What Are We Waiting For?

Advent 2a, Matthew 3:1-12 (December 5, 2010)

Text: you brood of vipers, who warned you to flee the wrath to come? Bear fruit worthy of repentance.

In my later teens I always had summer jobs. These jobs were procured to pay my way through university. One of those jobs was working in an office as a pay roll officer for men and women who fought forest fires. The least favourite part of that job for me was doing inventory. Do you know what inventory is? Inventory meant  accounting for every piece of equipment that our fire fighters had used or broken or even taken out with recording their transaction.  It was a night mare. Because what we had in the yard and what we had recorded as being used in the field never matched with what we had originally purchased.  When it comes to inventory there is always the reality of human error creeping in and messing things up.

 

In many ways things haven't changed.  I no longer need to count tools or larger items of fire-fighting equipment. But we all need to take inventory in some manner, shape or form. Do you ever got on a scale? That's a form of taking inventory – of how you have been eating, exercising or even of how your general sense of physical health is. Do you ever check out your bank statements? That's a form of taking inventory – of what matters to you enough so that you invest money and time in it. Do you ever write a Christmas letter? That's a form of taking inventory – both of how you have invested yourself in the last year – and as you email or snail mail those letters off – about whom you really want to maintain some kind of contact with.

 

Taking inventory isn't always fun or easy. Even though we have gathered in this place of worship, even though the songs on the radio tell us that's it beginning to look a lot like Christmas and even though we may feel a push to think or feel that somehow we should be happy-when it comes to taking inventory, many realities push their way into our consciousness.

 

And then comes John the Baptist. I confess that this John fellow is one of my least favourite Biblical characters. I suspect that's because he's so darn honest. He's out there doing his thing for God. There are no lights, no choirs, no musical background. There is just the river and John preaching. Many people respond. They approach to be immersed in that water, to be washed, to work at turning their lives in intentional ways towards God. Now they seek to do God's will with their lives.  It looks good. But then the Pharisees and Sadducees also approach John. I am not sure if they are coming to be baptized by John – or to watch and critique what he is doing. In either case he confronts them with harsh words. "You brood of vipers," – that is you children of snakes, "Who warned you to flee the wrath to come? Bear fruit worthy of repentance. "

 

John the Baptist's words to people who were religiously dedicated – who intentionally regularly thought about God and while likely trying very hard to obey God's law, stick in my being. John is saying to them – this baptism I am offering, this turning to God isn't so much about right thinking, but is much rather about living your life in ways that are dedicated to pleasing God.

 

But how can, how might one do that - Bear fruit worthy of repentance? Repentance is much more than even admitting I am sorry for what I have done – or I am sorry that I didn't do that which I should have. Repentance is an ongoing total reorientation of one's life towards God. Repentance involves  ongoing changes in one's attitudes and actions.

 

Such living with change and self-examination isn't easy!  

 

Are we loving as we are so loved by God in Jesus? Do we care about and for our neighbours, our co-workers, our friends, our enemies? Do we actually love God as we love ourselves? I mean do we spend time with God, seek God's direction in our decisions and actions, physically, emotionally, financially, spiritually? John's words continue to stick in our very being: Bear fruit worthy of repentance.

 

Or, do we give as God continually gives to us: each breath, each thought, each heart beat, faith itself, each and every person who loves us or who  looks to us for love, guidance and help? Yes, how am I, how are you giving to others:  gladly, joyfully, reluctantly? Are we trusting God to continue to provide? Do we see other people as our brothers and sisters? Do we experience a connection to the rest of creation?

 

Lastly are we trusting as we are being trusted? God entrusts God's own Son, Jesus to us! We are the ones who are continually blessed to hear and experience  Jesus' love and forgiveness. Many others do not know Him, have not experienced his love and forgiveness in conscious ways. Are we showing them? Will we naturally tell them of our experience, of God's ongoing love for this entire universe? Or are we ashamed, too unaware ourselves of His love to pass such a trust on?

 

John the Baptist's words echo again in my ears, my mind, my heart: "Bear fruit worthy of repentance!"

 

Any honest ongoing inventory of our lives tells us that on our own we don't, we can't bear fruit worthy of repentance. Even with those people we love the most – our children, our partner, our sibling, our friend – there are times when our words are harsh. There are times when we are not faithful to their well being. There are times when greed or fear or exhaustion overtake us and we exclude or put others down.  Or sometimes we just plain forget about them.

 

 And God?Wwell God fits in there somewhere – too often as an afterthought or after everyone and everything else. Bear fruit worthy of repentance? So often – we fail miserably!

 

This reality – our human frailty, our being turned inwards upon ourselves, does not change the important truth of John the Baptist's plea to bear fruit worthy of repentance. But that plea, its truth drives us, points and sometimes forces us beyond ourselves.

 

Before we could even make any movement towards repentance we require hope – hope that has a source beyond ourselves but which nevertheless comes to us. We need mercy. We need grace. We need our hearts and minds being continually changed and opened away from fear and selfishness, away from being focused on ourselves. We need the one whom John the Baptist says is coming. That's John's role – to point us to the one who is coming.

 

This One is not so much about sentimental feelings or even personal security. Rather this coming One approaches  with God's own Spirit and with fire.

 

What that means is continually unfolding. However in our own lives this Coming One baptizing with the Spirit and fire says that at the very least part of God's own being is imparted to those who are so baptized. For them God has a passion a fire that moves them sometimes gradually, slowly, at others times oh so quickly, to have the evil, the selfishness, the propensity to trust no one but somehow falsely themselves, " burned off". This is an ongoing process because both for ourselves as individuals and for the societies that we are part of, our selfishness, fear and false trust are reoccurring realities.

 

 But in this coming One, this Jesus, God can daily birth among us something new, something different. And someday all that birthing will reach an entirely new climax and reality.

 

So our question this day of Advent and each day is this: What are you waiting, watching, preparing for? The ongoing inventories of our lives continue. But the one that truly matters, the one that makes a difference today and forever not only for ourselves as individuals but also for the world, is, are we open to this One whom John the Baptizer says is coming? This One gives himself up on our behalf completely. In him our cannot's and will not's are transformed to God's, "I do", and "I will". In Jesus there is new life and love for all. Under his influence (reign) small children can and do lead, and neither the lion nor the leopard nor the bear hurt others anymore, for there will come a time when there will no longer be  hurting in this place. To God this place (this here and now)  is holy.

 

By God's grace may we so watch and wait and prepare for this One of God who has come, who is here now and who will come again! Amen.