Heed the Message

'A shoot shall come out from the stump of Jesse, and a branch shall grow out of his roots. The spirit of the LORD shall rest on him, the spirit of wisdom and understanding,  the spirit of counsel and might,  the spirit of knowledge and the fear of the LORD. His delight shall be in the fear of the LORD. He shall not judge by what his eyes see, or decide by what his ears hear; but with righteousness he shall judge the poor, and decide with equity for the meek of the earth; he shall strike the earth with the rod of his mouth, and with the breath of his lips he shall kill the wicked. Righteousness shall be the belt around his waist, and faithfulness the belt around his loins. The wolf shall live with the lamb, the leopard shall lie down with the kid, the calf and the lion and the fatling together, and a little child shall lead them. The cow and the bear shall graze their young shall lie down together; and the lion shall eat straw like the ox. The nursing child shall play over the hole of the asp, and the weaned child shall put its hand on the adder's den. They will not hurt or destroy on all my holy mountain; for the earth will be full of the knowledge of the LORD as the waters cover the sea. On that day the root of Jesse shall stand as a signal to the peoples; the nations shall inquire of him, and his dwelling shall be glorious.'

--Isaiah 11: 1-10

'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.”'

--Matthew 3: 1-12

The second Sunday of Advent is one of those days that makes me chuckle a bit. Because despite the fact that when I read the text from Matthew I said,  “The Gospel of the Lord,” the Lord Jesus doesn’t actually make an appearance. It’s more like the Gospel of John the Baptist. Did you know that there is a small religious group that believe John the Baptist was the Messiah and the last of the prophets? They’re called the Mandaeans, and their number ranges from about 60,000-200,000 followers worldwide, most of whom are in Iran, Syria, and Jordan. This is a Mandaean Gospel if ever there was one, but that doesn’t make it any less of a Christian message, just because it’s John’s time to shine. The Baptist is both the inheritor of the prophetic witness of folks like Isaiah and the forerunner of Jesus; and they all are, effectively, calling folks to heed a particular message. 

The Baptist.

That message is one of metanoia, a Greek word that means “to turn oneself around,” and is generally translated into English as “repentance.” It can be a loaded word, and to be sure, a lot of preachers have misused it in such a fashion that folks think that it means they have to beat themselves up. To practice metanoia, though, is not to drown in self-imposed punishment, but to re-orient one’s self – heart, mind, and spirit – toward the grace, mercy, and love of God. It’s a paradigm shift, a changing of one’s whole attitude and self.

Jesus himself uses the word metanoia 14 different times, and like John, he will use that word in conjunction with another word that has been somewhat misused and misrepresented in our modern parlance, hamartia, which is an archery term meaning “to miss the mark,” but that gets translated into English as “sin.” John, as the forerunner, sets the stage for Jesus, urging people to heed this message of turning from their sins. To turn, to repent, as John articulates it, is itself a way of coming closer to God. Whatever drove the Pharisees and Sadducees out to see what John was up to was of a curiosity than a genuine desire to turn themselves around, which might be why John calls them a brood of vipers, an insult even Jesus will employ after John’s death. 

John’s message of repentance is one that calls folks to a sense of responsibility, looking deep into their own hearts and being truly honest with themselves, not hiding behind their egos or their place within a given community. The Pharisees and Sadducees were satisfied with being children of Abraham, that seems to have been enough for them. Modern Christians, too, have a version of that. We are satisfied with calling Jesus our Lord and belonging to a specific church. That seems to be enough. But such an attitude runs the risk of viewing sin as a kind of psychological dilemma, purely spiritual in nature, and not tied to the choices that we make on a daily basis. We pray, “God, guard my heart!” but then we get all out of sorts by what some might call “first world problems.” We ask Jesus, “Make me more prayerful, help me carve out time for spiritual practices!”, but then we say to him, “Geez, look at my schedule?! Maybe I’ll try again tomorrow.” We ask for the mental assent to new life, but how often do we get to the actions that lead to the life-changing turn? We become like the car whose blinker keeps indicating that it’s going to turn any minute now….and is still blinking 10, 20, 30 miles later.

