Matthew 3:1-12

The Second Sunday in Advent | 12/4/2022 | Matthew 3:1-12 | David Zersen |

In those days, John the Baptist appeared in the wilderness of Judea, proclaiming, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near.” This is the one of whom the prophet Isaiah spoke when he said, “The voice of one crying out in the wilderness: ‘Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight.” Now John wore clothing of camel’s hair with a leather belt around his waist, and his food was locusts and wild honey. Then the people of Jerusalem and all Judea were going out to him, and all the region along the Jordan, and they were baptized by him in the river Jordan, confessing their sins.

But when he saw many Pharisees and Sadducees coming for baptism, he said to them, “You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come? Bear fruit worthy of repentance. Do not presume to say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham as our ancestor’; for I tell you, God is able from these stones to raise up children to Abraham.  Even now the ax is lying at the root of the trees; every tree therefore that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. “I baptize you with water for repentance, but one who is more powerful than I is coming after me; I am not worthy to carry his sandals. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire. His winnowing fork is in his hand, and he will clear his threshing floor and will gather his wheat into the granary; but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire.”

LETTING GOD SHAPE OUR FUTURE

Some years ago I remember getting off a street car in San Francisco only to be confronted by a man in a white suite who was yelling at everyone. I had the impression that he saw himself as a modern John the Baptist who was calling people to repentance. There is good precedent for that and many are those who have read today’s Gospel lesson with the notion that they might be called to denounce sinners in John’s style.

Avoiding a traditional approach to setting the world straight

When I was a camp counsellor in Central Wisconsin many years ago, a colleague told me about her pastor. Old Rev.Pape mounted the pulpit each Sunday in his black robe and launched into a fiery tirade, a kind of “Give-em-hell, Harry” type of sermon. Then, about half way through, he stopped, hiked his robe, pulled a handkerchief out of his pocket, and blew his nose. Then he proceeded to share the sweet Gospel, the good news that despite our sin, God sent his son to save us and to assure us of forgiveness and the promise of eternal life. Both parts of the sermon were so inevitable each Sunday that at least one camp counsellor who was telling the story found it difficult to take any of it seriously.

            I confess to having a similar problem with some of the General Confessions used in Christian worship. I have nothing against public versus private confession. I do feel, however, that some of the language used is so negative and self-castigating that it makes me wonder whether the Gospel has had any effect in my life since the previous Sunday. Using words like “I, a poor miserable sinner” have, at times wrung true. But is there no place, dear Jesus and preacher John, for me to celebrate what grace has achieved in me this week? To say it in theological terms, “Is there never any progress in sanctification, in my spiritual life?” As a faithful Lutheran, I make no claim to a righteousness which God has not affected in me through my trust in “Jesus’ blood and righteousness”. That very trust, however, should call me to see what God is regularly working in and through me and perhaps to create a different type of Confession which celebrates some things and repents of others.

            I have never forgotten the fire-chief in one of the congregations I served who said to me as he walked out of church one Sunday, “Do you really need to be so hard on us, Pastor?” Apparently that Sunday he had only heard the John the Baptist side of me in the sermon and preachers need to be careful that if they preach God’s judgement they also with both clarity and power emphasize God’s saving grace. I find it interesting in our text that John did not feel himself called to preach good news, but only to point to the one who would. As a point of history, it’s worth noting that many liked John’s preaching so much that even after he was decapitated by Herod, they took it seriously and moved East where they could  continue to practice baptisms of repentance as the major thrust of their belief system. Because of the Iraqi war, we have discovered that in southern Iraq, many of the Mandaeans, a sect that follows John the Baptist, had to flee to avoid the American bombing. Their numbers cut in half, there are now only about 250,000 descended from those John once called to repentance who have never been privileged to experience the greater baptism of the Spirit and fire.

Looking for new approaches to celebrate heaven’s nearness

            John’s preaching is, however, the basis of our text today and I’m wondering if we believe in the value of confession and repentance whether we can understand his words in ways that are positive and edifying? I’m thinking of two ways that might be useful, one having to do with baking and another that uses the imagery of the winnowing fork in the second portion of our text. First of all, it’s interesting to me that around this time of the year, I annually bake Stollen, a yeast bread that has origins in Dresden, Germany, and that is still popularly made in some families and sold in many bakeries, especially in Milwaukee where I live. The traditional approach to yeast-dough baking requires that after a couple risings of the dough, the baker needs to “punch” it down to take out the air and to strengthen the elasticity of the batter. In more recent years, however, I have used a newer method that allows the yeast to do its own work overnight (or over an 18-24 hour period) so that there is no punching involved. I find an interesting analogy in that exercise to the Law-Gospel approach in preaching. If the yeast represents the power of the Gospel to do its work quietly and powerfully, accepting the challenges involved in the dough’s mass, then it’s wonderful to see the finished product arise without the brutal attack that might otherwise have to take place. Likewise, if in our preaching we seek to explore the ways in which a grace-empowered life can be effective in our world, then we might avoid the strictures that could fashion us to be white-suited law preachers or condemning, stage-strutting tele-evangelists.

            Another example occurs to me in the language of our text about the winnowing fork. I have often read this passage with no understanding of what the winnowing process was. However, one time our family visited Old World Wisconsin, a wonderful collection of homesteads from all over Wisconsin that have been moved to a huge area near Eagle, about 35 miles SW of Milwaukee. A relocated barn had been placed on a fabricated promontory so that when doors were opened on both sides, wind might blow through the barn. As the farmer lifted the grain with his “winnowing fork”, the chaff was blown aside and the kernels fell to the barn floor. It’s a simple process that allows God to do the work, as with the yeast. The farmer doesn’t beat the grain, but follows a process that allows the good to be separated from the worthless and all glory to be given to God.

            There are insights in these examples that are helpful for all of us. I grew up in a society in which physical spanking, sometimes actual child abuse, was common. There were biblical passages like “spare the rod and spoil the child” from Proverbs 13;24 that were often quoted and applied by my parents, and by me! Our children grew up in another more introspective society in which such strong discipline was avoided for good reasons, and we as parents learned from our children who never spanked their own children. There are new and more caring ways to apply John’s strong language in our time and we ought to explore them together. It’s not difficult for us to understand the life-style that God in Christ is summoning up in us and there are practical and clever ways in which we can bring ourselves and others to a meaningful application of them.

            We are faced, for example, with a terrible outbreak of gun-violence in our society. A twenty-two-year old man shot and killed five people in Colorado and when his mother was openly castigated in an airport, she said that she wished she had enough guns to kill all of them! This is but one example of how the never-ending anger/hate cycle can continue. The extreme language in castigations, in liturgical Confessions or in personal criticisms all might be replaced with a more sensitive and analytical analysis of the real issues involved.

            In our 21^st century world, we are being encouraged to live out the loving lifestyle of the one who came after John, the one John longed for, the one whose birth we will shortly celebrate this Christmas.  And as we prepare to celebrate, may we in our gifts and greetings find new and clever ways to challenge old approaches to making things better. May we look for the ways in which God is seeking through us to create a world that lives by the Gospel, the loving insight that remembers the good already at work within us because the kingdom of heaven has come near.

Suggested hymn: Rejoice, Rejoice Believers

David Zersen, D.Min., Ed.D., FRHistS

President Emeritus, Concordia University Texas

zersendj@gmail.com