This passage starts with judgment, and it ends with good news. I hate to tell you this – it’s not very Christmas-sy, but good news will always have to have judgment in it. If there is no judgment in the story anywhere, then there is nothing, “good” about it. It is just news. And so as we approach Christmas, as we start the church year again in advent, it would be wrong not to begin at the beginning. Without judgment, there is no purpose for God to become a man. Without guilt and sin and unrighteousness, what happened in Bethlehem 2000 years ago just becomes a nice little story instead of the good news of the salvation of our souls. So, we’ll do what has come to just not seem right at this time of year, and we’ll start where it all should begin in our own hearts: listening to someone accuse us of improper motives and actions. Accuse us of sin.
Often, we come to church at Christmastime just like the crowd of all sorts of people came out to John the Baptist at the Jordan to get baptized. It’s the right thing to do. I may be inspired and feel good after it all. At worst, I’m bored for an hour, but God and some people who want me here are glad I came. Those people going out to get baptized by John, it appears that at least some of them were doing it as insurance so that they could go on with whatever they were doing in their lives. I’m afraid too many people go to church so that they can go on doing whatever they are doing in their lives and feel good about it. It is as if church or baptism or Christmas Carols would make everything else all right.
“You brood of vipers”, …”You crowd of slithering snakes,” say John the Baptist. That is not what this is about at all. You are not escaping judgment by playing around with religion. You are inviting it. You’re closer to it than you ever thought!
Leith Anderson tells a story about being misguided in your understanding of what God wants.
I once read a story about a bicycle race in India. The object of the race was to go the shortest distance possible within a specified time. At the start of the race, everyone cued up at the line, and when the gun sounded all the bicycles, as best they could, stayed put. Racers were disqualified if they tipped over or one of their feet touched the ground. And so they would inch forward just enough to keep the bike balanced. When the time was up and another gun sounded, the person who had gone the farthest was the loser and the person closest to the starting line was the winner.
Imagine getting into that race and not understanding how the race works. When the race starts, you pedal as hard and fast as you possibly can. You’re out of breath. You’re sweating. You’re delighted because the other racers are back there at the starting line. You’re going to break the record. You think, This is fantastic. Don’t let up. Push harder and faster and longer and stronger.
At last you hear the gun that ends the race, and you are delighted because you are unquestionably the winner. Except you are unquestionably the loser because you misunderstood how the race is run. (Citation: Leith Anderson, author and pastor of Wooddale Church in Eden Prairie, Minnesota; from sermon "The Height of Humility" (9-12-99).
Christmas is coming, and we are in danger of misunderstanding how this all works. We celebrate the incarnation – God becomes a man, a helpless child in the manger. But too often, it is just a nice story we spend time remembering for warm fuzzy purposes. I’ve mentioned an old line from an early contemporary Christian song by Larry Norman before: “Santa Claus is coming and the kids are getting greedy. It’s Christmas time.” Too often, even at Christmas, we have the rules all wrong. That just makes things worse than if we did nothing at all.
So, after John starts off by telling the crowd they are a bunch of snakes, and that they have it all wrong, they then ask him the inevitable question: “So what then is right?” “If this religion stuff isn’t going to help us, what will?”
I had a professor who said that the climactic passage of the Old Testament, of the rules of this life-game that God has given us, is Micah 6:8. “He has shown you, o man, what is good and what the Lord requires of you: to do justice, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God.”
It is exactly the picture John the Baptist gives. Do what you are supposed to do. That is the fruit of repentance, of a life as God wants it to be. He begins with the simplest thing for everyone. I spend a good deal of time trying to teach my three year old daughter to share with her little brother. Share your coats, share your tunics. Share. It is a reflection of the great commandment: Love God, and love your neighbor as yourself. Then the questions get more specific. Tax collector, be honest. Soldier, be content.
There is a great message in this section of the passage. In many ways, it sums up the best of the Old Testament. What God wants from us is not that we be religious in part of our lives so that we can do whatever we want with the rest of our lives. God wants our whole lives to reflect his glory in us. That is what he made us for. And that glory is reflected just as much when you are doing the dishes with a good attitude as it is when you are raising your hands in worship. As long as you are doing what God has called you to do in the way that honors him, then that is what the rules say to do.
