Advent: Falling Into Jesus (And Making Sense of John the Baptist)

It is the second Sunday of Advent, leading us up to Christmas.

So we have this reading from Matthew 3.

John the Baptist comes on the scene.

We see at the beginning of the New Testament.

It's been 400 years of silence in terms of somebody speaking for God.

Now remember, these people didn't have the Bible.

So God's people were dependent on prophets speaking to them for God.

And there's been silence.

There's been nothing.

But people kept on living, they're farming and hunting and tending their home and just life.

And then out of nowhere, 400 years of silence, nothing.

And then into that silence comes this wild man.

Incredibly intense, fiery wilderness guy, John the Baptist.

He's wearing leather, camel hair.

He eats bugs.

He eats honey, and people are flocking to him.

He's like a rock star.

He's a preacher rock star.

Everyone wants to hear him preach.

Everyone wants to be baptized by him in the river.

This is the guy.

But he's saying something quite different than other religious leaders at the time.

So let's reread and break down and make some sense of this passage and make some sense of John.

Matthew 3, 1 through 6.

In those days, John the Baptist came preaching in the wilderness of Judea, Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.

For this is he who was spoken of by the prophet Isaiah when he said the voice of the one caring crying in the wilderness, prepare the way of the Lord, make his path straight.

Now John wore garment of camel's hair and a leather belt around his waist, and his food was locusts and wild honey.

Then Jerusalem and all Judea and all the region about the Jordan were going out to him.

And they were baptized by him in the river Jordan, confessing their sins.

So point number one is it's relieving to finally admit we need help from beyond ourselves.

Now that's humbling on one side, but it's incredibly relieving to get honest about that.

When we refuse that honesty, it's exhausting.

It's sort of like this grasping, right?

We've all done it.

It's like you're grasping for something to make you feel forgiven, or grasping for something to make you feel worthy.

Nothing seems to work, nothing quite gives us peace or satisfies us, right?

You win one national championship, and 36 hours later you need another.

You get one raise, and you know, a few days later you just need another one.

I own two pairs, I I've counted for y'all.

I own two pairs of leather boots, uh, leather dress shoes, rain boots, hiking boots, two casual sneakers, three running shoes.

But you know, I'm pretty sure, like I'm pretty confident that the the gray on cloud monsters, I have the blue ones, I already have the blue ones, but the gray ones, they would really satisfy the longing of my soul.

Y'all know what I'm talking about.

I have the blue ones, but it's the gray one.

The gray ones will surely do it.

I can't seem to find a source of comfort or peace in the world.

I try really hard.

You probably do as well.

And I can be a real mess, and I can cause a real mess.

Another way to say that is I'm a sinner in need of grace.

And John says repent.

Which I know could be a word that has a lot of baggage.

If you've been around churches or sporting events.

It really just means become honest.

Be honest with God about your need and the ways you're discovering that you are messier than you thought.

Flawed, more sinful.

And it's not just an action, it's actually in our hearts.

Two weeks ago, our family was at the Georgia game, and we're taking a picture on the bridge, and they're up on the bridge, like every Saturday of a game day, probably most other stadiums around the country.

There were a few preacher men with bullhorns and signs.

And they are preaching away, they are yelling at us.

I thought I was a Christian.

I don't know.

I thought I was a good Christian, abiding in the Lord, loved by God.

Apparently, I'm not, according to them.

And they're just yelling.

Um, they're shaming people, they're condemning people.

And uh most people are not uh just suddenly repenting on their knees.

Um, most people are ignoring them, laughing.

Uh two guys were standing beside them mocking them, which I sadly sinfully thought was funny.

I've yet to see anger or condemnation produce lasting results.

It doesn't.

Um, it definitely does not produce heart results.

Yet, John the Baptist, he sounds a little bit like those preachers on the bridge.

So, what do we make of that?

What do we make of John the Baptist?

How do we understand John?

Well, John stands in between the Old Testament and New Testament, he's sort of in between this Old Covenant and New Covenant, how the law is taking us to the gospel.

So we have to understand John and his context.

John doesn't have the full picture, he doesn't have the Bible, he is an Old Testament prophet.

He knows a Messiah is coming, he knows it's Jesus, but he doesn't have Jesus' life, he doesn't have Jesus' teaching or death or resurrection, he doesn't have the letters of the New Testament, he certainly doesn't have Paul explaining Jesus to us.

So he knows this Jesus is coming, of he can't even be worthy to hold the sandals of, yet he has the tone of an Old Testament prophet of law and wrath.

And in this way, John the Baptist doesn't hold the full picture.

But John the Baptist drives us to Jesus, and what we have the gift of is we have the gift that Paul helps us understand Jesus.

It's amazing.

And Paul says that God's kindness leads us to repentance.

