Year C

Luke 3:1-6

The Very Rev. Denise Vaughn

God’s Historical Messengers

My family and I spent several days last week in Washington, DC taking in all the rich history of our country. You could spend days there and not see all the sights. The one place that touched us very deeply was the new Holocaust museum. It was almost unbelievable the evil that occurred during those years to the Jews and others. If we don’t want to repeat history, it is important to know history. And some of us love history, but even if you don’t, you have to admit its significance. Most of us want to know where we came from. I did the Ancestry DNA test several years ago to find out where my family came from. Along with so many others who have taken similar tests, I wanted to have a record of my heritage.

As Christians, we have a deep respect for history. It is a part of our faith, as Peter puts it in his second letter, “We do not follow cleverly devised myths”; rather, the disciples were eyewitnesses of Jesus’ ministry, death, and resurrection and they wrote about what they did and saw. Those first generation Christians, were also very conscious of the history and integrity of their faith. They were surrounded by false teachers who claimed to be true Christians and hundreds of gods all based on fables and myths. But Christianity proudly points to its roots in actual historical events. This is how Luke in his gospel today introduces us to the ministry and person of John the Baptizer.

John the Baptist is so important that Luke begins by naming seven Roman rulers scattered throughout Judea and the realm all to give us a setting for this Jewish prophet- John, the son of Zechariah and Elizabeth, the cousin of Jesus. It may sound a bit strange, much like John himself, to say that I find great comfort every Advent, as we are preparing for Christ’s birth and his second coming, to hear again the urgency in John’s words to us. He was a hinge of history. He closed a door on the old and ushered in the new. He was the voice in the wilderness crying out for the way of God to be prepared with relentless urgency.

His words were a message from God about what God is doing in the world. The world is always desperately in need of a word from God to give understanding and direction, meaning and encouragement. John was God’s messenger as was Malachi & Paul. Their mission was to communicate so that God’s desire for creation might be known: straightened paths, valleys and mountains made into plains, rocky ways made even. Refining and purifying as Malachi proclaims. The word Malachi in Hebrew means “my messenger.” Malachi, a prophet of the early fifth century was devoted to the Temple and its priesthood.

The word of the Lord came to him as a word of promise and the text today begins on a note of great good news. He prophesies the coming of a messenger to prepare the way before the Lord. The coming of the noble figure is by no means unexpected, for this is the one “whom you seek,” the one “in whom you delight.” He comes “suddenly” and his role is that of the “messenger of the covenant.” But the glad tidings with which the letter opens are soon transformed into a mood of apprehension. The messenger may be a news bringer, but the news he brings is a word of judgment. The justice of God, which this coming one represents, is so thorough in its determination that it is doubtful that any may survive unscathed. 

He will purify Israel a as a refiner’s fire to reshape the people of God into the image that Yahweh intends for them, an image of righteousness. Then and only then will they be able to present righteous offerings to their Lord. Thus, the church in this text is confronted by the reality that the Advent expectation is not just a longing for the “sweet little Jesus baby.” It is also the anticipation that with the coming of God’s messenger the world is put on notice that things are about to change, that wrongs are about to be uprooted and replaced with the values of God. This good news, this sense of crisis, is what John the Baptist in his preaching, speaks to, a crisis brought about by the coming of salvation in Jesus Christ.

God is about to shake up the current arrangements-salvation is announced as leveling, upsetting and overturning. This imagery of leveling and straightening is John’s call to the action of making, opening, and clearing the way for God; to turn to God, and from sin, to seek God’s forgiveness, and to prepare the way of the Lord. John’s work is directly tied to the coming of Jesus and preparing people to receive him but John’s hearers are going to fail to see God’s justice in Jesus. Both Malachi’s audience and John’s audience have made themselves unable to recognize God because they are trying to make him meet their standards. 

One of the hardest tasks for the church this time of year is to cut through the cultural layers of commercialism, consumerism, and sentimentality. There are so many activities vying for our time and energies, so many presents to buy. How will John’s message of preparation to receive Christ’s salvation or Malachi’s call to us to present the pure offering of our hearts, dedicated solely to the Lord, unblemished or distracted with worldly care and use, or how will Paul’s prayer that our love may overflow so we may be blameless on the day of Christ, be heard in the midst of all the business?    

This is why we need to hear again the message that John the Baptist, Malachi, & Paul’s urge us to hear in Advent. To remind us that preparation is necessary and difficult before the day of the Lord. It demands repentance, but joy comes in forgiveness. This moment, and no other, is the moment at which all the paths to God are suddenly made straight, there are no more valleys to be trudged through, no more hills to be climbed, no more winding lanes to take us out of our way. At this particular historical moment, God’s salvation comes to us as a gift, not by our own effort. Only God has the authority and power to let go of our sins. This refining and purifying will happen under God’s control and in God’s time and it will be good. 

God is at work in us, preparing us and the world for something magnificent-the salvation of all people. John reminds us of the need to be prepared for the Christ who is to come. We are given the task of making the highways workable again repairing them so that “all flesh” can indeed see God’s salvation, this task the church dare not neglect. Looking ahead, planning, and working for the better day that by God’s goodness and grace lies ahead is one of the best, healthiest things we humans can do. Paul says prayer, love, knowledge, insight and actions will help us best to be prepared for Christ’s presence. Martin Luther says that this kind of preparing for the future is a clearing out of the way whatever will be an obstruction. 

At the same time, John and Advent remind the church that the word of God does emerge in unlikely places. The rulers of the world and the rulers of the church continue in their ways, content with things as they are, perhaps lulled into believing that they are in fact the “rulers.” The advent of the infant Jesus will demonstrate that real power lies elsewhere and to expect the unexpected when it comes to God’s promises being fulfilled.  God chooses messengers not of power but of faith and has spoken to God’s people all through history. Like John, let us commit to preparing the way of the Lord. And leave history’s hinge to the lord of history.