John’s invitation, which Jesus will carry forth, is to prove by the very way we live that we have, indeed, begun to turn. And make no mistake, this is not a one-time thing. We don’t suddenly turn around and realize we’ve got it all figured out – “Oh hey, Jesus! Didn’t see ya there!” - and keep walking along, now fully changed or enlightened. It takes doing again and again, that’s why metanoia is a spiritual practice; we gotta work at it all the time. It’s not a destination, it’a journey, one we embark on through prayer, personal confession, and those other practices that turn us away from our egos and toward the transformed life that Jesus has to give us. There’s a lovely story about when Father Thomas Keating, the architect of Centering Prayer, was leading a group of nuns in the practice, and one of the sisters approached him after they had done the exercise of 20 minutes of silence, and she said, “Oh Fr. Keating! I’m so bad at this. During the silence my mind went off in a hundred different directions, and I just feel awful!” Fr. Keating, smiling, said, “Oh wonderful! A hundred opportunities to turn back to God!” 

Father Thomas Keating.

The world is fixing to turn, and we are invited every day this Advent season to heed this message of continually turning toward the grace, mercy, and love of God; for in this message is the hope that God is working something new in our lives, something that bespeaks God again breaking into the world.  The vision from the prophet Isaiah is one of the most beautiful and powerful in all of Scripture, and it is all about metanoia.  A stump shall come up out of the tree of Jesse.  A stump, that which symbolizes death where there once was life.  But even a stump has roots, and lo and behold a shoot will sprout from those roots.  And what’s more, all living creatures will turn themselves around, the prey will lie with the predators, the former having let God quell their fear, and the latter surrendering to God their predatory instincts.  In their midst, a little child, the most vulnerable of all, will lead them. As Christians we read Jesus into this vision—he, a descendant of Jesse, is that promised shoot, that little child for whose birth we prepare —but those who first heard this vision would’ve known how it signals the birth of a new innocence in which trust, gentleness, and friendship are possible in an often-cruel world.  The whole creation is turning and moving in a new way; we need only ask to be shown where the moments are for us to turn, so that we finally click that blinker off. 

I cannot help but think, on a day like this with readings like these, of Rory Cooney’s Canticle of the Turning, an Advent song usually sung to the old Irish tune Star of the County Down. Our congregation sang it on Sunday, and below is a video of a virtual choir rendition they offered during the pandemic:  “My heart shall sing of the day you bring, let the fires of your justice burn; wipe away all tears, for the dawn draws near; and the world is about to turn.”  Creation itself is turning, repenting. Perhaps if we all can heed the message, practice metanoia from our hamartia in the small, daily ways, then the bigger, systemic ways, will become more manageable, and this world can finally look like the loved, liberated, and life-giving place that God has always envisioned. 

The Church of the Advocate's virtual choir singing The Canticle of the Turning.

Again and Again and Again

'Jesus said to the disciples, “But about that day and hour no one knows, neither the angels of heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father. For as the days of Noah were, so will be the coming of the Son of Man. For as in those days before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day Noah entered the ark, and they knew nothing until the flood came and swept them all away, so too will be the coming of the Son of Man. Then two will be in the field; one will be taken and one will be left. Two women will be grinding meal together; one will be taken and one will be left. Keep awake therefore, for you do not know on what day your Lord is coming. But understand this: if the owner of the house had known in what part of the night the thief was coming, he would have stayed awake and would not have let his house be broken into. Therefore you also must be ready, for the Son of Man is coming at an unexpected hour.”'

--Matthew 24: 36-44

Here we go again. Another season – Advent – and the start of another church year – what we call Year A. I find great beauty and comfort in it, the rhythms and the routines of our liturgical cycle. As our secular calendar prepares to turn over, the Church gets something of a head start, moving into a mindset of preparedness for what is to come. It’s an old dance, but I’m always happy to join it again and again and again.

Still, the readings for the First Sunday of Advent always take me by surprise. I expect the gospel to be the opening lines of Matthew, which give us Jesus’ lineage and genealogy going back to Abraham, or at the very least I figure it’s going to be Matthew’s backstory of Jesus’ birth, which mostly focuses on Joseph. It throws me for a loop that our first Gospel for Advent in Year A features Jesus preaching about that day of many names: the Second Advent, Second Coming, the Eschaton, the Day of Resurrection, the Day of the Lord, the End Times, the End of the Age, take your pick.

When I hear this passage I think of a sermon preached by the Rev. Cleophus James at the Triple Rock Baptist Church in Calumet City, IL. Rev. Cleophus said in that sermon, “don’t be lost when your time comes; for the day of the Lord is coming as a thief in the night!” The congregation followed up with a singing of Old Landmark and dancing up and down the aisle. 

Reverend Cleophus James preaches to the flock at the Triple Rock Baptist Church.

