For What Do You Seek?

Langenburg / Churchbridge 2 Advent

4 December 2022

Isaiah 11:1-10

Psalm 72:1-7, 18-19

Romans 15:4-13

Matthew 3:1-12

God of justice,

clear our lives of hatred and despair

and sow in us seeds of joy and peace;

so that shoots of hope may spring forth in us

as we await the coming of the Christ,

who with you and Holy Spirit,

lives and reigns, one God,

now and forever. Amen.

_________________________________________

The prophet comes among us. He comes among us for the purpose of pointing our lives, our hearts to the Christ, to the love of God made manifest in the world around us.

Now, he’s not a soft-spoken man. Rather he’s lived most of his adult life among the Nazarene – the desert fathers of the Israelite tradition. So, to our amateur gaze, he probably looks more like what we would associate with a street person, a homeless person rather than someone who is meant to garner our respect and our compassion with his appearance alone. After all, John does come from the priestly class of Hebrew society.

But what reaches out to us, what draws us here today is his words, his message. It pulls us away from regular life, away from our usual leisure pursuits to hear, to inwardly digest and to live into his message to each one of us, today.

After all, our gospel tells us: “In those days John the Baptist appeared in the wilderness of Judea, proclaiming, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near.”” (Mt 3:1-2)

In each of our lives, we hunger for the love of God, and so, we, like the people to whom John is speaking, today, are looking for the one sent from God. We follow every clue we can find like a treasure hunter following clues to the ultimate grand prize.

I’m reminded of a scene in the movie National Treasure (2004) when Benjamin Gates tells his father he found “the Charlotte”.

For generations the Gates family has searched out any possible clue relating to the name “Charlotte” and a connection to the “founding fathers” of the United States. “The secret lies with Charlotte.”

Its only when Benjamin finds the ship The Charlotte that he finds the next clue in the path to locating the treasure that his family has known about since the early days of the United States.

So, today, we, search out the Prophet of the Most High God, as he proclaims: ““Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near.”” (Mt 3:2)

Here he is fulfilling Isaiah’s prophecy of the one who will point each one of us in the direction of the Messiah. The fulfillment of God’s redemptive love for all of creation.

But this sunburned and scruffy prophet of God is doing more than just talking, isn’t he?

We’re told that the people from all over the region were going to him, to hear him, to receive the baptism of repentance.

So, this man, this prophet whose job is to point us to Jesus, to the Messiah, the one who is greater than he is, is actively encouraging absolutely everyone to be in a better relationship with God through the waters of rebirth and repentance.

If we look back at Israel’s relationship with God, water and rebirth are constant themes.

When Jacob returned to the ancestral lands, he needs to cross the river

When Moses leads the Israelites from slavery to freedom, he leads them through the waters of the Red Sea, and after Joshua leads them through the waters of the Jordan River. (Ex and Josh)

Although with God’s blessing they cross through on dry ground, each time they cross the water, the people are reborn. Each time they cross the water they learn more about themselves, and their relationship with God.

Each time, they repent of previous behaviours and strive to grow into their, into our relationship with God, through the Messiah, through the teachings of Jesus.

And this brings us back to John who is in the Jordan river preaching and exhorting and baptizing the people who are searching and seeking God in their midst, in our midst.

It brings us back to the prophet who points us in the direction of the Messiah, the Christ.

“In those days John the Baptist appeared in the wilderness of Judea, proclaiming, 2‘Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near.’ … 5Then the people of Jerusalem and all Judea were going out to him, and all the region along the Jordan, 6and they were baptized by him in the river Jordan, confessing their sins. … [he declared:] 11 ‘I baptize you with water for repentance, but one who is more powerful than I is coming after me; I am not worthy to carry his sandals. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire. 12His winnowing-fork is in his hand, and he will clear his threshing-floor and will gather his wheat into the granary; but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire.’” (Mt 3:1-2, 5-6, 11-12)

But even when he is confronting those who he knows is supposed to live a more righteous life, he is striving to inspire our love and fear of God, as only prophets are able to do.

At the same time, we come to this text with a more scientific understanding of the way the world works. This means that we need to step back from the science, the discussion of evolution and we need to appreciate and find our sense of awe for all that God has created.

In this john uses such imagery as “axe is lying at the root of the trees”, John tells everyone “He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire. 12His winnowing-fork is in his hand, and he will clear his threshing-floor and will gather his wheat into the granary; but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire.’” (Mt 3:10a, 11b-12)

We’re told to fear and to love God, yet it’s a fear rooted more in awe than in terror.

After all, this is the same God who created the world, everything that is in the world. We are in awe of all that God has created from the micro cellular level to the galaxies “far, far away”

We are in awe of the beauty and the grandeur, of the detail, of the fact that we are able to form emotional attachment to our environment and to others in our lives, as well as to God.

John proclaims: “2‘Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near.’” (Mt 3:2)

And we are awe that God is among us.

We are in awe that God is guiding us, whether we acknowledge God in our midst or not.

So, we, like those who have come to John at the River Jordan. We are waiting.

We wait still, and in that waiting we come together, and we anticipate the coming of the Messiah into the world, into our lives, into our hearts.

At the same time, John recognizes that not everyone who comes to him is anxiously waiting for the redemptive love and will of God to be made manifest in the world, in our lives.

Some are here to find out what John’s message is, and how are they able to control the flow of information. These individuals want to know if they can charge people to hear what John has to say?

They want to know if John speaking out against existing rule of the day in any way that will cause problems for the Israelite community and the roman government?

So, john speaks to them directly. He calls them out. He names their desire to control instead of to embrace the love and the grace of God through the work of the Messiah.

“7 But when he saw many Pharisees and Sadducees coming for baptism, he said to them, ‘You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come? 8Bear fruit worthy of repentance. 9Do not presume to say to yourselves, “We have Abraham as our ancestor”; for I tell you, God is able from these stones to raise up children to Abraham. 10Even now the axe is lying at the root of the trees; every tree therefore that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire.” (Mt 3:7-10)

In the movie National Treasure, our main character faces much on his way to find the treasure from disillusioned family to government employees who are ‘just doing their job’, to a criminal element who, naturally, wants the “ill gotten booty” for themselves.

But when the treasure is finally found, Gates finds a way to capture the bad guys, not go to jail, return what was needed to find the treasure, and to enrich the historical treasures of countless nations around the world by returning to them what had been taken centuries and millennia before out of their own histories and treasuries. He declares the treasure should be “given to the people. … Thousands of years of world history.”

When we hear Johns words, when we align our lives so that we remember to be in awe of all of God’s creation and of God, when we share that treasure with the world around us, we enrich our own lives, as well as the lives of everyone we encounter.

Jesus’ message is not for one pair of ears. His ministry isn’t for one people alone.

Salvation is God’s gift to all people, and today we see John pointing the way to the one who wields the Holy Spirit to make the world a better place, one heart, one life at a time.

Look at the adventure that lies before us! What a journey! Amen.