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3. Sunday of Advent, 12/16/2012
Sermon on Luke 7:18-35, by Andrew Smith
18 tThe disciples of John reported all these things to him. And John, 19 calling two of his disciples to him, sent them to the Lord, saying, "Are you the one who is to come, or shall we look for another?" 20 And when the men had come to him, they said, "John the Baptist has sent us to you, saying, ‘Are you the one who is to come, or shall we look for another?' " 21 In that hour he healed many people of diseases and plagues and evil spirits, and on many who were blind he bestowed sight. 22 And he answered them, "Go and tell John what you have seen and heard: the blind receive their sight, the lame walk, lepers are cleansed, and the deaf hear, the dead are raised up, the poor have good news preached to them. 23 And blessed is the one who is not offended by me." 24 When John's messengers had gone, Jesus began to speak to the crowds concerning John: "What did you go out into the wilderness to see? A reed shaken by the wind? 25 What then did you go out to see? A man dressed in soft clothing? Behold, those who are dressed in splendid clothing and live in luxury are in kings' courts. 26 What then did you go out to see? A prophet? Yes, I tell you, and more than a prophet. 27 This is he of whom it is written, " ‘Behold, I send my messenger before your face, who will prepare your way before you.' 28 I tell you, among those born of women none is greater than John. Yet the one who is least in the kingdom of God is greater than he." 29 (When all the people heard this, and the tax collectors too, they declared God just, having been baptized with the baptism of John, 30 but the Pharisees and the lawyers rejected the purpose of God for themselves, not having been baptized by him.)31 "To what then shall I compare the people of this generation, and what are they like? 32 They are like children sitting in the marketplace and calling to one another, " ‘We played the flute for you, and you did not dance;we sang a dirge, and you did not weep.'33 For John the Baptist has come eating no bread and drinking no wine, and you say, ‘He has a demon.' 34 The Son of Man has come eating and drinking, and you say, ‘Look at him! A glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners!' 35 Yet wisdom is justified by all her children."
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.
The text for the sermon today is the Gospel for today from Luke chapter 7.
The Gospel reading last week ended somewhat ominously, "But Herod the tetrarch, who had been reproved by him for Herodias, his brother's wife, and for all the evil things that Herod had done, 20 added this to them all, that he locked up John in prison." (Lk 3:19-20) This week's Gospel reading picks up on that thread in Luke's narrative of the kingdom of God come in Christ Jesus.
John the Baptist sitting in Herod's prison, his physical needs tended to by his disciples, sends two of them to Jesus. Their question is certainly one of theological depth and profundity. But remember for John, who Jesus is more than a theological question. If Jesus is the one who was to come, then John's suffering in Herod's prison has a purpose. He is suffering for the sake of the kingdom Jesus brings with Him.
A question in the minds of many who read this passage is whether John, sitting in Herod's prison, had begun to doubt. And so he sends his disciples to Jesus to be reassured that Jesus is in fact the long-prophesied one. I'm okay with that reading. I think it makes John the Baptist a little more human and a little less super-prophet of Lord. There is another way to read this too and that's that John is sitting in prison and is concerned for his disciples and as a good teacher and forerunner of the Messiah, he sends them to Jesus so that they are reassured that Jesus is the coming one. That makes John a quite extraordinary kind of man. I'm certainly okay with that reading too. I think either one works because Jesus answer to their question is the real focus.
"Are you the one who is to come?" They are asking, unambiguously whether Jesus is God's Messiah, God's deliverer. The phrase they use is often translated poorly in our English Bibles. There's no capital letters used here and we'd never get the idea what we're looking at it is a proper title, a title used for the Messiah of God. The Messiah is the "One Who Was to Come" or the "Coming One." It was a title that the Jews of John's and Jesus' day were well familiar with. As I said, their question is not just a desire to end some theological musing but a real one considering John is suffering as the Messiah's forerunner and herald. And Jesus answer is absolutely clear.