I wish I could say I heard that sermon in-person, but I didn’t because Triple Rock Baptist Church doesn’t exist, and the Rev. Cleophus James was a character played by the late-Godfather of Soul, James Brown, and the sermon and song-and-dance routine are from an early scene in my favorite live-action movie, The Blues Brothers. That film will preach, y'all! There’s good news in Reverend Cleophus’ sermon; good news that Jesus imparts in his own sermon to our ancestors and to us even still; though it might not seem so at first glance.

The thought of Jesus sneaking up on us at some unknown hour doesn’t exactly sound like the good kind of news, am I right? Considering the stress that we are already under – like, all the time – now we have to guard against a surprise visit from Jesus? To borrow a line from Seinfeld: I hate the pop-in (and I bet many of y’all do too)! To constantly be at red alert, under threat of intrusion, even by Jesus, whom we profess to love, sounds utterly exhausting. Can’t he at least send a text first?

Wonder if Debbie is ready...

Realistically, though, does it seem likely to any of us that Jesus actually wants to scare us into readiness? He’s not some cartoonish evil engineer, stepping off the train as it races forward at top speed, leaving us to steer the thing, then threating punishment if it gets off-track. He’s the same Jesus who will say at the end of Matthew’s Gospel, “I am with you always, even to the end of the age.” Maybe this dire warning of his – and the many more we will hear in this Gospel throughout the year – are not merely about a future day that we affirm in our Creed will eventually come; maybe warnings such as this one are about all of our days.

To be on guard against some spectacular, sky-breaking day, whose date is unknown can leave us feeling even more anxious and unprepared. To know that Jesus comes unexpectedly EVERY DAY, though, changes our lives and hour whole perspective. Now each situation, each place, each person is where Jesus is apt to appear. Life becomes less of a threat and more of an adventure. Jesus showing up again – and again and again – maybe even today(!) - becomes the expectation that he will, no doubt show up soon and very soon. We become like the congregation of early Christians in Rome to whom Paul reminded, “Keep awake!” Or, in our more modern parlance: stay woke! 

I asked our Bible Study group last week: how many Second Comings have y’all survived? Passages like this Gospel text today may evoke thoughts of our more evangelical siblings and their penchant for trying to predict when Jesus is coming again to judge the quick and the dead. I wonder what kinds of fears and anxieties are at work in the hearts, as they feel it so necessary to get that date right. Perhaps there is grief over what is going on in their lives at the present moment – I’m sure we can all understand that – and they try to almost will Jesus to come on back and take them away from all of the pain and suffering they see. It’s that bargaining phase of grief, an effort to make sense of what we is being experienced. If we can fine-tune when he’s going to get here, we can be ready; it’s a form of maintaining control. Yet Jesus himself says that it is not our place, nor is it even his place, to know when such a moment will occur. That privilege belongs only to God. So maybe it isn’t about being anxious or fearful of the future. Maybe it is in the present moment – all of our present moments, from now until that day – that we are called to practice making room in ourselves for his arrival, or noticing him when he already shows up in our neighbor. In our churches we engage in spiritual practices of prayer, study, and mindfulness; we meet him at the Table, and we see him in one another, as we pass the Peace, we welcome the stranger, and we break bread together after worship. Yet if Sunday morning is merely the dress rehearsal for the rest of our lives – as one colleague of mine is prone to say – then what could it mean for us, as we head back out into the world, to have that kind of mindful preparedness, to anticipate Jesus’ arrival wherever and with whomever we go? At the gas station, the grocery store, or the Target: what if we prepared to see Jesus there?

The opportunities for Jesus to surprise us are there every day. From the moment our open our physical eyes up to the moment they close, there is the possibility that they the eyes of our hearts can be open to some sort of heavenly breakthrough. Maybe that’s our prayer this Advent: to have those eyes to see, to have the curiosity so as to be surprised, to prepare with all our heart, all our soul, and all our mind, for Jesus’ arrival.

Noah, Jesus reminds us, prepared for what was to come, even during the sunny days. Though his neighbors scoffed at him, though he could have tried predicting when the rains would start to fall, he prepared each day as if that could be the moment. Advent is the time for us to make such preparation. The more we prepare, the less anxious we become, and the more ready we are for Jesus’ Second Advent, whenever that may be.

German theologian Karl Barth said that we live between Creation and Re-Creation. It’s a liminal space, this life of ours. Ferris Bueller said that life comes at us fast, and if we don’t slow down, we might miss it. We dare not miss those moments, sisters and brothers. We dare not be numb to the world around us so much that we miss the opportunity each moment presents for Jesus to show up again…and again…and again.