From Out of the Wilderness: A Meditation on Matthew 3, for the 2nd Sunday in Advent

In those days came John the Baptist, preaching in the wilderness of Judaea,

And saying, Repent ye: for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.

For this is he that was spoken of by the prophet Esaias, saying,

The voice of one crying in the wilderness, Prepare ye the way of the Lord,

make his paths straight. And the same John had his raiment of camel’s hair,

and a leathern girdle about his loins; and his meat was locusts and wild honey.

Then went out to him Jerusalem, and all Judaea, and all the region round about Jordan,

And were baptized of him in Jordan, confessing their sins.

But when he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees come to his baptism,

he said unto them, O generation of vipers, who hath warned you to flee from the

wrath to come? Bring forth therefore fruits meet for repentance:

And think not to say within yourselves,

We have Abraham to our father: for I say unto you,

That God is able of these stones to raise up children unto Abraham.

And now also the axe is laid unto the root of the trees:

therefore every tree which bringeth not forth good fruit is hewn down,

and cast into the fire. I indeed baptize you with water unto repentance:

but he that cometh after me is mightier than I, whose shoes I am not

worthy to bear: he shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost, and with fire:

Whose fan is in his hand, and he will thoroughly purge his floor,

and gather his wheat into the garner;

but he will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire.

If you’re looking for a soft and squishy Jesus that will fit nicely into your holiday decorations, St. John the Baptist is not going to give that to you.  St. Matthew records this beginning of John’s ministry as the voice of one calling out from the wilderness to the people of God, fulfilling the prophecy of Isaiah over 500 years prior.  At this time when John began preaching, Jesus was already a fully grown man, but had not been publicly revealed to the nation as the Messiah He was.  As he made this proclamation, John’s voice came from the wilderness—from outside the traditional halls of either political or religious power—to announce a Savior and Judge who would also transcend those cultural, man-made barriers.

At this time in Israel’s history, there appear to have been several political, religious, and cultural camps into which the general population was divided, some described in Scripture, and others known from archeology or history.  The Pharisees and Sadducees represented the primary religious sects, and both had their problems.  The Pharisees were a legalistic sect with a great valuation for education, philosophy, and history.  The Sadducees were primarily concerned with duties around the Temple, and were a rationalistic sect which denied certain miraculous elements of the faith (such as the resurrection of the dead at the end of the world).  Both vied for power and influence over the religious lives of the people, as well as with the political institutions of the day—and both camps eventually unified in their persecution of Jesus.  In the political sphere, there were Zealots who were working for the overthrow of the Roman Empire, primarily concerned with re-establishing a physical Kingdom of Israel reminiscent of the one under Kings David and Solomon.  Among other sects and groups there was also a group known as the Essenes.  Thousands of these eccentric and apocalyptic folks lived in the desert caves outside Jerusalem, convinced of their need to remain separated from the corrupted religious and political machinations of Israel, and that God’s fulfillment of Hebrew prophecy was imminent.  To the socially acceptable sects of Israel, these wilderness dwellers were viewed as fanatics and lunatics, uncouth and disturbing.  From the writings which have been discovered in their caves over the last couple hundred years or so (sometimes called the Dead Sea Scrolls), that assessment isn’t too far from the truth; mixed in with scrolls of the Biblical Old Testament texts were an assortment of more and less strange spiritual writings, many with a very apocalyptic vision of the soon to be coming end of the world.  Many biblical scholars also suspect, that these Essenes represented a large number of the thousands of new converts to Christianity recorded in the early chapters of the Book of Acts.

Biblical scholars also speculate that it is very likely, given the Gospel’s description of John’s formation in the wilderness, the age of his parents at his birth probably leaving him orphaned at an early age, and the presence of the well established Essene community outside Israel, that John the Baptist began his prophetic ministry there.  Whether John the Baptist was an Essene or not, he brought the Word of God to the people of Israel from outside Israel’s normal and accepted channels of religious and political communication.  His austere clothing and diet, partnered with his fervent call to faith and repentance before the imminent Day of the Lord, certainly made him more familiar with the desert dwellers than those of education, rank, or prestige.  John was sent by God to prepare the people to receive His only begotten Son, Jesus Christ, who would be simultaneously the supreme Judge and Savior of the whole world.  In preparation for Jesus’ coming to His people, the Holy Spirit moved John the Baptist to preach a message of repentance and the forgiveness of sins, so that all the paths of all the hearts of all the people might be made ready to receive their King.

