The third list

Hi everyone,

If you were there on Sunday, you would have heard me talk, at length, about the concept of the third list.  If you weren't there, I will run through the lists for you really quick.

List number one is the stuff you have to do.  It's the stuff you have to bake, what you have to clean, what you have to look after, what you have to sweep up and put away, what you have to wrap, and so on.  It's a list typically divided by person, to make sure that everyone has their own jobs to finish.

List number two is like it, but different.  List number two is the list of people who you still have to buy for.  It's different from the first list, because you don't know what you're actually going to buy.  You just sort of walk into a store with a list of names, and you have to match those names to gifts.  Good times.

But the third list is more nebulous, because it's not written down, now, is it?  The third list is composed not on paper, but in your mind, and especially in your heart.  All of us have a wonderful third list that is written on the list paper of our hearts, and it includes what makes Christmas Christmas.  That is, there are certain things that have to happen before it begins to feel like Christmas for you.  It might be cabbage rolls, it might be perogies, it might be the smell of Christmas tree, it might be the day when the Christmas towels come out, it might be when you hear Silent Night sung by candlelight at Good Shepherd at either 5:00 or 7:00.  All of these things have been known to make up the third list for some people.  Now, what's on your list is what's on your list, and it's your list and nobody else's, but it is absolutely vital for you to get that stuff done and together so that the Christmas season can be truly Christmassy.

But as I said on Sunday, a big part of what happens in the scriptures is the fulfillment of this third list for God, what makes Christmas Christmas.  And no, it's not cabbage rolls and Christmas trees.  The scriptures describe it as the fullness of time.  And this is why the Bible seems so worked up about the ancestry of Jesus.  The lineage of Jesus ends up being important to those who were watching and waiting for the coming Messiah.

This is what we forget, and forget pretty quickly, that there were people deseprately for that first Christmas, people waiting for the arrival of the Christ child and there were certain things on that great list that God had made, that they were all looking for.  And one of the major ones is that they were looking for the descendant of David to rise and sit on his father's throne.  Real quick primer, the monarchy in Old Testament Israel started with Saul, who ended up being a fairly bunk king.  Then, the next king was David.  And David was seen as the great king, the one who brought prosperity and light to the world.  And his throne was seen as bringing the kingdom of Israel together.  But David was an earthly king, and as earthly kings do, he died, and left his throne to his son, Solomon.  And Solomon was good too, not, you know David good, but still good.  And then Solomon died too, and he left his throne to, well, Rehoboam his son, and then after that, the kingdom was divided.

And so people hearkend for that time.  They longed for the time in which David sat on the throne, and reigned over Israel, in which they had their independance, in which they had their strength, in which they could repel invaders, and set themselves up as those who were in charge over everyone else .  That was the plan.  And that's what everyone was expecting to happen.  They all wanted to have God place a faithful king over them in the kingdom of Israel.  Someone who would turf out the Romans and who would reign in their place.

But here's the thing.  There's a very good reason that Jesus was of the house and line of David.  He was of the house and line of David to complete these lists, these lists from way back in the Old Testament, lists talking about what the house and line of David would be like, lists talking about the virgin conceiving and giving birth to a son, lists talking about what we are to expect from the coming messiah.  Birth in Bethlehem, born of a virgin, being Immanuel, or God with us, crushing the serpent's head, being called out of Egypt, called a Nazarene, raised up like a serpent in the desert, all these things.

You see, when you forget the Old Testament, you forget about the history of salvation, and it ends up being pretty important, and it helps you to understand Jesus, the Christ, and his echoes all the way throughout history.  If you know him, you see him everywhere, the all in all.  He shows up in the Old Testament in the most curious ways, glimpses of him in the miraculous births of Samson and Isaac, raised up on a stake in the wilderness like a fiery serpent, journeying to Egypt to escape a massacre like Moses, being baptized in the Jordan like Naaman the Syrian, he is all over the scriptures, you almost can't turn a page without seeing him.

