Advent 2
Luke 3:1-6

Dear Friends in Christ,
The city of Chicago has the year 2016 in its sights. Hoping to host the 2016 Summer Olympic Games, the leaders of the city are busy building their case to be presented to the Olympic Committee, who will ultimately decide between Chicago, Tokyo and San Francisco. Chicago Olympic committee chairperson Patrick Ryan says the new plan will be submitted to the Olympic Committee and announced in Copenhagen, Denmark in 2009.
If the Summer Games indeed come to Chicago in 2016, all kinds of plans are possible. Among them: The 350 acres of Washington Park on the South Side could be the site of a 95,000 seat Olympic Stadium; after the games conclude, most of the stadium would be removed, leaving behind a sunken 10,000 foot amphitheater. Soldier Field and McCormick Place could be updated to accommodate certain events; two Astroturf fields would be constructed for track and field. After the Olympics, those would be converted to high school football and soccer venues. To the west of the park is a Chicago Transit Authority line and to the east is a Metro train station. If Chicago does get the nod to host, the economy gets a boost, jobs are created, development takes place and words like “clean”, “Repair” ,“Prepare” and “build” become the order of the day .
Things haven’t changed in several thousand years. In ancient times, when cities anticipated important civic celebrations—particularly the visit of a king or great leader, there would be all kinds of cleaning, building, upgrading, and remodeling going on and words like “repair” and “prepare” would become part of an often-chaotic ramp up to the visit.
On a more personal level, we do the same thing when we anticipate guests in our home. Many of us still have this to look forward to this holiday season. There’s the cleaning, the repairing, maybe even some major building yet to be done, so everything looks its very best for our guests. Many of us will also experience a chaotic ramp up before the guests arrive.
The season of Advent is that time of year when we focus on the coming of Christ. Last week we began by focusing on the second Advent, the coming of Jesus at the end of time. I emphasized that it is not a time to fear, but rather a time to rejoice as God’s final redemption is fulfilled. This morning we focus on the first Advent, the birth of Jesus. How do we get ready to celebrate his birth among us once again?
By all accounts the birth of Jesus was a fairly quiet, routine event that went unnoticed by most. There wasn’t any advance preparation other than the normal plans new families make for the birth of a child. When it came time for Mary to deliver, the city of Bethlehem did not roll out the red carpet and provide the finest lodging in town. Quite the opposite, there was no room for them in the inn, so they had to go to the stable out back. The people of Israel were not in a buzz about the birth of this long promised Messiah. The scribes and the Pharisees, the learned ones who were supposed to know the prophecies of scripture, didn’t even bother to go and see the child. Only the lowly shepherds, and later the foreign wise men, went to the manger. The vast majority of the people did not yet know of the treasure that had been born, the savior, Christ the Lord. It was just another baby.
It would be another 30 years before John the Baptist would break into the scene with his message of “repair and prepare” for the coming of the savior. The gospel writer Luke provides the historical context. It was in the 15th year of the reign of Emperor Tiberius Caesar, who ruled from 14 to 37 AD. Pontius Pilate is named, as is Herod, Caiphas, and several other rulers.
When we look at this moment in history, we see that Pilate, Herod, and Caiaphas are the most powerful leaders in Palestine. But something remarkable happens. God speaks through one lone, desert prophet from rural Judea who goes down in history as greater than any of these rulers of the day. His name was John the Baptist, and his message was repent, be baptized, prepare, and get ready for the coming of the Lord. He was not announcing the birth of the baby, he was announcing the coming of the now fully grown, promised Messiah.
We, of course, are people that already know that the baby Jesus grew up to be our promised savior. This is not just another baby, but the one that would die on the cross and rise from the tomb to save us from our sins. For that reason, we, too, listen to John’s message this season of the year, to help us prepare again for the coming of the Savior.
Now there’s lots of preparing taking place right now for Christmas. Most of it is physical, hands on things we do. There’s the shopping, the wrapping, the decorating, the baking, the cooking, the house cleaning, not to mention the travel plans and other family arrangements being made. That’s all well and good. But that’s not what John had in mind when he called out to people to get ready for the Messiah. No, his was a spiritual preparation, a preparation of the heart. What does he tell them, and us, to do?
