Luke 3:7-18
John said to the crowds who came out to be baptized by him, “You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee the wrath to come? Bear fruits worthy of repentance. Do not begin to say about yourselves, ‘We have Abraham as our ancestor.’ For I tell you that from these stones God could raise up children to Abraham. Even now the axe is lying at the root of the tree. And every tree that does not bear good fruit will be cut down and thrown into the fire.”
The crowds asked him, “Then what shall we do?” In reply, John said to them, “If anyone among you has two coats, you should give one away to someone who has none. If any among you has food, you should do likewise.” Even some tax collectors came to be baptized and they said to him, “What should we do?” John said to them, “Do not collect more than has been prescribed for you.” Some soldiers also came and asked him, “And we, what should we do?” He said to them, “Do not extort money from anyone by threats for false accusation, and be satisfied with your wages.”
While the crowds were filled with expectation and wondering in their hearts if John was the Messiah, he answered them all saying, “I baptized you with water. There is one who is more powerful than I coming after me. I am not worthy to untie the thong of his sandal. He will baptize with the holy spirit and with fire. His winnowing fork is in his hand to clear his threshing floor and to gather the wheat into his granary, but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire.”
With these and many other exhortations, John proclaimed the good news to all the people.
I heard from a few of you, after last week’s sermon, that I seemed angry while I was preaching. I was a little surprised and self-conscious about that … concerned about how it might come off to people who don’t know me well. So I was glad to see that we got some more from John the Baptist this week – and that he was calling people names, yelling about the wrath to come, railing about threshing floors and unquenchable fire. I feel like that makes whatever I was up to seem justified, and tame, by comparison.
And, on top of that, after calling the crowd coming to be baptized a “brood of vipers,” after threats of being cut down and burned up like trees, after talk of being baptized by the holy spirit and with fire, and after announcing that Jesus, wielding his winnowing fork, was about to “clear his threshing floor” and “separate the wheat from the chaff,” we’re supposed to believe people heard all of it as good news?!
It doesn’t sound like good news to me. John, the Baptist, seems angry. And, on the Third Sunday of Advent it certainly doesn’t feel like Christmas.
But the truth is, John didn’t have Christmas on the brain and wasn’t feeling the holiday spirit in those days by the river, when he was baptizing people and waiting for Jesus to meet him out there in the wilderness. It’s important to remember, what we just heard takes place years after Jesus was born in Bethlehem. These were days just before the beginning of Jesus’ ministry, when he was already grown, about to show the world that the kingdom of God had come near and that he was the Way and the Truth and the Life of it all.
And John the Baptist was tired of waiting. Again, not waiting for Christmas to come, like so many of us may feel right about now. And not just waiting for Jesus, really, either.
No, John seems to be tired of waiting on the people – all those people, coming to be baptized – all those men and women and children, presumably. All those tax collectors, soldiers and strangers, too, who made their way into the wilderness hungry for a different kind of teaching, longing for a deeper spirituality, searching for a new way of being in the world that John’s baptism and this Messiah they were hoping for promised them. And John seems tired of waiting for them to get it, to grasp it, and to be changed by this promise he was offering … and that Jesus came to deliver.
Have you ever waited for someone to change something in their own life, for their own good? Like an alcoholic who can’t get sober… Like a drug addict who can’t kick the habit… Like a loved-one with an eating disorder, maybe… Like a friend who won’t leave a bad or even abusive relationship… Or, like a kid who just won’t do what they could or should do to get their grades up or try something new or make better choices…
I imagine that’s how John felt, down by the river. Not as furious as he was frustrated; Not so much mad as he was discouraged; Not as angry as he was exasperated; Not so much pissed-off as he was pleading with God’s people to do something new, and better, and different for a change.
Because that’s what “repentance” means, remember: to turn, to change, to be changed. John wanted people to stop making excuses. To stop denying responsibilities. To grab hold of what a journey of faith could mean – not just for those who engaged it – but for the world they were meant to engage because of it. Which is why I think John still has something to say to you and me.
Because, what gets my attention about this passage every time is when John tells the people, “from these stones God could raise up children to Abraham.” What John knows is that some of the Jews in his day were resting on their laurels as descendants of all those Old Testament Jews we know about. They seemed to have been under the impression that, since they had Abraham in their family tree, that this faith-walking, repentance and life-changing stuff, didn’t really apply to them. That maybe they had an “in” with God because of who they were as a people.
So, when John says, “from these stones, God could raise up children to Abraham,” he’s basically saying, “get over yourselves and get busy.” “If God just wanted descendants of Abraham; if God just wanted religious people by name or ethnicity or heritage, God could bring them back from the dead or just mix up a batch of new ones from the stones at your feet.”
“From these stones God could raise up children to Abraham.”
But, just like those crowds of tax collectors and soldiers and curious souls of every stripe, being baptized by John way back when, we are descendants of Abraham, you and I. And we have work to do, you and I, not because we HAVE TO, but because WE GET TO. And like the saying goes, I think John is saying to us – just as he was saying to the crowds way back when – “we are the ones we are waiting for.”
We forget it sometimes – when we rest on our laurels or when our despair gets the best of us or when the world convinces us we can’t, or shouldn’t, or that it’s not our place – but we are the ones we are waiting for to make a change in and for the sake of this world, precisely because we are descendants of Abraham and children of God; blessed in so many ways to be a blessing in so many ways.
We are the ones we are waiting for, to do something about gun violence in this country.
We are the ones we are waiting for to do something about this pandemic, whenever and wherever and however we are able.
We are the ones we are waiting for to do something about everything I mentioned last week – racism, sexism, homophobia, and poverty, too.
We are the ones we are waiting for, you and I, to give thanks for the grace that belongs to us because we belong to God – and we’re the ones called to share that same grace with the world however we’re able.
And I think sometimes it takes a child to remind us of that – a child, in a manger, wrapped in swaddling clothes and headed for Calvary. A child who looks like the crowds gathered at the riverside with John… a child who looks like us, still waiting for so much to change… a child who looks like the “we” we’ve been waiting for.
So, let’s be changed, you and I, by the kind of repentance John calls us to and the kind of repentance God desires; the kind of repentance that matters; the kind of repentance that would make God smile.
Let’s ask different questions and seek better answers and let’s keep longing for a better way. And let’s let this child who comes, in Jesus, turn us around in real, meaningful, evident ways that haven’t happened yet – but that can and will happen, when we let the grace of God, at Christmas, have its way with us every moment of every day that we’re blessed to live and move and breathe in and for the sake of this world.
Amen. Come, Lord Jesus.