I realize Jesus doesn't say, "Yes, I'm the Messiah. Go reassure John, or be assured yourselves, that indeed I am the God of Israel's long promised Messiah." But what He does say, means precisely that. Jesus clearly says He's God's Messiah, the One who was to come. Jesus says, "Go and tell John what you have seen and heard: the blind receive their sight, the lame walk, lepers are cleansed, and the deaf hear, the dead are raised up, the poor have good news preached to them." (Lk 7:22) So where did we get this job description of the "Coming One"? What Jesus says He is doing is a direct fulfillment of Isaiah's prophetic description of what the Coming One will do when He comes. Isaiah 29, "In that day the deaf shall hear the words of a book, and out of their gloom and darkness the eyes of the blind shall see." (Isa 29:18) And Isaiah 35, "Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf unstopped; 6 then shall the lame man leap like a deer, and the tongue of the mute sing for joy." (Isa 35:5-6a) If you go back through the chapters between last week's Gospel reading and this week's reading you'll see that Jesus has been doing precisely these things since the beginning of His public ministry. He preached in the synagogues. He cast out demons. He healed many from their sicknesses including a lame man and a blind man. It's no wonder He told them, "Go and tell John what you have seen and heard." Jesus is God's Messiah.
But this reading comes to us in the season of Advent, on the Sunday of joy, pink candle and all. John is in prison awaiting his end. What could this reading have to do with Advent? What joy could this message bring to John in Herod's prison. What joy could this message bring to you in your prison of sin and captivity to death and the power of the devil?
If we are to look at John's predicament, we might say that the thing John most needs is to be let out of prison. And yet are we sure that is what John needs most? What John needs most is to know that what He suffers, He suffers for a purpose. I know that some people say that everything happens for a reason, but I'm not going down that path. The fact of the matter is, sometimes the real reason and the reason we've set our minds on are not the same thing. John is in prison not so that glory of God might be proclaimed but because Herod is a wicked and evil man. It just so happens that God used even the wickedness of Herod to His own advantage to proclaim the authority of God over and against Herod's authority. And so with John as a case in point, the meaning of it all is clear. Jesus not only tells the people and John's disciples who He is, but He tells everyone within earshot who John is, the messenger of the Lord, as per Malachi chapter 3, sent before the Messiah as standard bearer for the Lord's Messiah and herald of the Coming One.
You're probably familiar with the prophecies from Isaiah that Jesus quoted to support His Messiahship. You're probably less familiar with this question from Jesus, "What did you go out into the wilderness to see? A reed shaken by the wind?" That's a rather odd expression, isn't it? On our coins we have the heads of former presidents, Lincoln, Jefferson, Eisenhower, Washington. Rome too had the heads of caesars on their coins but in Israel the Law of God forbade the graven image. So on their coins there were symbols. When King Herod came to power new coins were minted with symbols that meant something to Herod. His favorite was that of a reed from the shore of the Sea of Galilee. A reed symbolized the beauty and fertility of the area that Herod ruled. Our culture is overwhelmed with images but the only graphic art a common person might see on any regular basis were the images on coins. When Jesus asks this odd little question about going to see a reed blowing in the wind, the people knew exactly what He was asking. "What did you go out into the wilderness to see?" Another king like the one just down the road here? A man who lives in palaces and wears fine clothes?" A prophet? Yes and more than "a" prophet." John was THE PROPHET to end all prophets, the last in the line of prophets whose job was to foretell the coming of God's deliverer of Israel.
On the question of whether John was just being a good pastor to his disciples or really confused by the ministry of Jesus up to this point, I tend to side with the confused John. John knows who he is and he was pretty sure who Jesus was but Jesus was not doing the kinds of things John had expected God's Coming One to do. He expected that Jesus would be king and Herod would be cast down from his throne like cousin Mary had sung about. It's not as if no one expected Jesus to be the kind of Messiah He was; we have evidence from the one of the Dead Sea Scrolls that some were expecting the Messiah to do exactly what Jesus had been doing. And so Jesus confirmed what sort of Messiah He intends to be: "not a straightforward rival to Herod, even though his kingdom will eventually challenge and outlast all the Herods in the world, but a kingdom operating in a different mode altogether, healing people and the world at every level." (Wright, Luke for Everyone, 87-88)
Jesus is "The One Who Was To Come." John the Baptist was the greatest prophet who pointed to the coming one, even to the point of imprisonment and death. In the death of the forerunner of the king, we have a foreshadowing of what awaits the king when He receives His crown. His coming, His death, His resurrection, all of it done to make you a citizen of the kingdom of God Jesus came to restore. And this season we wait the return of our king.
Come, Lord Jesus. Come. Amen.
The peace of God which passes all understanding keep your hearts and minds through faith in Christ Jesus. Amen.