Well, his is a call for repentance. John wanted to make it clear that any cleaning, any planning, any repair or building for the Messiah, starts with a change in our own hearts, through the work of the Holy Spirit. The writer Luke calls it the baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. John’s baptism was a call to the people of that time to be washed clean of the sin that covered them like so much desert dust. This baptism by John was an outward sign of an inward change. One writer put it this way: “Repentance has two sides—turning away from sins and turning toward God. To be truly repentant, we must do both. We can’t just say we believe and then live any way we choose and neither can we simply live a morally correct life without a personal relationship with God, because that cannot bring forgiveness from sin.”
Preparing for the birth of Jesus begins with repentance, which is nothing more than an acknowledgment that I am in need of cleaning, repair, rebuilding, and renewal in my life. It is an acknowledgment that, over the course of the past year, indeed on any given day, I have not followed the savior as I should have. I do need the savior in my life, to reconnect the disconnect I have with God caused by my sin. We need him to straighten the winding paths we travel, to fill in the valleys into which we wander; to bring low the mountains and hills that we can’t get over; to make straight the crookedness that we, in some twisted way, actually enjoy. We need Jesus Christ to smooth the rough ways for which we settle.
John the Baptist was the prophet whose own coming was prophesied by an earlier prophet, Isaiah, 700 years earlier. He was the sign that the savior was coming. Isaiah wrote: The voice of one crying out in the wilderness: ‘Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight. Every valley shall be filled, and every mountain and hill shall be made low, and the crooked shall be made straight, and the rough ways made smooth’. Isaiah pointed to the sign, John the Baptist. John then pointed to savior, Jesus. Jesus had come to usher in a new age and reality in the lives of people. Into the culture of oppression, confusion, and hopelessness, Jesus came to shift everything. He came to straighten the winding paths and fill the valleys. In the same way, he still comes to lower the mountains and hills, to straighten the crooked, and smooth the rough ways. John was the sign that this was coming. Jesus is the one who came to fulfill the promise. Through his death and resurrection he creates possibility in the face of impossibility, he creates hope in the face of hopelessness, he brings a way where there seems to be none. That’s the savior we get ready for at Christmas.
Now this is not a new message for most of us. But it is one that we continue to need to hear and act on in our lives. I read of a pastor who had the pleasure of moving her family into a new home. It had been nearly half a year that their belongings had been in boxes while the house was being finished. Finally the day came when they could move in and begin to unpack their boxes. She said that it really became a marvelous moment of grace. All of those treasures had not been available to them for months. Now, it all seemed brand new. Old toys were embraced like they were new. Familiar sweaters packed away were tried on again like the first time. Old books were re-shelved like they had been just purchased.
In a way, that’s the meaning of Advent. It is to remember the old familiar promises of God, to look at them again, and to be thankful they have been fulfilled in Jesus. It is to repent of our sins, knowing that this is the one way our hearts can be made ready to receive our savior anew.
In this season of Advent, there’s much to get ready for the guests that will soon come. There’s cleaning and preparing and repairing. But as we do that, let’s not overlook the spiritual preparation called for by John. After John, comes Jesus. John’s purpose was to announce Jesus’ arrival. Jesus was coming, and like preparing for a ruler or a king’s visit, people needed to prepare for his arrival. There was specific work to do to prepare for not just any message—but The Message—Jesus Christ. People needed to clean their lives, be washed, and to get ready.
In this season of Advent, we anticipate Jesus coming anew at Christmas. Are you ready? I don’t mean the physical preparations, but the spiritual ones. Are you prepared? Will you let him do the work of renewal in your life today? We all need to be cleaned and repaired, not just once, but again and again. It’s a step called repentance, and it’s the key to our spiritual preparation for Christmas. It’s really what Christmas is all about, removing the clutter of our sin and making room in our hearts for Jesus. May we all hear again John’s words of preparation, confess our need for renewal, and so be ready for the coming of the savior again to us. Amen