And that itself is important for two reasons.  Firstly, because of the fulfillment of prophecy.  God was doing what God was going to do in his own time for his own reasons.  And in the fullness of time, he brought forth his son into the world.  At exactly the right time, in the right place, born into a time and place full of people who were expecting him to arrive, and who could look at him fulfilling the scriptures in their presence and know it.  And secondly, and for us importantly, is that seeing him all the way through the scriptures should remind you of Jesus' image of the final judgment, in which he says

Whatever you did to the least of these, you did to me.

Think about that for a second.  We expect Jesus to be all over the Old Testament, becasue we can read backwards into it.  We expect him to be all over the New Testament, because that's his story.  Do we expect him to be all over the world, though?  Not really.  But this is a vital lesson for us to learn as Christians in the here and now. Jesus is everywhere.  The body of Christ is bigger than you had ever thought possible.  It affects you and me profoundly, because we're all in it. Looking into the scriptures, you can see Jesus in pretty much every page.  Look around you, and you can see Jesus in every person.
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And this brings us to God's third list.  The list that isn't written, but is still required.  You've heard it said that God the the God of Abraham, of Isaac, of Jacob, of David, of Solomon, and that's all true.  But the entirety of that list is not written in the scriptures, because that list would be far too long to ever endure.  Because it would contain that unbroken line of faith from Adam right the way down to you.  We talk about how Jesus is the reason for the season, which he is, but the reason for him being here at all is for you.  He forsook heaven and its glory, and came to earth humble in a manger. He lived life in obscurity, he fasted, he wept, he got dirty, he got tired, he got angry, he rode into town humble on a donkey, and was crucified between two common criminals.  He was whipped, beaten, scourged, mocked, and spat upon, all for one very important reason.

You are on his third list.

And it wouldn't be heaven without you.

Advent blessings.  Christmas blessings.

PJ.

Magnificat.

Our journey with Mary, from maiden to mother, culminates with her speaking the Magnificat, the first explicitly Christian piece of poetry, or song, ever written.  It's so old that it predates Christ himself, by a period of about 6 months.

Mary, the unwed mother to be, has just crossed over an immense gap.  She has moved between being scared, not sure what the fate of this child or of herself will be, and at the point of the Magnificat, she has embraced it.  She has embraced her role.

This is something all prospective mothers have to do at some point, is to deal with the fear and trepidation, and to crest the wave of imminent change.  All prospective mothers, when they find out that there is a baby on the way, are riding a crazy emotional roller-coaster for a while, and it brings them dizzying highs and crushing lows, as they consider all the changes that this child will bring to their lives.  And as men, we miss this, because for the nine month period that a mother is expectant, not much changes in our lives.  We get up, go to work, perhaps we make a few more suppers, or give out a few more backrubs, but our lives don't change until the arrival of the child, not really.

But for the women, it's different all the time.  It's crazily different.  It has profound effects almost right away.  Your body changes over the course of those months.  And forget all those magazines you see where Kim Kardashian gets her pre-baby body back nine seconds after giving birth.  It's not really realistic.  The thing is, you go through a period of time, through those nine months, where that baby changes you from the inside out.  You get swollen ankles, weight gain, stretch marks; you're hot when you want to be cold and cold when you want to be hot, and this is all significantly before the child is even born.  And that's how the babies work.  They change you from the inside out, and then, after they're born, you know they're going to change you from the outside in.

More than anything else in creation, your children can bring you to the highest highs, and to the lowest lows.  They bring you more joy than anything else in creation, and them spurning you brings you more heartbreak than you could possibly imagine.  In a sense, when you have a child, you are taking a step into a much bigger, much more frightening world, with unlimited potential, but potentially disastrous results.

It's sort of like when God created humans, isn't it?  The one thing in the universe that had free will, the one thing that was free to love or hate God, without him controlling them.  And before making people, God had the thought that he was to make mankind in his image, but would not be controlling and running them all the way through.  They could love or spurn, they could cleave to or leave.  And when you have a child, when you make something in your own image, there is a chance that they could be very good, or very bad.  And that's the price you pay for embarking out on this journey.