The parallels to our own day are striking.  Various religious and political sects vie for the loyalties of the people, and most of them have rejected the Word of God to greater or lesser degree.  We have the religious sects who love their learning, pomp, titles, and prestige, but turn themselves into petty dictators of a hypocritical legalism and enthusiasm that is often only skin deep.  We have other religious sects who also love their learning, pomp, titles, and prestige, but turn it into a liberalism which denies the miraculous works of God and turns His message into one of practical utilitarianism, or social justice utopianism.  We have our political parties which also divide people into various liberal or conservative camps.  And apart from these main stream, socially acceptable divisions of people, we also have our eccentric and odd communities which are not permitted in polite society.  These folks living in our cultural and physical deserts span a spectrum from mostly harmless to truly frightening, occasionally popping into the public consciousness when one of them gets sideways with the law.

But we must not be too quick to ignore or dismiss the desert dwellers, particularly as the Lord’s Second Coming looms so large on the horizon.  Somewhere among the whackos and the lunatics, the dirty and the unpolished, the dubiously educated and credentialed, is the wilderness from which the Lord so often calls His messengers to prepare the way before Him.  Out there on the fringe of pleasant society lie the ones who still believe the Word of God and strive to abide within it; those who believe that the God of Adam and Eve, Noah, Moses, Joshua, Sampson, David, Solomon, and all the Prophets is the same God who was born of the blessed Virgin Mary, suffered and died on a Roman Cross, rose again the third day, and promised to come again at the end of time to judge the living and the dead; those who believe that this same God continues to abide among His people through His Word and Holy Spirit, enlivening and strengthening them in saving Faith and Repentance unto everlasting life; those who believe that they live by grace through faith in Christ alone, and who are raised up unto a new life marked by the divine gifts of faith, hope, and love.  Somewhere, out there, beyond all the political and religious trappings of human pride and avarice, the people of God gather in faith around Jesus in His Word and Sacraments, receiving His free gifts of forgiveness, life, and salvation, as well as His victory over sin, death, hell, and the power of the devil.

From out of that desert wilderness, the Word of the Lord calls to you this day, as well.  It calls you to prepare your heart for the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ, both at this blessed Christmastide, and at the end of all things, through faith and repentance in His Word.  The voice of John the Baptist, together with all the Prophets and Apostles, saints and martyrs, and all the holy angels, call you to hear the One who spoke the universe into existence, thundered from Mount Sinai, preached from the Mount of Olives, and died for your sins upon Mount Calvary.  To you the Word of the Lord calls, though it may seem strange and austere to your culturally accommodated ears, and despised by the religious and political rulers of the world.  It is a simple Word which brings life and light, healing and restoration, to all who will turn to Him and believe.  It is a Living Word which calls to you from the womb of the Virgin, an humble manger in Bethlehem, a remote village in Galilee, and an empty tomb outside Jerusalem, declaring to you the love, mercy, grace, forgiveness, life, and peace of God which passes all understanding, piercing through all eternity to seek and save you.  Hear this Word of the Lord as it calls out to you this day.  Repent, believe, and live.  Amen.

Waiting and Arriving: A Meditation on Matthew 21 for the First Sunday in Advent

Then the multitude who went before

 and those who followed cried out, saying,

"Hosanna to the Son of David!  Blessed is He

Who comes in the Name of the Lord!

Hosanna in the Highest!"

And when He had come into Jerusalem,

All the city was moved, saying, "Who is this?"

So the multitude said,

"This is Jesus, the prophet from Nazareth of Galilee."

