Swanton Novers 9-12-01
Fact or Fiction Mt. 3:1-12
On a cold Christmas Eve in 1818 Father Joseph Mohr (1792-1848) walked the three kilometres from his home -in the Austrian village of Oberndorf bei Salzburg - to visit his friend Franz Gruber (1787-1863) in the neighbouring town of Arnsdorf bei Laufen.
Mohr brought with him a poem he had written some two years earlier. He desperately needed a carol for the midnight mass that was only a few hours away.
He hoped his friend, Gruber, a schoolteacher - who also served as the church’s choirmaster and organist - could set his poem to music.
And so Franz Gruber composed a melody for Mohr’s poem in just a few hours on 24th December 1818.
Recent flooding of the nearby Salzach river had put the church organ out of commission, so Gruber composed the music for guitar accompaniment.
A few hours after Gruber finished his composition,he and Mohr stood before the altar of the St. Nicholas Church in Oberndorf to perform their own work.
A local choir group backed them up as the sounds of the brand new carol broke the silence of that “Silent Night” in the mountain village of Oberndorf.
It is true that Joseph Mohr and Franz Gruber did write the famous carol “Silent Night” in 1818, but sadly, the story of the broken church organ, is fiction.
Distinguishing fact or fiction is what this morning’s Gospel reading is all about.
John The Baptist came to herald the "advent" of the True Messiah - Jesus who birth we celebrate at Christmas.
But first he had to come and dispel some of the myths about the ROLE of the Messiah and the "worthiness" of the "people of GHod - the Jews.
Let me explain what I mean.
The Jews in the first century AD were expecting an ALL CONQUERING Messiah to come. One who would boot the hated Romans out.
Their reasoning was that God – whose sons they were after all - wouldn’t allow this unjust state of affairs to continue. And he had done it before
hadn’t he? Let me explain a bit of the background.
The last of the Old Testament prophets Malachi had spoken almost 400 years earlier. From that time onwards, the Jews had had no direct word from God. In that period between the last words of Malachi and the coming of John the Baptist, the Jews had been conquered first by the Seleucids and then by the Romans.
However they had successfully risen up against the Seleucid ruler, Antiochus IV, when he defiled the Temple in Jerusalem by sacrificing a pig on the altar in 167BC.Under the banner of the Maccabees, the Jews retook Jerusalem in 165BC and rededicated the Temple.
And the Jews- to this day - remember this event
in the Feast of Hanukkah. They once again become an independent kingdom, with the house of Maccabees as kings. It was a period of history of which they were – rightly - very proud.
However, in BC 63 the Roman general Pompey was invited to settle a dispute between two Jewish claimants to the throne of Israel. Instead of settling the dispute, Pompey took it as an opportunity to conquer Israel. So in 63 BC he took Jerusalem and from then on, the Romans imposed their rule.
So by the time of Jesus’ birth, the Jews – with nationalistic fervour - were expecting a Messiah much like the Maccabees had been 150 years earlier - an all-conquering hero .
In the same way as the story of “Silent Night” was a mixture of fact and fiction, so the Jews expectation of the Messiah was a mixture of fact and fiction. The fact was that the Messiah was coming. The fiction was that he was going to kick the Romans out.
Instead John the Baptist came with a shocking message. REPENT.
Surely it is not us Jews who need to repent – but the Romans. “Not so” said John.
His message of repentance had three effects.
1.Alarm
The first effect of John’s call to repentance was that people were filled with alarm.
They came “from Jerusalem and all Judea and the whole region of the Jordan. Confessing their sins, they were baptised in the Jordan River.” (Mt. 3:5)
The reason I think they were filled with alarm is that they made the long journey out to hear him. And then responded to his message by being baptised.
If they hadn’t been alarmed they wouldn’t have come that long way – and remember they didn’t have cars and motorways to come like we do today to church. Some might have travelled days to come to listen to John.
They wanted to get straight with God so they confessed their sinfulness and pledged to
change their way of life.
2. Action
The second effect of John’s call to repentance was that action was needed.
When the Pharisees came to him, he told them:
“Produce fruit in keeping with repentance.” (Mt. 3:8)
The Pharisees would go religiously to the Temple week in and week out. But that wasn’t enough.
John was saying - God is not interested in “religious duty” he is interested in Godly living!
For John, repentance must result in ACTION.
John told them to “Produce fruit” in keeping with their repentance”. What fruit you might ask is John talking about?
In the parallel passage of Luke 3, we read that John told
tax collectors to collect no more taxes than they were legally entitled to and
soldiers not to extort money and accuse people falsely.
Repentance must change the way they live.
3. Attitude
The third effect of the call to repentance was that their attitude must change.
The Jews used to look down on the Gentiles – the Greeks and Romans.
So much so that they referred to them as dogs. The Jews saw themselves as a “spiritual elite” – because of their birth.
Not so! said John the Baptist - your attitude has to change:
“Do not think you can say to yourselves ‘We have Abraham as our Father’. I tell you that out of these stones God can raise up children for Abraham” (Mt. 3:9)
Repentance requires humility.
And perhaps there is an allusion here to the passage in Ezekiel 26:36 where the Lord says to his people:
“I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you. I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my spirit in you and move you to follow my decrees and be careful to keep my laws”
What is this heart of flesh all about? Well I think it produces the new attitude to which John is referring?
When we are born again, God gives us a new heart – and with it a new attitude in life.
Paul calls it the fruit of the Spirit in Gal 6:22 and defines it as:
Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law
Conclusion.
Advent is a time when we look forward to the birth of Jesus, when God took flesh and became a human baby in Bethlehem 2000 years ago.
However, in the same way as the story of “Silent Night” was a mixture of fact and fiction, so our view of Christmas is often a mixture of fact and fiction.
The fact was that Jesus, the Saviour of the World was born in a stable in Bethlehem. The fiction is that everything will be “hunky dory”.
Perhaps J John put it well when he said: If you take Christ out of Christmas, all you are left with is M&S (logo of the English chain - Marks and Spencers).
John comes like a thunderbolt from the sky challenges us to REPENT.
I believe his message is
1. An alarm call – to wake us up to reality
2. A call for action and
3. A call to review my attitude to others.
If going to the Temple was not enough for the Jews, surely going to Church on Sunday will not enough for us today.
“I cannot preach the good news and be the bad news.”
I am challenged by John’s message. As the apostle John put it - when speaking about Jesus.
“He must increase and I must decrease.” Jn 3:30
Is that THE challenge for Christmas for you too?
