Advent III, 2004                                                                                     Susan J. Barnes

Matthew 11: 2-11                                                                             St. Matthew’s, Austin

John the Baptist was in prison, waiting to die, waiting to be killed by Herod.   He was there because his life and his ministry were totally outside the bounds—not just the bounds of village society and conventional religion, but also the bounds of cozy collaboration with the authorities.     So John had denounced the marriage of the Roman governor, Herod, to his sister-in-law Herodias.  Soon, she would have him beheaded.

John was a prophet.   He told the truth.  Because prophets are driven—compelled by God--to speak their truth, regardless of the cost, regardless of the risk.

John had announced the advent—the coming--of the Messiah.   He had baptized people and called them to repentance to prepare for that coming.   Now, staring death in the face, he wanted to know the truth about Jesus.    So he sent his disciples to ask Jesus whether he was the Messiah:  “Are you the one who is to come, or are we to wait for another?”

That question is a message in code—a code that Jesus and his disciples understood as well as John and his disciples did.   The code was necessary, because the answer could be grounds for treason.   There was only one Son of God in the Roman Empire, the Emperor himself.   With John in jail, his disciples were surely being watched.   Spies and informers were everywhere.   If Jesus declared himself the Messiah, he risked the same fate as John--the fate that would claim him soon enough.

But why did John have to ask the question?  Didn’t he know?    As Luke tells it, John and Jesus were cousins; John recognized Jesus when they both were in the womb.   Matthew—whom we read today--tells us nothing about their early relationship, nothing about John, until they meet at the River Jordan.   Jesus came to be baptized, though John resisted.   According to Matthew, John said: “I need to be baptized by you.”     Clearly John recognized something special—something holy—in Jesus, even then, as Jesus was beginning his ministry.

So why didn’t John know now--now, months later, when Jesus’ ministry and teachings had drawn large crowds all through the Galilee?   Why didn’t he know that Jesus was the Messiah?

We can only surmise.   Let’s look back at John’s prophecy in Matthew 3:  “I baptize you with water for repentance,” he said, “but one who is more powerful than I is coming after me.  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.”  

            If we take that prophecy seriously—not just literally, but as an expansive  metaphor —John’s image of the Messiah was one of power, judgment, and even vengeance.   It was in keeping with the image we so often point to from the Hebrew scriptures: the Messiah, the anointed, as a heroic leader, a military conqueror, a unifiying King on the model of David.

            If that is what John had expected, it’s no wonder he was puzzled.   It’s no wonder he needed to ask.   That image didn’t fit Jesus at all.

            And how did Jesus answer?    The way he always responded—carefully, provocatively, and indirectly—never with a simple “yes” or “no”.   Sometimes with a question, sometimes with a parable, sometimes—as he did here--with an allusion to scripture.

            Like John, Jesus carried within him the words and the imagery of the Hebrew scriptures.   Both men knew them by heart.    So Jesus knew the scriptures about the Messiah that John might have in mind, like Psalm 72, which describes the Davidic king: “May he have dominion from sea to sea….May his foes bow down before him and his enemies lick the dust.  May the king of Tarshish and of the isles render him tribute….May all the kings fall down before him.”   

            But God had given Jesus other scriptures.   God had chosen Jesus, indeed.    Jesus was God’s anointed, God’s beloved Son.   Somewhere in Jesus’ ministry God had given him a new vision.    Perhaps it happened in a blinding flash, perhaps it grew in Jesus’ daily times of silence, listening to God, and evolved as he ministered to the people.   God had revealed to Jesus a new kingdom—a heavenly kingdom, but one that might also come to be on earth.   In that kingdom, all were healed, all were loved, all were brought together at the table, all were reconciled to God and to one another.    That kingdom vision became Jesus’ life work, it became his understanding—not only of his call as Messiah, but also of the call of everyone who followed him.

            In his teachings, Jesus showed that that vision, too, was grounded in scripture.    First, the Law.   Jesus distilled and conveyed that vision in two commandments: Love God; love one another.      There were also scriptures for this new vision of the Messiah.  

Today, we ask: “What would Jesus do?”   Two thousand years ago, as the Son of God, Jesus seems to have asked: “What would God do?”    The scriptures gave him answers like the passage we have today from Psalm 146:   God “gives justice to those who are oppressed, and food to those who hunger.   The Lord sets the prisoners free; the Lord opens the eyes of the blind; the Lord lifts up those who are bowed down;  the Lord loves the righteous; the Lord cares for the stranger; sustains the orphan and widow, but frustrates the way of the wicked.”   That’s one passage from many, many more.

            John the Baptist was in prison waiting to die.    He wanted to know whether, like Simeon, he could “depart in peace”, having seen God’s promised Salvation at hand.   Jesus understood John’s question, and his confusion.   Jesus knew that what he had to say to John would transform John’s understanding of God’s will.   Jesus could not explain it to John in person, but he knew how to deliver the message, to say it in their code, and in a way that John could not fail to understand:   “the blind receive their sight” Jesus said, “the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the poor have good news brought to them.  And blessed his anyone who takes no offense at me.”  

With those references to scripture, Jesus remade for John the image of the Messiah.   And he redefined once and for all what it meant to be God’s chosen, God’s anointed one.

Jesus’ words ring down through the centuries.    Here, today, we proclaim Jesus as our Lord and Savior.    What does that mean?   Two thousand years ago it meant standing up against the powers and the principalities.   It still does today.    Two thousand years ago it meant serving the last and the least, defending and supporting those who cannot defend themselves, working for justice and peace.   It still does today.    Two thousand years ago it meant giving up your priorities and your life-script and trusting God to provide a new one that would help to bring the kingdom of heaven here on earth.    It still does today.

Can we as present-day followers begin to hear the gospel today with the same urgency, power and challenge that his disciples heard it then?   Can we be emboldened by it to leave our nets, leave our boats, leave our prejudices and preconceptions to follow Jesus?  Materially our lives are so much more comfortable than theirs were.   We’re less likely to risk it.   We may think we have more to lose, but we don’t.    The stakes are the same: the salvation of the human soul, the salvation of the human family. 

I believe with all my heart is that in Jesus’ message to John the Baptist, Jesus not only defined himself as Messiah.   At the same time, he defined the heart of our work as Christians.   In today’s gospel, Jesus calls us to follow him in ministering to the sick, to the outcast, the poor.   That is kingdom vision, kingdom work. Many of you do that work in places like El Buen, in prisons, in soup kitchens, in retirement centers, in hospitals, and here through the IHN —and I thank you, honor you and bless you for that.   But there are folks like myself who can get buried in busyness,  who let other voices drown out Jesus’ call.   For me, for us, Advent, Christmas, and Epiphany are seasons of recommitment.

In the January Word, you all will be invited to listen, to discern whether Jesus is calling you to one of many pastoral ministries in this parish.  We will train you for membership in the Community of Hope again this spring.

John the Baptist got the message, even if it was in code, and we get the message  today—loud and clear.   If we are going to follow Jesus we must be about the work of the kingdom he proclaimed.   We must join in ministries to the sick, the hungry, the poor, the imprisoned, the stranger.   That, my friends, is what it means to be a Christian