Waiting and arriving are themes that run throughout the Scripture, and one of those pivotal moments occurs in our Gospel text for this first Sunday in Advent.  The people of God had waited a long time for Him to come and deliver them, and the Hebrews kept record of God's Law and Promises, Wisdom and Prophecies, in the Holy Scriptures which we Christians now call the Old Testament.  There in those pages of holy writ, is the record of God's people hearing his voice through the Prophets, waiting in faith upon His promises, and His visitations to deliver them.  Though Moses wrote under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit somewhere around 1500 BC, he set down the record of Adam and Eve's first encounter with their Creator, and His preservation of them even in their Fall; of Noah's salvation through the Flood; and of Abraham who received God's promise, presence, and salvation 500 years before Moses' time.  After Moses, with God's visitation to save His people in Egypt, that Old Testament continued to bare witness to Kings and Prophets for another thousand years, until several hundred years before Jesus came.  And while the Hebrew people trusted and waited upon God for His intercession in the struggles of their daily lives, they also looked forward in hope to His final coming which would save them all from sin, death, hell, and the power of the devil forever.  Without trying to calculate the ancient pre-history of the Hebrews, Scripture and archeology both show us that since the time of Abraham around 2000 BC, the Hebrew people waited in faith and hope for what happened in the Gospel text we read today:  God's Savior arriving in Jerusalem to save His people, according to His promise.

Now 2000 years later in our own time, the people of God look back on that pivotal arrival with Thanksgiving and great joy.  Jesus, foretold intimately and intricately by the prophets for thousands of years before His Virgin birth in Bethlehem and His triumphal entry into Jerusalem, presented Himself as the Lamb of God to be sacrificed for sins of the whole world-- a Vicarious Atonement which would save His people, exchanging their death and condemnation for His life and glory.  Having conquered death and hell forever, Jesus rose the third day, and sent His disciples out with a new message of hope and joy that was far wider reaching than just the Hebrews through whom it had come.  This was a Gospel of reconciliation, forgiveness, and eternal life to all who would believe and trust in Him, no matter what their tribe, tongue, nation or social standing might be.  And even as Jesus promised to be with His disciples through His Word and Holy Spirit to the very end of the age, He also told them that He would return once more at the end of days to restore both them and the whole creation-- the day of the final resurrection, the final putting away of all evil, death, and suffering, and the final victory of love, peace, joy, and life.  In this testimony the Church has now labored for 2000 years, carrying forward the Old and New Testaments which continually point all people to salvation in Jesus.

But as the people of God have done since the beginning, we wait not in despair, but in hope, having already received in our own time His promises made to us, and trusting in Him to fulfill them.  It is not a blind or ignorant hope, but one strengthened by the testimony of countless generations who heard the Word of the Lord, trusted in Him by faith, turned from the ways of death and embraced His forgiveness, life, and salvation through His manifold gifts of grace.  We carry the testimony of thousands of years of saints and martyrs, Prophets and Apostles, and yet we carry in our own bosom the testimony of that same Holy Spirit who moved all people before us, and all who will come after us, to a saving faith in God's Messiah.  We wait, even while we work, knowing that the promise of God is more enduring than the stars of heaven or the earth under our feet.  We trust His promise at the dawn of life while in our youth we understand so little of what lies before us; in the heat of life's day, where our labors combine with a little wisdom and understanding, and yet suffering tempts us to doubt; and at the end of life, when our work is done and we've learned what we will, and yet stand on the precipice of eternity with nothing to cling to but the saving Word of Christ.

Advent reminds us that the faith which saves and secures us in His love and grace, is a faith that actively waits in and upon His Word.  This faith hears the promises of God fulfilled across all time and place, receives the Gospel of forgiveness in the present moment, and moves forward in love of God and neighbor toward that last day of Jesus' return.  We are a people marked by waiting upon the Lord through His Word of promise, and a people marked by His coming to save and restore all things.  We are a people who remember the saving love of our Lord, and reflect that love into a dark and dying world, until the time of our earthly work is complete.  We are a people who live with one eye upon the world as it is, and one eye upon the eternity of what the world shall be, when the Lord of Glory comes to visit His people once again.  Hear the testimony of the ages, the witness of the Spirit through His Word to you now, and the promise of all that is to come.  Turn from the sullen darkness of a fallen world and all the emptiness of its continuously broken promises, that you may be bathed in the light and loving warmth of God's never failing promise to you in His Son, Jesus Christ.  Hear Him, believe, and live.  Amen.