A little bit different than John, and yet it's John that takes us to Jesus, and then Paul explains Jesus to us, and we start to see the redemptive arc of the scriptures.

The word repentance is the word metanoia, meaning a change of mind, entering a better course of life.

Now, maybe you repented out of fear, done that before.

We don't have to.

Our repentance is actually created by God's kindness to draw you to his heart and his path for you.

So we are so loved by God, so loved by God that we can become honest about who we are.

We're so sufficiently forgiven and sufficiently righteous in Christ's word for us, we can actually be honest that we're not perfect and we are sinners in need of God's grace.

And there's the beginning of a transformation.

We've been saying our great transformation, we've been saying it for the past month or so.

Our beginning of transformation is this transition from I got this to I need help, right?

Like I got this is this tight dripping on life.

And I need help is when we begin to release and understand we need help from beyond ourselves with a whole bunch of life, especially when it comes to matters of the heart.

One of our favorite sentences around our church about repentance comes from Pastor Professor Jack Miller.

He's now past.

His legacy out of his teaching goes Tim Keller, Scotty Smith, Dan Allender.

I mean, this is a grandfather of gospel.

Repentance is our ongoing calling to collapse on Jesus, acknowledging our need and receiving his supply.

This is why our ongoing Christian practices, whether it be Bible study or quiet time or prayer or meditation or silence or whatever it is, how you have expression of Christian faith, is not for God's love.

It's about our need, an ongoing collapse into the sufficiency of Jesus, the already lavish love of God for us, that we're already loved.

Now that enables our hearts to be incredibly healed and healing and live an ongoing confession and gratitude without having to revert back into shame or fear.

Point number two, repentance is a turning into Jesus' welcome, care, and sufficiency.

See, at the time in the Jewish religion, you had to cleanse yourself before you came into the temple.

So you had to bathe yourself in these baths they had all around the temple.

Immerse yourself, go under the water, go under the water enough, make sure you do it all the way.

You do it, your work.

And then you can come into the presence of God.

So purify yourself by what you do, and then you can come into the presence of God.

And John says into that context, you need an immersion of repentance.

You need a surrender.

An honesty that nothing you do is enough.

You actually are a sinner in need of God's grace and provision.

This brings us into verse 7.

But when he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees coming to his baptism, he said to them, You brood of vipers, who warned you to flee from the wrath to come?

Bear fruit in keeping with repentance, and do not presume to say to yourselves, We have Abraham as our father.

For I tell you, God is able from these stones to raise up children for Abraham.

Point number three is this we don't have to use our pedigree or performance to be loved, accepted, or forgiven by God.

You don't have to use your family legacy, you don't have to use any of your pedigree, your moralistic record.

You don't have to use your performance of how good you are, how good you're going to maintain it to be today.

See, John blasts the Pharisees for this sort of thinking and way of faith, but it's easy to do.

It's easy to revert to.

Well, we're called to die to self.

Die of that toil and the weariness of self-justification.

And that's in the world and that's in religion both.

I mean, the gospel is the good news that Jesus really is enough for you.

That God really did provide for all the forgiveness you ever need and all the righteousness you ever need.

So it's free.

You're free.

You're free.

And in that freedom, there's going to be incredible healing and incredible transformation to come that will come from the heart.

Pastor Tim Keller writes this about repentance.

I've read this probably every time I preach on repentance.

Our hope is in Christ's righteousness, not our own.

So it is not traumatic to admit our weaknesses and lapses.

In religion, we repent less and less often.

But the more accepted and loved in the gospel we feel, the more and more often we will be repenting.

And though, of course, there's always some bitterness in any repentance, in the gospel there's ultimately a sweetness.

This creates a radical new dynamic for personal growth.

Two years ago, we planted some camellias along our driveway.

Here's a picture of the camellias.

I took it this week.

They arrived, they were not blooming when they arrived.

We put them in the ground.

The entire first year they didn't bloom.

They just sat there.

Nothing.

We went through the first season they should bloom, late fall, early winter, nothing.

We've got nothing.

And then the most amazing thing happened this year.

They started to bloom.

I mean, they bloom like crazy.

I mean, they're just flowering and the flowers fall off, and another bloom comes up, and they're just blooming and blooming and blooming.

So an entire season, no blooms.

And then everything changed.

I'm not a master gardener.

Some of you are.

You got your real license for that.

I'm not a master gardener.

But I think this has something to do with rooting in.

Being rooted.

See, our calling is not to obsess on our fruit.

Our calling is to gaze on Jesus, to live an ongoing collapse into Jesus.

And rooting into that, deepening ourselves into the wealth of identity we have as a children of God.

And the most amazing thing will happen.

We will bear fruit in keeping with repentance.

Fruit will come.

This brings us to verse 10.

Even now, the axe is laid to the root of the trees.

