“John the Baptiser appeared in the Wilderness, announcing a baptism for repentance of sins”
Do any of you have one of those relatives you get a bit embarrassed about inviting over for Christmas Dinner. You “love them dearly” because they are related to you, but well… they are just a little bit odd. So it was with John the Baptist. He’s not the sort of person you really want over for Christmas Dinner.
I mean it’s the smelly clothes for one thing - Camel Hair? And when it came to baths, standing in a probably pretty filthy River Jordan was as close as it got.
And then there is the fussy eating. I mean some people for very good reasons don’t eat certain things - perhaps they are vegetarians or gluten intolerant or whatever it might be. But you can always find something in the freefrom aisle. But John the Baptist? locusts and wild honey? that’s taking faddish eating to extremes isn’t it? Not Turkey. Not Nut Loaf. but locusts.
and then his message “announcing a baptism for Repentence of sins” - Does that sound very Christmassy? in the midst of mince pies and office parties some wild eyed preacher stating “oi you: Repent!”. Except that that is exactly what we need at Christmas. The beautiful prophecy from Isaiah 40 “prepare the way of the Lord , make straight his path”. The prophet probably imagined those words would be fulfilled by the literal building of a highway across the desert from Iraq to Israel so that the king Messiah could lead the Jews home from exile.
And yes, this prophecy did indeed turn out to be about our coming home from an exile. But it is about a different form of coming home from the exile of estrangement from God’s love, with a different sort of Messiah.
and so we are to prepare the way of the Lord, to make straight the highways.
Did you know that half the Gospels don’t include a Nativity scene? Matthew and Luke both have the baby Jesus, but in Mark and John, the beginning of the Gospel doesn’t include shepherds or wise men but it does include John the Baptist.
John the baptist, who’s uncomfortable Christmas Message is repent!
So what does repent mean?
[cue music - You change your mind like a girl changes clothes - sung by the Chippettes]
The Greek word for repentance is Metanoia. How do we explain what it means?
[fetch giant picture of brain from back]
You know what this is?
A brain -
Metanoia means God taking out our old slefish mean spirited spiteful grumpy brain, and giving us a fresh new one.
Metanoia means “changing our mind” not in a trivial way as in deciding at the last minute to have goose instead of turkey. Rather changing our mind so we think in a different way, so we live in a different way.
It means making a U Turn.
The preacher J John tells a story of when he became a Christian when he was about 18. His mum was furious. “You have been brain washed”. “Yes mum, I have been brain washed, and if you had seen what was in my brain before, you would be very glad it had been washed” (1)
John the baptist appears uncomfortable because he appears to be wagging a finger at us. Nobody likes other people lording it over them and pointing a finger at them. But actually, if we are honest with ourselves, all of us have plenty in our brains that needs a jolly good scrub. If someone invented a machine that when you were wired up, every thought that you had ever had was projected on a screen so that everyone in this church could see it - well how many of you would volunteer to have every thought you have ever had projected up there for everyone to see?
We all need our brains given a jolly good scrub - “Prepare the way of the Lord and make the path straight for him” (Mark 1:3)
In terms of taking the old brain out [mime it] and putting the new brain in [mime it] there are three parts to it. Lets call them the three “R’s” of repentance,
The first “R” is recognising our sin. Verse 5 tells us that this is what those first century Christians did: “The whole Judean countryside and all the people of Jerusalem went out to him. Confessing their sins…” (Mark 1:5) Recognize our sin.
At first sight, we all like to say “oh, I’m not that bad.” but how far do you have to think back last week before you come to something you said or did or thought that you really don’t want everyone in this church to know about because you are ashamed about it? Perhaps you are far holier than me and can think back so long before you recognise something you wish you had not done or thought or said.
Perhaps you can think back at least as far as …. yesterday?
Something I have found helpful, and something many people in Anglo-catholic churches find helpful is what’s called “Making your confession”- When I go (or you go) and sit in the presence of a priest and say out loud to God the things I am ashamed of. I don’t know about you, but I find I am not always honest with myself. I can pretend “oh it wasn’t that bad” - but when I say it out loud, I come face to face with the fact that it wasn’t good what I have done. I guess that’s why “The whole Judean countryside and all the people of Jerusalem went out to him. Confessing their sins…” (Mark 1:5) - they felt the need to get that bad stuff off their chest. I guess that’s why the letter of James too advises us to confess our sins out loud. It’s not the only way to do this first R| of “Recognise our Sin”, but I find it very helpful, and if you have never tried it, you might find it helpful too.
