12152021 – Luke 3. 7-18 Advent III
I think I am right.
But I have been wrong so many times in my life, that I even doubt myself sometimes, maybe even often.
I think I am right.
I think we do not HEAR the Baptizer. Maybe we never did hear him. We silence him and his voice. Or we laugh at his silly words pointed at “others.”
I mean, why would WE listen to him or pay attention to HIS WORDS, he wasn’t speaking to us.
We always think: He was talking to THEM…He was talking to “those people.”
Biblically, we know, he was talking to Jews and to a handful of Gentiles. You know, Tax collectors, Roman soldiers, the Scribes, and to ordinary folks who wandered out “to get a look-see,” the Pharisees, who no doubt came out to spy on him…He was talking to THEM. THOSE people. And probably to some genuinely, sincere, and well-meaning individuals who really did want to change their lives. Individuals who took repentance seriously. People who WANTED TO HEAR what he had to say.
But he definitely wasn’t talking to YOU and to ME. We are removed by over 2,000 years from that land and that time.
We are more cultured and civilized…more socialized…more integrated…much more intelligent. We have space travel and the internet, computers at our fingertips. We are a modern, advanced technological society. We do online banking. And can have our groceries dropped off on our doorsteps.
You cannot compare APPLES and ORANGES.
Surely, all of his judgment, bravado, and negativity is pointed at “others” and not at us.
Why would his words of JUDGMENT and CONDENATION have any meaning for us?
After all, we go to church. We pray. We praise. We give a record of our offering. And we commune regularly.
And yet, there is this “gnawing inkling” that he may be talking to others…maybe even untold, unnamed others…maybe even “others” far removed…AND IN DISTANT PLACES…
If he were, perhaps he might speak to the sins that continue to “pervade our relationships” and “our communities,” all the injustices that continue, that structure “a broken world.”
Would he name the “pernicious sins” that infiltrate and harm God’s good creation?
Would he have anything to say about what we have done and continue to do – to God’s good green earth?
Would he name the scourges of “racism” and “sexism” and “xenophobia” that constant fear, of “the other” or of people who are different from us?
Would he speak TO gun violence on our streets and blatant racism?
Would he “call us out” for the number of people dying on the streets in most LARGE American cities?
Just what would this “old prophetic character” have to say about the number of people that go to bed hungry, night after night…
Or the small children that suffer from malnutrition?
Then there is the treatment of women and young girls not only in Afghanistan but globally…and Biblical flooding in the South Sudan that has displaced hundreds of thousands of people, and a global economy that is increasingly out of sync and the need for greed by some even during a global pandemic…
AND SEX TRAFFICING THAT INCLUDES BOTH BOYS AND GIRLS…
Anything goes to make a buck.
You have to make hay – when the sun shines…
Which translates into make money any way you can get it.
Drugs on the streets…
Drugs at our local schools…
Kids messed up on drugs and alcohol…
Not OUR PROBLEM…
We didn’t create this mess. We inherited it.
As WE ALL look “the other way.” It is NOT OUR PROBLEM. It is THEIR problem. Those people. Those kind. The people over there. You know the ones.
If it doesn’t directly affect US or our immediate family – then, it is someone else’s problem. Let them deal with it.
Oh, we feel bad for them, don’t get me wrong. We feel sorry for their burden. For the weight they have to carry. BUT…
No, the Baptizer is not speaking to us.
Life is good when you are not responsible for anyone or anything other than yourself.
Life is good when it is their problem…and not out problem.
Nope the old prophetic guy does not speak to us – he ONLY SPEAKS to others…
And I think, (but I maybe wrong) we LIKE IT THAT WAY.
Amen.