Every tree, therefore, that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire.

John seems to be thinking about an afterlife here.

People who refuse to repent.

This idea of fire in the scriptures is a way to say the refusal of the grace of God is a welcoming of the disintegration of the soul.

That's turmoil.

That's hell.

It's horrible.

That disintegration of the soul, the separating of it.

And yet a life moving in the grace of God is the integrating of the heart and the soul into the wholeness of who you were created to be.

Verse 11 I baptize you with water for repentance, but he who is coming after me is mightier than I.

See, John's on to something.

Whose sandals I'm not worthy to carry, he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire.

His winnowing fork is in his hand, and he will clear the threshing floor and gather his wheat into the barn, but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire.

Now, verse 12, without the preceding verses, would be haunting.

Like it's not a life verse.

Okay?

No life verse here with verse 12.

You need a lot of context, a lot of redemptive arc of the scriptures for verse 12 not to just destroy us.

I mean, we could be sent into all sorts of insecurity and anxiousness and fear.

Am I in?

Am I out?

Am I gonna burn in the fire?

Am I not gonna burn in the fire?

Am I good enough?

Am I enough?

Insecurity is a horrible way to live.

But remember, John is leading us to Jesus, and to Jesus' teaching and life and the full sufficiency of his work for us.

And Paul helps us understand all of that and brings us such a security of how full the gospel is for us.

And that we are loved and secured, like we say in our communion liturgy, not by any work that we have done for him, but by his work for us.

I love the quote by theologian Fred Craddock on this passage.

He says, when repentance, and this is a quote that's coming around the context of this whole passage, when repentance and forgiveness are available, judgment is good news.

The primary aim is to save the wheat, not to burn the chaff.

God's heart is to save, to welcome, to forgive, to love, to redeem.

In Jesus, God is welcoming lavishly, arms wide open.

And it's not when you get your act together, it's just right now.

Maybe last week you heard about the Thanksgiving miracle.

Did you remember the Thanksgiving miracle?

Maybe you had a Thanksgiving miracle, but this is the Thanksgiving miracle.

Carnival Cruise line, you'll see that.

A 28-year-old man, he was at the Carnival Cruise Bar at 11 p.m.

I'm sure that's quite the scene, the Carnival Cruise Bar at 11 p.m.

The man leaves the bar at about 11 to go use the restroom, never comes back.

His friends and family, they head to their rooms.

The next morning they wake up, guys, the guy's still out to come back.

They search the whole ship.

He's nowhere.

At 2.30 p.m.

they call the Coast Guard.

We lost one.

He fell overboard.

He's out in the ocean.

He's been out in the ocean from 11 p.m.

to now it's 2.30 p.m.

the next day.

Something like that?

I mean, no, no life jacket, no boat, nothing.

I mean, he is helpless.

Imagine that night.

A boat takes off from Venice, Florida, a helicopter from New Orleans, two planes, one leaves from clear water, another one from Mobile.

All for this one helpless, needy, no hope, this guy.

200 mile search.

I mean, this is a needle in the haystack.

And they find the guy six hours later.

Here's an incredibly horrible picture of it.

Really bad.

I think my child drew that in kindergarten at one point.

He's barely bobbing up and down in the water.

And you think he's probably in the water for 15 hours.

I mean, what an image of needing help and having no hope unless somebody comes for you.

Yeah, I know that you've felt that way.

At least I have.

It's easy to feel helpless.

It's easy to feel like you're drowning.

If you're not feeling that way right now, praise God.

But it might be like next Tuesday, okay?

Just next Tuesday morning, you'll feel this way.

You've been exhausted, you've been beat down, you've been broken.

But there is hope.

That God is for you and He's with you.

And He's not giving up on you.

And to that, this morning, we pray the historic colic prayer for this second Advent Sunday.

And you can just listen as I read it.

And maybe you want to open your hands in a prayer posture if you desire.

You don't have to.

That could be weird to you.

But you're welcome to.

Merciful God who sent your messengers, the prophets, to preach repentance and prepare the way for our salvation.

Give us grace to heed their warnings and forsake our sins, that we may greet with joy the coming of Jesus Christ, our Redeemer, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever.

Amen.

Let's pray together.

Heavenly Father, thank you that your grace is sufficient for our mess, for our brokenness, for our sin.

Thank you that you are enough for the judgment due to us because we are imperfect and we are sinners.

That in Jesus we have all the forgiveness we need, all the righteousness.

And that all the judgment do our sin, for full justice to be known in this world, Jesus is enough for us.

We thank you for this.

Help us to trust even more.

Help us to heed the prophets.

Let John drive us to Jesus.

And to know in Jesus this lavish welcome, full provision and sufficiency.

All the forgiveness we need and all the righteousness we need.

In Jesus' name we pray.

Amen.