So with Mary, her trepidation gives way to resolve.  She is able to look at her status, unwed mother, young woman bringing a child into the world, and more than a normal baby, but a baby who would be born into the world, and say 'this is what I want.  This is good.  This is right, this is the right thing to do.'  Embracing even in the midst of fear and doubt, what is good and wonderful.

And of course, this child, we know, will cause her unimaginable pain.

Standing by the cross of Jesus were his mother, his mother's 

sister, Mary the wife of Clopas, and Mary Magdalene.

When Jesus saw his mother and the disciple whom he loved

standing nearby, he said to his mother 'Woman,

behold your son!' Then he said to the disciple,

'Behold your mother!'

John 19:25-27

The pieta from Durham Cathedral.  It is shockingly moving.

She had to stand there and watch him die.  The greatest pain a parent can ever experience, and Mary had to suffer through it.  It was preordained, it was set, this was going to happen.  She was going to have to have her eldest child die before her eyes. This is as bad as things get for human beings.

But there was also indescribable joy.  The greatest joy that a parent could ever hope for, the thing that is lurking at the back of the mind of every parent who has ever lived, is that their child could do well, succeed, be prosperous, happy, and never die.  If we seriously considered that our children were going to die at some point, I wonder if we'd ever have them in the first place.  But that risk of crushing sadness is mitigated by Christmas, and by Easter, by the decisions made by Mary so long ago, who understood whose child this was to be.

For unto us, a child is born, 

And unto us, a son is given.

Whose child is this?  He belongs to the world.  To bring joy to the world.  Light and life to all he brings, far as, far as the curse is found.  This is what Christmas is all about, the coming of the child into the world, the child who still to this day brings us intense joy and crushing sadness, through his word and his spirit.  He breaks us with the law, and carries us towards heaven with his grace.  And yes, it's a daunting prospect to get close to God, to get close to Jesus, it is a terrifyingly daunting prospect.  But Mary took that journey from maiden to mother, and Christ took that journey from manger to cross, in order that we might be given life, and have it abundantly.  He was born not just for his family, but to the whole world.  whoever does the will of his father is his brother and sister.  

Rejoice and be glad, for Christmas is almost here, and the child who once changed one woman from the inside out, is here to change us all.

My soul doth magnify the Lord : and my spirit hath rejoiced in God my Saviour.

For he hath regarded : the lowliness of his handmaiden.

For behold, from henceforth : all generations shall call me blessed.

For he that is mighty hath magnified me : and holy is his Name.

And his mercy is on them that fear him : throughout all generations.

He hath shewed strength with his arm : he hath scattered the proud in the imagination of their hearts.

He hath put down the mighty from their seat : and hath exalted the humble and meek.

He hath filled the hungry with good things : and the rich he hath sent empty away.

He remembering his mercy hath holpen his servant Israel : as he promised to our forefathers, Abraham and his seed for ever.

PJ.

Carded

This is the time of year in which card sellers make the majority of their profits. I'm sure of it.  Everyone you've ever met, all your family and friends, all those whom you perhaps have forgotten, they all still get a Christmas card, amirite?  We exchange cards with one another send them out hither and yon, and we recieve cards back in return, decorating our homes with wonderful winter scenes.  As an aside, how loopy is it that we are now in a world in which we'll complain about how cold it is outside, meanwhile, we'll have pictures of snowy woods up IN OUR HOMES?

We do this because winter is pretty.  All of us who don't like to shovel, all of us who are all done with the nonsense, with the plugging cars in, with the ice, with the wind, with the accumulation of all the puffy white powder all over our houses and cars, all of us, there's still something magical about sitting inside your house, sipping a cup of hot ovaltine, and watching the beautiful snow fall.

The point is, that we have a certain disconnect in our brains, in that we feel, genuinely feel, as though we can watch the snow fall, see that it is pretty, sip our tea, and not have to deal with the freezing, back breaking labor that inevitably will ensue.  How else can you explain the popularity of Irving Berlin's "I'm dreaming of a white Christmas?"  Pretty sure it'll be a white Christmas regardless, Irving.

So here we are, as a group of people, who know that the winter is pretty yet hate the winter all at the same time.  And we wish, sincerely, that we could have all the benefits, with none of the fallout.  And you see, this is where our understanding of the incarnation comes in.