In the Green Wood: A Meditation on Luke 23, for the Last Sunday of the Church Year

And there followed him a great company of people,

and of women, which also bewailed and lamented him.

But Jesus turning unto them said,

Daughters of Jerusalem, weep not for me, but weep for yourselves,

And for your children.  For, behold, the days are coming,

in the which they shall say, Blessed are the barren, and the

wombs that never bare, and the paps which never gave suck.

Then shall they begin to say to the mountains,

Fall on us; and to the hills, Cover us.

For if they do these things in a green tree,

what shall be done in the dry?

This Gospel text from Luke 23 selected for the last Sunday of the Church year, is taken from the midst of Jesus’ passion narrative.  Already condemned by Pontius Pilate and heading toward the mount upon which He would be executed, Jesus turned to address those who mourned His fate.  Rather than giving His disciples bland platitudes about how every little thing was going to be alright, or general waves of the proverbial arm about how God has everything in control and not to worry, Jesus met them and taught them in the midst of their sorrow.  He knew where He was going and what He was about to do in order to save the world from sin, death, and hell, but He also knew the real perils of a fallen and diabolically controlled world.  Even as He made His way to His Cross to suffer and die for the sins of the whole world, He knew that His disciples would have to continue living in this world of brutality, oppression, and malice.  In order to help them understand their situation, Jesus turned their mourning for Him to what they should really lament—the suffering and abuse which would befall this world because of the evil and wickedness which pervades it.

It is customary on the last Sunday of the Church year, sometimes called Christ the King Sunday, to stop and consider the Last Things, among which is the climax of suffering and persecution which will precede the final return of Jesus.  He rightly points out that if the evil of this world is willing to persecute, slander, betray, falsely condemn, torture, and murder the Savior of the World—the very Word of God Made Flesh, who is Himself the eternal Author of Life—there is no limit to what it will be willing to do to other people who trust in Him and His Word.  Unlike Jesus, we are full of sinful desires, thoughts, words, and deeds.  We only have life because we, as dead and dried out twigs, are miraculously grafted into His living vine and thereby resurrected into Him.  While the evil one could find no just cause to slay Jesus, he has plenty of just reasons to destroy us… and throughout the history of Christ and His people, the demonically inspired hordes of this world have done precisely that.  In our own day, Islamic terrorists continue to murder Christians by the thousands, while secular humanists in various nations turn a blind and uncaring eye.  Atheistic regimes around the globe imprison, torture, and murder Christians at their pleasure, often leaving no record to remember them beside the one God Himself keeps in heaven.  The devil and his willing or unwitting devotees have been tormenting the dry wood of fallen people for centuries, making martyrs of the saints in every generation.

In the last days this persecution will hit a fevered pitch, such that mothers will curse their own motherhood and wish they were barren.  The people will cry out for the covering of the mountains and hills due to the sorrows falling down upon them at the hands of wicked men.  In those last days, evil will rise into the halls of power and influence, making one last attempt to wipe away the faithful from the earth by every brutal and treacherous means at their disposal.  In that day, all the foreshadowing anti-christs of the preceding generations will manifest as one final and horrific Antichrist, who will put his foul boot upon the throat of secular and churchly institutions, enslaving the world in his wickedness.  In those last days, the love of many will grow cold, the faith of many will fail, and there will be great apostasies and falling away where none may have been imagined before.  In those last days it will look to all the world that the persecuted remnant of Christ’s people are on their way to their final extinction, overwhelmed by the “progress” of history, so that faith in the Word of God might be extinguished from the earth.  Whether we have entered these last days already, or await them in days to come, we know from Jesus and His Word that they will be days of great mourning, weeping, and distress.

