The Second Sunday of Advent
“John went throughout the whole region of the Jordan, proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins.” Lk. 3:3
Pontius Pilate, Tiberius, Herod, Annas, Caiaphas, Lysanias.
Luke includes them all the introduction to his Gospel.
Why?
Because they all possessed the highest positions of power in the Roman Empire, and because each of them lived a life of violence, torture, theft, massive wickedness, and unconscionable greed.
The mood of that era can only be hinted at with words like “fear,” “terror,” and “desperation.” As one writer puts it:
“When was there a more hopeless hour?”
And then … amid all this darkness:
“The word of God came to John.”
Every Advent season features John the Baptist as the person who presents a “call to attention,” if you will.
And year after year most of us find ourselves a little uncomfortable with the way in which John is presented: a kind of wild-man figure who eats strange food, lives in the desert, and dresses in even weirder clothes.
Not exactly the kind of guy we look forward to bringing home for dinner!
But the Baptist’s importance is so significant in Scripture that Jesus calls him “the greatest of all the prophets.”
So, what’s so great about him?
Maybe it’s that the central importance of Jesus’ gospel of love cannot be rightly understood until we first come face-to-face with John the Baptist’s gospel of repentance and conversion, and then the development of a whole new mindset.
John’s life and preaching represents the heroic first stage of the God journey: defining repentance and conversion by their results.
As one scholar puts it:
“If you are truly repentant, the Baptist would say, produce the appropriate fruits. Don’t just talk about it, show it. Produce something new in your life. Make changes.”
John the Baptist is very practical in his insistence on change.
For example, to the tax collectors who placed enormous burdens on the poor, he said: “charge no more than your rate.” To the everyday person, he said: “if anyone has two tunics, share one with someone who has none.” To the soldiers, he said:
“Don’t intimidate people. Don’t manipulate them. No bribing, blackmailing, extortion.”
How much more practical could a prophet be?
Untransformed people will always be preoccupied with power, with controlling others, with manipulating them, with demeaning them, with using them for their own gain.
What John the Baptist says to all of us is that we must be converted to become people who actually realize we are called to share.
The gospel of Jesus is essentially a gospel of generosity – including the most generous act of all: mercy, the forgiveness of others.
If the kind of practical acts of caring and sharing that John speaks of aren’t happening within you, then you’re not open to the next step:
The gospel of love.
Conversion must come first. And then, and only then comes the experience of true, lasting love.
That’s why John the Baptist is so important. He got it right. Conversion, repentance, the development of a new mindset.
Then, we’re ready for the next step: Jesus.
Now, Jesus is able to lead us to the remaining stages of the God journey – stages that will involve death and resurrection; stages that will give us the necessary tools to be freed from anxiety and open to a life of gratitude and abundance. In a word, Love: the embrace of a life highlighted by generosity and mercy.
But we must begin at the beginning, on the ground floor: conversion, change, repentance.
We must begin with John the Baptist.
Then – and only then – are we ready to move on to the manger.
face
And what we will find there is a Child – a Child who will lead us on to the next stages: the journey to the cross, and finally, to resurrection – to a whole new way of living.
Ted Wolgamot, Psy.D.