Have you seen Christmas cards with the nativity on them?  If not, there's one to the left here.  These cards always, without a single exception, show people looking awfully well put together.  Mary and Joseph are typically kneeling in adoration around the manger, and the incredibly tidy Jesus is sweetly gazing back at them.  If there are shepherds or wise men (and there had better not be wise men), they are well put together too, and in no way look like they were just working in the fields, or had just finished an incredibly long camel journey across a desert.  The animals, if they are there, are quite benign, and are limited in role to just looking on, and to being in the background.  And this is the way that we approach the nativity, nay the entire life of Christ.  That he could be near the world, but only the world as it existed in a snowglobe, or a Christmas card.  Where everything was drawn in pencil shapes, or fashioned out of ceramics, or carved out of wood.  Where everything smelled nice, and looked nice, and where the people were practically perfect in every way.  Almost every single peace of sacred art I've ever seen has had a pretty sanitized slant on it, in order that the people who were there, they ought to look nice.

This ties into the question that Jesus asks the crowds who are there to see him, and there to see John, asking them 'what did you go out to see?  A man dressed in soft clothes?  No, I tell you, for those in soft clothes are living in king's palaces."  You see, people didn't expect the prophet of God to be showing up, wearing animal skins and eating bugs.  They expected him to be nice, presentable, and equivalent in almost every way to wearing soft clothes, hanging out in king's palaces, and looking good.  They didn't expect what they got.  So too, we expect Jesus to be nice, pleasant, presentable, and in no way seriously engaged with the world we live in.  For comparison, this is one of the best pictures of the nativity I've ever seen.  Look at Mary:  She's exhuasted!  She can't even hold her own baby!  She's being very tender with her midsection, and the ubiquitous chickens are not in the background, they're basically underfoot!  And we have Joseph, stepping his daddy game up, and holding the baby that he has promised to raise as his own, showing immediate tender care towards a baby that isn't his.  This is what it's all about:  The stable was doubtlessly dirty and smelly, it had straw everywhere, animals all over the place, unsanitary, dangerous, poorly lit, and honestly rather unpleasant. And we want to sanitize that, we want to make it seem nicer, because we want Jesus to come into a nice place, where it is fit for him.  But that's not what he's all about.  He's not here to wear soft clothes and live in King's palaces, he's not here to look nice, or to only go into nice places.  He's here to enter into the most dangerous, dirty, filty, unsanitary place you can possibly imagine God heading into.

He's heading into your heart.

Your heart with all that depraved nonsense in it, your heart with all its sin and shame, your dark heart, where you love the darkness so that nobody can see your deeds, your heart with all its anger and wrath, that's where Jesus is heading.  Because he's a carpenter.  He's a guy who does repairs.  Have you ever seen HGTV?  If you're a lady, I bet you have.  And you have on those shows on HGTV, something like income property, and there are two types of people.  People who wear soft clothes and  live in king's palaces, and people who are the fixers.  Most people want to move into a place that is already perfect, move-in ready, and they have in mind to have it perfect before they even show up.  Contrast that, if you will, to someone like , Bronson Pinchot Vanilla Ice, Scott MacGillivray or Hillary Farr from love it or list it, and you'll see that they're people who want to live in a nice place, but who are willing to move into a place that isn't yet perfect, in order to fix it up, repair it, so that is eventually will be worth moving into.  Your heart is one of those places, all busted up, with rats and mice infesting it, major structural damage, damp and overrun with animals, covered in straw and filth from those animals, just an absolute mess.  And that's what Jesus walks into.  To make your heart a fit place for him to reign.  By forgiving your sins, and cleansing you from all unrighteousness.

All Christianity is incarnational Christianity.  If you're a Christian, and you think the idea of a dirty, smelly, run down ramshackle stable is offensive, then you need to take a serious look at what you're asking Christ to do in your own life.  Do you want him to be in soft clothes, and living in king's palaces?  Or do you want him to leave all that behind, and walk into the filth?

