John the Baptist appeared, preaching in the desert of Judea and saying, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand!”
On the second and third Sunday of Advent it is the figure of John the Baptist who takes center stage, above the fold in newspaper parlance. It is not surprising. His pointing to Jesus as the Lamb of God directs our attention during this Advent season to coming of the Lord, both in history and in the time yet to come. Next Sunday we will hear Jesus say of John: “Amen I say to you, among those born of women there has been none greater than John the Baptist…” I will take Jesus at his word, but John has never been one of my favorites.
There are other principal players in the Gospels with whom I would prefer to spend time. I would relish and hour or so with Simon Peter, preferably over a beer, to talk about what he was thinking and feeling that fated night before Calvary when he said of Jesus, “I tell you, I do not know the man.” Although it might be a little eerie, hearing what Lazarus had to say about his more than near-death experience would make for quite a listening session. I know many would like to talk with Mary, and, of course, that would be graced time. But I have always been curious about Joachim and Ann, her parents. I suspect they are not beer people, but I would like to hear, maybe over a nice chardonnay from the Galilee vineyards, how these small town folks handled the news, the scandal really, that their daughter was found to be with child before she and Joseph, her betrothed, lived together.
I guess I am a little afraid of John the Baptist. And who wouldn’t be? He is one of those people who are not afraid to tell you what they are thinking; or more ominously, what God is thinking. Today, what God is thinking makes us sit up and take notice and, maybe, squirm in our seats: “I am baptizing you with water, for repentance, but the one who is coming after me is mightier than I. I am not worthy to carry his sandals. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire. His winnowing fan is in his hand. He will clear his threshing floor and gather his wheat into his barn, but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire.” Not exactly the kind of rhetoric I want to hear at this time of year! I prefer the gentle twinkling of lights to the raging of unquenchable fire. And the carols of the season rest more comfortably on the ear than all this talk about repentance and winnowing fans.
One of the unsettling things about John is that he will not go away. He continues to be a prophet for our time. His voice is to be heard not only in the wilderness on the banks of the river Jordan, preparing the way for the rabbi Jesus of Nazareth fame; his voice is to be heard today, on the shores of our lives, preparing the way for the return of the Risen Jesus, the Lord of History, who will come at the end of days at a time we cannot know. He will come, says Isaiah, and on that day “justice will be the band around his waist, and faithfulness a belt upon his hips.”
That is why, on day one of Advent, we were told to “be awake.” And why today Saint Paul tells us: “Whatever was written previously was written for our instruction, that by endurance and by the encouragement of the Scriptures we might have hope.” What was written of John cannot be put on a shelf in the history section of our libraries. What was written of John is still page one news. We view the Baptist not through a telescope as if he were sitting on some far away bank of a river of history. He is here, next to us, urging us, cajoling us, challenging us and maybe at times even frightening us to consider our ways, measuring them with the yardstick of the Gospel ethos.
I would like to sit at table with Simon Peter, and Lazarus, and Joachim and Anne. But it is John the Baptist who comes to dinner today. His diet of locust and wild honey may not be pleasing to the taste. But it will surely cleanse the palate of our lives. Pope Benedict says that John the Baptist “offers us something completely new… a conversion that gives the whole of life a new direction forever.” (Jesus of Nazareth, chapter one)
And so while we wrap the presents and trim the tree and bake the cookies and hum the carols, as indeed we should, we also take pause to hear the voice of one crying in the desert, the voice of one still crying in our hearts calling us to repentance, calling us to turn toward the God who is yet to come. And when he comes, for those who heed his word and follow his way, the wolf shall be a guest of the lamb and the leopard shall lie down with the kid; the calf and the young lion shall browse together, the cow and the bear shall be neighbors, together their young shall rest. When he comes there shall be no harm or ruin on God’s holy mountain, for the earth shall be filled with knowledge of the Lord.
Maranatha, Come Lord Jesus!
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