….
After that first “R” of repentance “Recognising our Sin”comes the second “R,” and that is RECEIVING forgiveness from God. Verse 4 talks about a "baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins.”
The shocking message of Christianity is that there is nothing you can do that is do terrible that God will not forgive you.
After the horrors of the Khmer Rouge, one of the former generals of that regime Comrade Duch became a Christian. Why? Because after he recognised the evil of what he had done, where was he to go? The Buddhism of his native land offered only karma - the threat of eternal consequences for his evil. Only the message of Jesus offered the possibility of forgiveness. Not an escape from Jail - Duch has gone to jail. But the possibility of forgiveness.
I’ve never met a war criminal, but I have met people who have done time who have become Christians. Society may have written them off but Jesus does not write them off.
What about us? If God can even forgive those things, then the things that we think no one can forgive us for, the things we keep beating ourselves up about, God says “You are forgiven”.
“Receiving a baptism for the forgiveness of sins” - baptism is like a giant plug hole sucking all our sins away into the grace of Jesus on the cross. Whether you were baptised as an adult, as a teenager or as a baby, you were washed not just on the outside but on the inside. And it doesn’t just deal with our sins up till that date, otherwise we would have to wait till our death bed to get baptised. To quote 1 Peter 3:21 “baptism now saves you, not as a removal of dirt from the body but as an appeal to God, through Jesus Christ (who has gone into heaven and is at the right hand of God) for a good conscience”
a giant plug hole sucking all our sins away into the grace of Jesus on the cross.
Indeed, if you “make your confession” through the mouth of a priest you’ll hear God say to you those very words “Your Sins are forgiven”.
Even here in mass - at the beginning of every mass, we say sorry and then we hear the absolution - that our sins ARE forgiven.
God takes our sins, and to Corrie Ten Boom, he chuck them to the bottom of the deepest ocean and puts up a sign saying “no fishing”.
Recognising our sin
Receiving Forgiveness from God
….
The final “R” is reforming your life. That means that after you have been forgiven
for being so impatient, you become patient in your life. After you have been forgiven for having a bad temper, you become gentle. After you have been forgiven for being so greed, you become generous. After you have been forgiven for disobeying God and making excuses, you begin to obey God, not because you have to, but because you want to. You change from a self-centered worshiper of pleasure to an others-centered worshiper of God. The final “R” of repentance is when your life is reformed, changed, from how it was before.
But how do I do this? How do I find courage to confess all my sins to God? How do I know that I am really forgiven? Where can I find strength to change, to reform my life? How does this take place? What would John the Baptist say to you? He would say, “After me will come one more powerful than I, the thongs of whose sandals I am not worthy to stoop down and untie.I baptize you with water, but he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit.” (2)
Have you ever sat there after a meal and thought “if only the dishes would wash themselves” - and of course they don’t. And it is the same with us - like dishes we can’t change ourselves - But God changes us. He pours his Holy Spirit into us and changes us from the inside out.
Now perhaps this all sounds a bit puritan and killjoy. It’s three Sundays to Christmas and yet Father Mund is talking about Repentence.
But repentance isn’t kiljoy. Rather it’s about becoming who God made us to truly be. Remember the story of the ugly duckling. When he tries to be a duck he thinks that will make him happy but instead he is miserable and unhappy all the time. Then he realises he is meant to be be a swan - and he flys away graceful and happy. God doesn’t want us to be tied down in a life of sin that is making us miserable and unhappy all the time. Through repentence and renewal he wants you to become the you you were truly made to be.
Prepare the way of the Lord
An elderly grandma decided she did not really know what young people wanted for Christmas these days, so she decided to send them a cheque instead with the card. Well she wrote all the cards, sealed the envelope and posted them off.
A few days after she posted all the cards, she discovered she had forgotten to include the cheques inside.
Imagine all of the children opening a card from grandma with a note inside that simply states, “Buy your own presents.” (3)
When we prepare for Christmas, remembering to put the cheques inside the envelopes is probably important, but even more important is remembering to prepare our hearts - “Prepare the way of the Lord and make the path straight for him” (Mark 1:3)
(1) Sermon preached by J John at HTB, July 2014
(2) The three “R”s of repentence from a sermon preached by Lutheran priest Don Schultz on this site
(3) Joke from sermon by Fr Jeffrey Smead on this site