And if you don't for one second sincerely believe that your heart is a much grimier, more dangerous place for the son of man to enter in, spend a few moment with Him in His word, and see how far off you are from what he would have you do.  And realize that he's not in soft clothes in a king's palace.  He's in the meager manger of your heart.  And through his forgiveness and grace, he will make it into a fit place for him to call his home.

Advent blessings, as always,

PJ.

A suspicious vacation

Okay, normally I just update on Sundays, but the point I made on Wednesday is actually worth expanding on today.  Mainly because it was something I'd never thought of.

The reading I chose for last night was part of my series of Mary: from maiden to mother, and it follows the Gospel of Luke telling us about how Mary was dealing with the pressures of her inevitable motherhood.  Last week, we had the annunciation, and this week, we had Mary's trip to see Elizabeth.  Now, please, for one moment, take off your Christian goggles (which I also wear), and try to think of Mary as less of a saint, and as more of a person.  Think of her as who she is, at the time in her life that she is.  Now, please read the reading that I chose for last night, and I have some follow up questions after you're all done.

39 At that time Mary got ready and hurried to a town in the hill country of Judea, 40 where she entered Zechariah’s home and greeted Elizabeth. 41 When Elizabeth heard Mary’s greeting, the baby leaped in her womb, and Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit. 42 In a loud voice she exclaimed: “Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the child you will bear! 43 But why am I so favored, that the mother of my Lord should come to me? 44 As soon as the sound of your greeting reached my ears, the baby in my womb leaped for joy. 45 Blessed is she who has believed that the Lord would fulfill his promises to her!”

Okay, do me a solid and think about this for a second, again not as a Christian, but as a human being.  Who is Elizabeth?  She is Mary's cousin.  How long does Mary stay with Elizabeth?  For three months.

What would you think of a young woman, somewhere between 16 and 19 probably, who suddenly (ESV 'with haste') went to go stay with family somewhere in another town for a few months.

Exactly.

This is just another of our efforts to try to sanitize the Biblical narrative, and remove all the humanity from it.  We have in our minds that Mary went to go see her cousin because she's Mary, and that's what the Bible says to do.  She follows the narrative because that's what's dictated.  But that only makes sense if she's not a real person.  

But she is.  Mary is a real person.  She has genuine hopes, dreams, fears, all that.  And at this juncture, she has been informed by Gabriel that she is going to be having a baby.  And she knows that it isn't Joseph's baby.  It would be bad enough for her if she was to conceive Joseph's baby before getting married, but conceiving a baby that isn't his, well, that's far far worse.  And Mary knows what's at stake, too.  She's smart enough to know that Joseph didn't 'know' her, and that he isn't going to react well.  How do we know that he isn't going to react well?  The Bible tells us so.  

Her husband, Joseph, being a just man, and unwilling to put her to shame

resolved to divorce her quietly. 

She was pregnant out of wedlock with a child that didn't belong to her fiance.  At the very least, she faced a quiet divorce from her husband.  At the worst, she faced public shame, humiliation, loss of husband, loss of family, loss of friends, and lest we forget, loss of life.

If there is a betrothed virgin, and a man meets her in the city and lies with

her, then you shall bring them both out to the gate of that city,

and you shall stone them to death with stones, the young woman

because she did not cry for help though she was in the city, and

the man because he violated his neighbor's wife.

So you shall purge the evil from your midst.

Deuteronomy 22:23-24

Do you see what was at stake?  Everything!  Mary had a lot to lose, just like every unwed mother throughout the ages.  She had an awful lot to lose, so what's the first thing to do, is to head out to your cousin's house, and stay there for a few months.  And over those months, you have some tough decisions to make.  For you see, babies don't stay babies.  And believe it or not, giving birth do a child doesn't spell the end of your responsibility to that child.  We aren't cane toads where we lay eggs and then sort of walk off.  We have to raise these children if we want them to survive. And so the choice that Mary faced was as follows.  Was she going to give birth to this child and raise it for herself, thus potentially losing a husband, friends, family, respect, and her own life, or was she going to stay with her cousin, give birth to this child, and then give it to another couple who could raise it as their own, and she could go back to Joseph?