As with Christ, however, so it will be with His people.  While all the world thought  Jesus and His Word were about to be wiped off the planet at Calvary, He showed forth His victory over death and hell by His resurrection, sending the Good News of His triumph throughout all the world.  Like Jesus, His people will be persecuted, but they will rise victorious and free in Him forever, alive by grace through faith in His Word which can call His people forth even from the grave.  What the devil will believe is his final battle to seize the world away from its Creator, will turn instead into the final judgment of all evil, wickedness, and unrighteousness by Christ, the returning King of Heaven and Earth.  Together with Christ, His people will reign, free of sin, death, hell, and the power of the devil forever.  In that day all suffering and lamenting and mourning will cease, and nothing will be heard from one end of heaven to the other but eternal praise for the living Savior who gives never-ending forgiveness and life to His people.  On that day, like a blessed birth which comes after the dark throes of painful labor, there will be rejoicing, reunion, and celebration forevermore among all the saints in light.

On this day of ending, we think also on a new beginning:  the joys of salvation made complete in Jesus.  With eyes fixed on the New Creation, the Church of Christ presses forward through every adversity, every challenge, every treachery, every betrayal, every pain, and every persecution.  On her lips is the blessed Gospel of Jesus’ victory over sin, death, and hell for everyone who will repent and believe.  With Christ our King enthroned at the right hand of the Father, His Spirit working in us by His Word, and the sure promise of His return at the end of the age, His people move forward through mourning and suffering to joy and jubilation forevermore.

Have you met Christ our King, and heard His blessed Gospel which brings rejoicing into even the darkest of times and places?  Hear Him call to you today, that by grace through faith in Him, you may pass through all these fallen things temporal, such that you lose not the blessing of those good things eternal:  forgiveness, life, and salvation in His Name, given freely by the grace of His Word.  Hear Him.  Repent, believe, and live forever.  Amen.

Darkening Counsel without Knowledge: A Meditation on Job 38

Then the LORD answered Job out of the whirlwind, and said,

Who is this that darkeneth counsel by words without knowledge?

Gird up now thy loins like a man; for I will demand of thee, and answer thou me.

Where wast thou when I laid the foundations of the earth?

Declare, if thou hast understanding.

Who hath laid the measures thereof, if thou knowest?

or who hath stretched the line upon it?

Whereupon are the foundations thereof fastened?

Or who laid the corner stone thereof;

When the morning stars sang together,

and all the sons of God shouted for joy?

Many things happen in the world.  Things have been happening for thousands of years, and should the Lord tarry in His Return, they shall be happening for thousands of years more.  Some of those things people have found pleasant, others have been unpleasant—but all too often, the reference point of human appreciation is driven by a short sighted focus on personal happiness.  Even when people try to analyze local and world events with more academic rigor, no one has ever been able to weigh all the variables of a present moment, let alone all the variables preceding and succeeding from that moment.  In essence, no one is able to fully grasp the totality of the tapestry of their present moment in time, let alone every present moment to have ever transpired, or that ever will transpire to the end of time.  From the weather on the other side of the globe, to the political machinations of a small central African tribe, to the family dynamics of a cottage in Scandinavia, no one can calculate and weigh with accuracy every element in play in any given moment of time.  While the moment we live in may seem straight forward within our field of view, imagine trying to balance every thought of every person within a five mile radius of you, let alone the natural variables of every molecule in motion, every chemical reaction in progress, and every weak or strong nuclear force.  With a finite human mind, it simply isn’t possible to even perceive the infinite number of variables in even a local area of a present moment, let alone the totality of that present moment across the globe and the universe, and to accurately assess the value of one particular occurrence.  In terms of simple physics and the science of human cognitive function, no human being is up to the challenge of knowing and assessing without error or oversight the totality of any given moment.  We are finite beings, with limited capacities of sensation (in order to perceive the world around us) and reason (in order to analyze the information we have perceived).  Such knowledge of our limits should make us profoundly humble in our pursuits of truth in this universe, but unfortunately, given our fallen and self-absorbed nature, such healthy humility is often supplanted by an unhealthy pride.

