews safely home from their captivity. For that journey, they must prepare themselves. They must prepare also the way of the Lord. By God’s grace, and God’s power they were to change their minds and hearts. They were to make an easy path, not for themselves, but for God. They were to make the way easy for God to enter their lives. They were to make life straight where their living had become crooked. This is the small print on the bottom of our invitation. We begin to make a way possible for right living by first confessing our sins. Then we join John at the River. Without confession there can be no baptism. Romans teaches baptism is a visible sign and seal of God’s invisible grace. Baptism is the beginning point for a true conversion of an inward change outwardly expressed in our way of living that glorifies God and moves us closer to God. The people who came to John, there in the wilderness of their lives, were not the kind of folk who gave up on God. Why should folks with no hope of knowing God come to John? If life has no chance for such hope there really is nothing to look forward to, no reason to get close to the River Jordan. What happens there makes no difference. The people who came to John were not folk who see their life as being perfect. Folk who see their life as being perfect do not come to John for baptism either. Why should they? Life has been perfect. Why mess things up being dunked in a river. What for? John warns these brood of vipers that their comfortable little life is on the way out. A new world, a very different world, the Kingdom of God, is going to come! He is placing a critical choice before them and before us. Have we given up on hope for anything in our lives that would be good? Have we become senile and hardened our hearts and refuse to change one thing in our lives? Are we afraid to invite Jesus into our lives? Or, are we longing to make the pilgrimage to the Jordan. Are we expecting and hopeful that hearing God’s voice through John, or perhaps our favorite scripture, or perhaps our own lives, we are hearing a call 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. Be alert 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 in yourself, your loved ones, even strangers. Be alert to see the presence of the holy in the wilderness of the neighborhood park, seeing the diversity there as part of one glorious thread of God’s good creation. Be alert to see the presence of the holy in the wilderness of a shopping trip. I cannot believe I just said that. Jesus, what have I done. Or more appropriately, what have you done. When we dare see the mass of shoppers as one continuous life force of preparation for invisible grace we may have a glimpse of baptism’s sacrament. If our hope is to prepare the way for God’s coming consider living differently in the presence of the holy at work, in school, or at home. See there not right or wrong, good or bad, joy or disappointment, fair or unfair, but a common spirit that moves in the ordinary fabric of our everyday lives. See a spirit that works at sorting out, even in the sometimes murky interior of the human heart, where and how God invites us into the fullness of our being as a Christian. Be alert, dear ones, to these movements in life as part of the way we prepare for the coming of the Christ child and our life of faithful discipleship. God is so very proud of us. God’s love for us is never tarnished. With our eyes now open to the presence of the holy and our most cherished invitation of the year, we see God’s love a little more clearly and we take up our burden and prepare the way and it does not matter much if the house looks clean or not. What matters is the impact on the lives of those around us. For there is life giving hope just a few days away, and his name is Jesus. In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen 120813.gpc