Tough choice, and it's the choice you face too.  It's the choice that you and I face as Christians.  Believe it or not, carrying Christ with you can easily lead to the loss of a spouse, or of family or friends, or even of life.  This much is promised in the scriptures.  Jesus tells us that he has not come to bring peace, but a sword.  He tells us that he has come to divide families against each other, three against two, and so on.  Having him around won't under any circumstances make things easier in the world, he already told us that.  

And so this Christmas, we gather around the manger one more time.  We are present for the birth of that baby.  And we have the same questions and fears and doubts that Mary has.  What do I have to lose by taking this baby home?  And what do I have to gain?  If I take this baby home, will it change my life?  Most certainly.  If I take this baby home, will it make me into a different person?  Assuredly.  Will I lose friends, family, spouse?  Possibly.  So is it worth it, or should I just leave this baby here?

That's the question Mary had to ask, and it's the question that we have to ask too.  Is it worth it?  Do we dare take this child home?  Hopefully, for the vast majority of us, the answer is yes.  Hopefully the answer is a very cautious, and tentative yes.  Mainly because of the promise of this child.  The promise that this child will change you.  The promise that this child will make you into more than you are now.  We all know that about children, that they bend you, break you, and make you into something other than you start out as.  But in that, there is the truth that your children make you into a better human being than you would have been, or could have been, otherwise.  Your will is no longer your own, and you are living for something greater than yourself now.  

It's the same way with Christ.  Be perfect, he says, as your heavenly father is perfect, and he means it.  If you bring him home with you, then his will will become your will, his words will affect your words,  His life, every aspect of it, will affect your life.  This is how it is supposed to go.  And finally, he will forgive you of all your sin, and make you holy, that's the entire point of the Christian faith.  

Bring that baby home with you, and make him part of your family.  Believe me, it's worth the cost.

Advent blessings,

PJ.

Re-gifting and re-pentance.

You ever get some junk for Christmas?  'Noooooooo' you may say 'Pastor Jim, I have loved and appreciated every gift I have ever gotten and no matter what, I open and am excited by all treasures beneath the tree.'

Of course you do.

But for those of us on planet earth, we live in a different situation.  You see, even though a gift may be a great

idea, even though it may be great on paper, it may not be quite right.  It might be clothing that is not quite the right size, it might be a video game for the wrong system, it might be a good that you already own, or anything like that.  It's something you might otherwise want, but, well, it just doesn't work out as exactly what you can use.

And I'm being generous.  Those are the things that are so right for you that you already own them, but there's also a chance that someone might buy something for you that you have zero interest in whatsoever.  Something you don't want and can't use.  And that's the deal that you have sometimes, when you open a gift and in no way shape or form desire the contents.  And that means that you might not want to be stuck with the gift in question, because you're never going to use it.  But what to do with it?

Well, there's a good chance that you might just give it away again, a phenomenon known as regifting, which I'm more in favor of than you might expect, since if you're not going to enjoy the gift, you might as well give it

to someone who might enjoy it.  But hold the phone, because there's a really good chance that you might have been given a gift receipt along with the gift.  This is something that all of us should do all the time, include a gift receipt with all gifts, as there is a chance, an outside chance, that someone might not want what they end up with.

Now think of the Israelites of the first century.  For a long time, they had waited for the coming of the Messiah, and for the return of Elijah, who was to prepare the way for the Lord.  And they knew what they wanted, too.  They were living in one of the most humiliating times in their history, as the Romans had moved in, and showed no sign of weakness whatsoever.  The nation of Israel was held down and controlled by the Romans in every way, and your choices for guys in charge were Pontius Pilate, Roman governor, or Herod, the tetrarch, who was basically a Roman puppet.  And you didn't want either.  You may have craved the days in which the Israelites were a dominant major player in the world, and a controlling power in the region, but now, well, it wasn't looking good for them.  Israel is small.  Like, really small.  It could fit into Saskatchewan 31 times, and that's contemporary Israel!  There's a good chance the borders of Judea in the past may very well have been smaller!  This was a tiny part of the world, occupied by a nobody people in the middle of nowhere.  They didn't have the military might to overthrow the Roman empire, and there wasn't much chance that the Romans were just going to emancipate them back to regular life and self government.  They wouldn't be much of an empire if they did.