In the story of Job, we find a righteous person—a person of faith and repentance before God, living by His grace, according to His Word—who endures tragedy at the hands of the devil.  Previously blessed with prosperity, he has been reduced to misery, all due to a conversation between the devil and God over whether Job would remain faithful should his fortunes change.  In Job’s misery, his friends come to counsel and console him, offering a series of unsatisfying propositions for why this fate has befallen him.  As Job begins to crack under the strain of having lost his wealth, his family, and his health, he begins to ask a variation on the timeless question, “Why me?”  Finally, at this point of crisis, God appears to speak with Job from a whirlwind.

Perhaps odd to our modern sensibilities, God is not gentle with Job, nor does He seem particularly concerned with offering Job a “safe space” so as to avoid “triggering” him.  Quite to the contrary, God drives right to the heart of Job’s weakening faith and calls him onto the proverbial carpet to stand up and answer like a man.  While Job has fallen prey to the temptation to question God for the justice of his present moment, God dumps upon him the totality of his woeful ignorance.  For several chapters God will continue to refine His point, that Job has no standing to question God in this present moment, when he cannot fathom the moments which have led up to it, nor the ones which shall succeed it.  Job was not there when God called the universe into existence, established the laws of physics, chemistry, biology, mathematics, and wrote the Natural Law into the whole cosmos of living and non-living things.  Job’s finite and fallen perspective was miniscule before the scope of the totality of time and space, and smaller still before the endless expanse of eternity.  God having used His Holy Law to straighten Job back out, returning him to a state of grace through faith and repentance, He then restores to Job by His Word of Gospel far more than was ever taken from him.  In the end, Job becomes an icon of those who always live by grace through faith, despite the ups and downs of life’s present moments, knowing that their saving God has all things well in hand, and in the words which the Holy Spirit gave to St. Paul, is working all things for good for those who love Him.

Job’s lesson is one which every person should learn anew in our own time and place.  Rather than despondence, rioting, and emotional flailing at God for why the world around us is the way it is, God calls us to hear His Word and trust Him.  We are reminded that we cannot fully understand even our present moment, let alone all the moments which have led us here, or the moments yet to come.  But God has given to us His Living Word of Law and Gospel that we might live in this present moment, even if we can’t fully understand it.  He has given us the Law of Love for God and neighbor (well detailed in the Ten Commandments) to help us orient our hearts and actions according to our vocations.  He has given us His Gospel of forgiveness, life, and salvation in Jesus Christ, to raise us up to new and eternal lives of faith, hope, and love with Him.  He has taught us to pray in the Lord’s Prayer.  He has given the Sacramental signs of Baptism, the Lord’s Supper, and Absolution to continuously remind us of the grace He continues to pour out upon us in Christ alone.  The witness of all Holy Scripture leads and builds to the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus for the salvation of the world, and the promise that He will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead.  As we wait in faith and repentance for His return on the Last Day, He has left us with His Word and Spirit so that we might endure courageously whatever life would bring to us in any given present moment yet to come. 

So, too, in this present moment, God speaks to you by His Word and Spirit.  He does not come to pamper your pride, or to try and stuff the understanding of eternity into your fallen and finite mind.  He does not answer your ignorant and self-centered question of “Why me?”  Rather, He uses His Holy Law to remind you of the fallen and finite creature you are; broken, blind, befouled, lost, and dying in your sins, drowning in a world awash in the evil imaginations of wicked men and monstrous demons.  And when you have come to rightly know yourself before the God of the Universe, He speaks to you His saving Gospel of forgiveness and life for the sake of His Son, Jesus Christ; a love which raises you, washes you, enlivens you, and seals you forever in His grace and mercy.  These are the eternal things which God speaks into this moment of yours, regardless of the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune.  These are the things of eternal life and fellowship with God, which help us to see everything else in its proper perspective, even if we can’t understand the ultimate significance of every variable in our lives.  This is the saving Word of God which seeks and saves you today, and every day, for eternity.

Hear the Word of the Lord in this your moment.  Repent, believe, and live.  Amen.