I hate to tell you this as a pastor. I’ve been blessed with some time to study the rules. I feel like I know what I should be doing, the kind of thing that would really bring honor and glory to God. It’s things like love God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength, and love your neighbors. I’m supposed to love mercy and justice. And, even more than that, walk humbly with God. I have a picture of walking so close that I hear every specific direction, challenge and encouragement as if the choir sang it right behind me. I have an idea of what John is saying, and I really appreciate it. But I hate to tell you this as your pastor, I just haven’t done it as I should.
I’ll tell you why I’m here in church this Christmas season: I’m paid to be here!. Now, I’m certain I’d be here even if I wasn’t paid. But I cannot say that being paid does not affect my motives. It certainly does. I’m just not perfect, either in what I do, or in the motives for which I do them. And the truth is, none of us are.
This passage is the great jump from the Old Testament to the New Testament. When the people ask what they are supposed to do, John tells them. You’re supposed to do everything right for all the right reasons. That is what God expects. John the Baptist is the last of the Old Testament prophets. But he also speaks of what is going to happen next. Because, so far, it is good to know what is right, but it doesn’t make us do it.
Veronica and I had an interesting experience while we were driving to her parents last month. We were in Ohio, about the time gridlock was setting in around here, on Monday of Thanksgiving week. The car was quiet, the kids were asleep. Just trying to keep alert, I fiddled with the radio. First, I got the Laura Schlesinger program. I don’t listen to her much, but it kept me occupied for a few minutes. A caller was asking advice on how to deal with her sordid past now that she was trying to live a stable life as a wife and mother.
I don’t know if you have heard Dr. Laura. She is a strong, Jewish woman with a real sense of what is right and what is wrong. From the little I’ve heard, I agree with a great deal of it. This woman clearly understood and now agreed with what Dr. Laura believes in the area of morals. But she wanted to know how to deal with the scars and wounds of her own past. Dr. Laura’s advice was very simple: “Get over it. It’s the past now, and you can’t do anything about it. Just get over it and get on with your life.” John the Baptist reflects Dr. Laura, both good Old Testament people. When someone asks them, they say what is Dr. Laura’s catch phrase, “Do the right thing.”
Then we lost her signal, so I turned the radio station channel. I found Dr. James Dobson’s program on a Christian station. He is a well-known Christian psychologist and radio host. He had a guest, a woman who has written books on dealing with past failures. A woman called in with just about the exact same story. She wanted to know how to deal with her past indiscretions from her young adulthood especially now that she had a daughter approaching that age herself. Her own scars had never really healed, and now they were being re-opened.
There was a dramatically different response than from Dr. Laura.
One is coming, says John the Baptist. “I’ll tell you to get your act together and throw some water on you. He’ll heal you from the inside out.” I’ll tell you to stop sinning. He’ll give you the means to do it. I’ll point you to do what is right. He’ll make you righteous.
The woman who called on the phone was a Christian. She’d been a Christian for a long time. But they didn’t tell her to just get over it. They told her that it has to start with trusting God enough, having enough faith in him and his love, to be honest with him. It is only with faith in God that we can begin to face our own sin. It is only in trusting the doctor will we submit to his healing. Without that trust, we’ll just try to ignore our injuries or take care of them ourselves. Trust God and face your sin. Take it to him, and really, truly, absolutely believe that he loves you.
This is what Christmas is about. This is what the child came for. This is why it is such good news. It is because we need it so desperately. I have sinned. I need someone who will help me.
One is coming who will, who has, baptized me with the Holy Spirit and fire. This is an incredible picture of my heart and life being purified.
Dietrich Bonhoeffer, imprisoned by Hitler during World War II, writes to his fiance on one lesson learned from life in prison:
A prison cell, in which one waits, hopes, does various unessential things, and is completely dependent on the fact that the door of freedom has to be opened from the outside is not a bad picture of Advent. (Citation: www.Preachingtoday.com - Dietrich Bonhoeffer, in Letters and Papers from Prison; in a letter to his fiancee, Maria von Wedemeyer from Tegel Prison in Germany, November 21, 1943; submitted by Bill White, Paramount, CA
This Christmas, know the good news. Know that the good news starts with some bad news. Don’t be afraid to face your scars, the wounds of your own sin and the sin others have imposed upon you. Know, there is someone coming, and someone here, who can heal you.