So, they were waiting for divine intervension.  They were looking God to appear and lay the smack down on the Romans, and beat them into submission, reinstating Israel as the chosen people.

And then John the Baptist showed up.  And things went from bad to worse.

If the good people of Israel ever wished that they'd been given a gift receipt, this was the time.  They looked at the message of John the Baptist, and all at once, wished that they could send it back.  The message of John the Baptist really started to cut them to their core when they came out to the Jordan river to see what the fuss was all about.  And John gave them the exact opposite from what they desired.  What they wanted was for John to show up and promise that God was going to descend from the clouds, sweep away all the people that they didn't like, and would set up a reign full of them, and people like them.  That's what people
are secretly talking about these days when they talk about the rapture, it's what they desire, is to have God, the God of heaven and earth, save them and people like them, and banish people who are not like them to the dustbin of history.  And what they were surprised to find was that John the Baptist did not espouse the idea that God was going to ride in on a white horse and beat on the Romans.

Instead, John talked at great length about repentance.  In fact, that's almost all he talked about.  Repentance repentance repentance.  "Repent" he says "for the kingdom of heaven is at hand!"  And what people didn't like about this, was that John didn't seem to be talking to foreigners, telling them to get in line with the Pharisees and Saducees.  Instead, he called them a brood of vipers, told them to bear fruit in keeping with repentance, and warned them not to fall back on where they were born and who their parents were.  He told them, in no uncertain terms that God could, if he chose, raise up from the stones children for Abraham, which is clearly true, as even the birth of Isaac, Abraham's son, was a miracle, impossible without God's intervention.

This call for across the board repentance affronted the Pharisees and Saducees, who were living under the assumption that the Messiah would return, set up a throne, and institute an order in which the world would be made to be more like them, or perish. But God had in mind a different order, a good and just order, an order in which people were pushed not to be more like other people, but more like what God would and did have in mind.  The question that John gets after he promises that the axe is at the root of the tree, is from the terrified people 'what shall we do?'

John answers not with a comparison to people who are doing well in his eyes, but with a comparison to God's laws: "Whoever has two tunics is to share with him who has none and whoever has food is to do likewise."  Wow!  Anyone who wanted to show up and preen before John and be lifted up by him as an example would be disappointed, when John just told them that there was a divine law that they weren't keeping up with . They were frauds and extortioners just like people today are.

And so, the question that they ask 'what shall we do?' is answered by John with simple terms.  Be perfect, just as your heavenly father is perfect.  Okay, that's good advice, right?  If you are fearing the wrath that is to
come, if you are fearing being burned with unquenchable fire, if you are fearing the axe at the root of the trees, then just be perfect, not be more like each other, but be more like God.  Simple, right?

Oh, wait.  You're not perfect?  That must be very hard for you.  You must be human.

And now, we get to the core of what John was talking about, and why people shouldn't have been trying to return him for a better prophet.  He pointed out sin, but he told you about a way out.  Bear fruit, he says, in keeping with repentance.  Repent, repent, repent.  Rend your hearts, and not your garments.  Turn from your life of sin, and turn to Christ.  John knows that you're not going to be perfect, he knows that the requirements placed upon you by God himself are far too big for you to ever meet up with, so he tells you not just what perfection is, but what to do when you fail.

Repent, for the kingdom of Heaven is at hand.

And this is what Advent is still all about.  It is about repentance.  It is about turning back from your sin, and bearing fruit in keeping not with perfection, but with repentance.  It's not about doing better, it's about being forgiven.  What you should be thinking about in the season of Advent is repentance, thinking about not just that is a baby being born in a manger, but why that baby had to be born in the first place!  Because we should have come with a gift receipt!  We ended up being wrong, we ended up being bad, we ended up being the sort of thing that God would not want, and would certainly want to take back.  And he had a choice, to either make us into what he wanted, or to get rid of us and start again, with axes, roots of trees, and unquenchable fire.


Aren't you glad he threw away the receipt?

Blessed Advent, everyone.

PJ.