Charlotte Collins Reed
Christ Church Episcopal
December 5, 2021
2 Advent C
My father kept meticulous baby books when my sister and I
were born just 13 months apart. The
books are full of all the details of the world into which we were born. Those details include things like who the President
of the U.S. was, what the big news stories were, names of the most popular movies
and TV shows, and other tidbits of information about the world into which we
were born. On the one hand, this seems
like trivia. But on the other hand, that
information gives the context into which my parents brought their small humans
into the world.
Luke is doing a similar thing this morning when we are told
that, in the fifteenth year of the reign of Emperor Tiberius, when Pontius Pilate
was governor of Judea, Herod was ruler of Galilee, and on and on until we get
to Annas and Caiphas as the high priests, the word of God came to John. On the one hand, my eyes tend to glaze over
reading lists of names like that. I’m
looking for the verb. Just tell me what
happened!! But on the other hand, Luke
is telling us that at a very specific moment in time, a concrete, identifiable
moment, the word of God came to John the Baptist in the wilderness. What was John the Baptist doing in the
wilderness at the moment the word of God came to him? Who knows?
But that word sent him into all the region around the Jordan proclaiming
a baptism for the repentance of sin and urging people to prepare the way of the
Lord.
The wilderness is a hugely important place in the Hebrew
scriptures, a place where God is often encountered and usually in unexpected
ways. In the book of Exodus, Moses is
out beyond the wilderness tending the flock of his father-in-law when God calls
to him from a burning bush, changing the course of Moses’ life and Israelite
history forever. The Israelites are in
the wilderness 40 years, following God in a pillar of cloud by day and a pillar
of fire by night, and encountering the power and love of God in a myriad of unique
ways. Isaiah (43) writes eloquently about
the new thing God is about to do in the wilderness and the way the wilderness
will burst into bloom, rejoice and be glad at God’s presence (Isaiah 35). The examples go on and on of the ways God is
experienced in the wilderness, so we should not be surprised when the word of
God comes to John in the wilderness.
What does the voice of God speaking through John the
Baptist call the people to do? John quotes
Isaiah and calls them to “Prepare the way of the Lord. Every valley shall be filled, every mountain
and hill made low, the crooked shall be made straight, and the rough ways made
smooth.” That sounds like a LOT of
work! In fact, what John is asking of
the people sounds impossible. If we have
to fill valleys and flatten mountains in order to prepare the way of the Lord,
we may well have to remain unprepared.
At the Family Table service at 9am last Sunday, the Bible
study for the adults was on the gospel reading for that day, in which Jesus
calls us to be alert to watch for the signs that he is returning. One person in the Bible study said that he
hears those words differently after almost two years of being on high alert all
the time. The words do not sound so
exciting anymore and alertness fatigue is a real thing. I think the same applies to the call to
prepare. We have a bit of preparation
fatigue, having lived in the Covid wilderness since March 2020. We have prepared by buying and wearing masks,
and I know I have sampled a ridiculous number of masks to find the one that
fits just right. We have purchased extra
toilet paper, Clorox wipes, and Tylenol in case of shortages or in case we
become homebound. We have prepared for
food shortages, supply chain disruptions, for what we would do if we had to quarantine
or if the economy goes south. So the
thought of having to prepare the way of the Lord by filling valleys or flattening
mountains sounds a bit overwhelming this morning and we can easily write off
the words of John the Baptism as a bit of scriptural hyperbole.
However, I wonder if the words of Baruch can be helpful
here. Baruch calls us to a different
kind of preparation, a way of preparing not by what we do but by who we are. Baruch says to us “Take off the garment of your
sorrow and affliction and put on forever the beauty of the glory of God….for
God will give you evermore the name “Righteous peace, Godly glory.” Baruch
is calling us to a way of living, of living as people of hope in what God is
about to do, people who rejoice in the glory of God. Yes, Baruch still says that God has ordered
that every mountain be made low and the valleys be filled to make the ground
level, but Baruch also says that God will lead Israel with joy, in the light of
God’s glory, with the mercy and righteousness that come from him. Perhaps the mountain that needs to be leveled
is the mountain of despair and the valley that needs to be filled is the pit of
hopelessness. Perhaps preparing the way
of God is to live such that our lives reflect the joy and hope of which Baruch
speaks. The good news is that we do not
have to do this work alone. The promise
of Baruch is that God will lead us with joy in the light of God’s glory and we
will go together. We prepare by being the
people God calls us to be, which will lead us to the work God calls us to do to
prepare the way of the Lord.
That the Word of God came to John in the wilderness should be
no surprise. The surprise, perhaps, is
that God continues to break into the wilderness at specific moments in time and
in concrete ways, whatever that wilderness might be, and even in that wilderness
God calls us to be people of hope and expectation in what God is about to do. As we await the birth of the Christ Child, the
call of Advent is to prepare by living as people of great hope and deep
expectation. The promise of Advent is that God will lead us
and that we go together. There is
nothing we have to do alone. Then, we
will be amazed at what happens, what mountains fall and what valleys are
lifted, so that all flesh can see the salvation of God.
Amen.
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