Year A
Matthew 11:2-11
The Very Rev. Denise Vaughn
The Joy of Reversals
The third Sunday of Advent with the coming of the Lord growing ever closer is traditionally one that emphasizes joy. We are to celebrate with joy this coming Messiah. We lit the rose candle on the Advent wreath which is the liturgical color that symbolizes joy. Historically, today is known as “Gaudete” Sunday. “Gaudete” is Latin for “rejoice [ye]”. All our readings today invite us into the joy of new life with God and to examine our hearts to discover what may be keeping us from fully embracing that joy. Ultimately, in this season of waiting and preparing, as in every season in the church year, we are called to live into the hope of the resurrection.
Today, we find John the Baptist, the first one to recognize Jesus as Israel’s long-awaited Messiah and who was sent to prepare the way of the Lord, is in prison. Hard to find much hope or joy in his situation. King Herod had taken exception to John’s fiery preaching and in particular to his condemnation of him for marring his brother’s ex-wife. John came to announce that God’s kingdom and God’s true king was on the way. Herod was not the real king. It’s no wonder Herod put him in prison. Now in prison, with things not working out the way he had expected, it sounds as if John is disappointed. Possibly having doubts about Jesus being the Messiah. He must have expected that when the Messiah came, he and his group would be vindicated. Jesus would confront Herod himself, take him off the throne and become king in his place.
But it seemed as though Jesus was working to a different script altogether. Jesus was going around befriending tax-collectors and sinners, people whom strict Jews like the Essenes, of which John was a part of, would regard as outsiders, not keeping the Torah properly. Jesus was not at all doing what John expected or wanted him to do. Had he been mistaken? Was Jesus after all, ‘the one who was to come?’ Well, yes and no. John had clearly witnessed to Jesus as the Messiah at the time of Jesus’ baptism and Matthew wants to make it clear that Jesus really is ‘the one who was to come. But Jesus wasn’t coming so that corrupt people like Herod would be confronted, destroyed, or burned up like chaff in a fire.
He was coming for a kingdom that would turn the world upside down. The coming of God’s Son would reverse and upset usual expectations, challenging the way things are always done, pouring out wonderful surprises. The texts today tell of a series of reversals that the arrival of God’s son will bring because God kingdom makes all things new. The first new things are reversals of place. For the prophet Isaiah, the desert “blossoms” with flowers and trees; wilderness and dry land, instead of evoking terror are filled with praise. Places of scarcity and danger suddenly become places of rejoicing. Joy pulses though Isaiah’s words from the first line to the last line; when ransomed people come home singing.
This text does what Advent does: it points back-ward to old promises, which point us forward to a fuller, fuller joy. We still live in the in-between time as Isaiah’s people did. But God will come and save. We are to take heart for the ransomed people, all of us, will come home singing with gladness. This gladness marks the next reversal that God’s son brings for people physically, socially, and spiritually. Physically, the blind receive their sight, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed. The hungry have food, the oppressed find justice, “the poor have good news proclaimed to them.
Socially, the psalmist today points out to us the people of whom the Lord pays particular attention: the widow, the orphan, the prisoner and the stranger or immigrant. Over and over, the scriptures target this group of social sufferers as the ones God has compassion on. This must have been comforting to a people like the Israelites, who were conquered and sent into exile. God had not forgotten them. Yet, God expected them to show others the compassion they had experienced. They are commanded not to forget the widow, the orphan and the stranger.
For those suffering spiritually, especially at this time of year, God may seem absent. We may have doubts and question as John did what difference does Christmas make. The difference is found in Christ’s life, death and resurrection, where God shows us that we have been forgiven, that we are beloved children and promises unending life with our Lord. As James tells us today, we are to strengthen our hearts and be patient until the coming of the Lord. For patient people are not burdened by the suffering or irritations that arise in life but, like the prophets who live “in the name of the Lord” they find joy in seeing beyond the moment and work towards what is promised as grace.
This is the hope that Advent calls us to keep alive, that God is not finished either with creation or with human history. God is present and active in our lives and in the life of the world to bring about the purposes that God intends. Go and tell John what you hear and see Jesus said: the blind receive their sight, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the poor have good news brought to them. Jesus came in power, not the kind of power John anticipated. Jesus’ power is the power of healing and grace. His power is in his deeds and in his message of the reversals the reign of God brings.
The arrival of the Messiah didn’t instantly fix all our problems. It didn’t free John from prison. John is later beheaded by Herod. Yet, when Jesus answered John’s question, he answered it just when John needed to hear it. Jesus gave John joy by giving him the clearest answer about his identity as the Messiah. Are we as convinced that Jesus is the Messiah and that the future is in God’s hands? Are any doubts or uneasiness right before us, making us wonder what difference Christmas really makes? It may be helpful to know that John has been there before us, as so many others and Jesus’ answer to John is our answer.
When we see the power of healing and the wisdom of true teaching, we see the difference the coming of the Savior makes. When the church preaches good news to the poor and shows others the compassion they have experienced by not forgetting the widow, the orphan and the stranger, we see the difference the coming of the Savior makes. Mercy was at the heart of Jesus’ mission, just as it remains at the heart of the church’s work today. This is where and how God is at work and Advent gives our eyes time to get used to a world turning upside down. With joyful anticipation let us look for the reversals that mark God’s coming kingdom.