Just Do the Right Thing (Reflections on Advent 3, Year C 2024)

 

“So, with many other exhortations, (John) proclaimed the good news to the people.” (Luke 3:18)

If the above verse isn’t the punchline of a joke, I don’t know what is! Good news..? In the Gospel appointed for Advent 3, Year C (Luke 3:7-18) John the Baptist just told the people they were a bunch of snakes and warned them if they didn’t get religion in an almighty quick hurry, they were going to be destroyed with unquenchable fire. Is it just me, or does anyone else have a hard time accepting that pronouncement as “good news?”

I guess there’s a certain amount of good news in being warned that there’s going to be some wrath to come. If you can’t flee from it, maybe you can do something to make it a little less wrathful. The children of Abraham knew God had set them apart and blessed them so they could be a blessing to the world. I’m thinking the folks out at the Jordan listening to John preach were just a little too smug being blessed without having to bother blessing anyone else. It’s pretty easy to slither into complacency, don’t you think?

Earlier last week I was listening to NPR and heard a chat with a sociologist named Musa al-Gharbi[i]. This rather impressive fellow was being interviewed to promote his book, We Have Never Been Woke: The Cultural Contradictions of a New Elite. Mr. al-Gharbi maintains that lots of well-meaning people get blessed—that is, make names for themselves—by denouncing the injustices which have afflicted racial minorities, women, the LGBTQ+ community, etc. Yet they have done practically nothing to alleviate the conditions they decry. Al-Gharbi recounted seeing a vast host of “woke” protesters on New York City’s Broadway holding up “Black Lives Matter” signs following the murder of George Floyd in 2020. People drove past this protest parade and honked their horns in support as the protesters dutifully cheered them. What struck al-Gharbi, however, was noticing how the protesters, in their righteous zeal, ignored the community of obviously homeless individuals on the very same street.

The crowds asked John the Baptist, “What, then, should we do?” Mr. al Gharbi suggested that the BLM protesters—most of whom seemed to be affluent members of the Columbia University community—might’ve advanced the cause of social justice less by waving signs and more by purchasing a meal or a pair of shoes for one of the unhoused of Broadway. Doesn’t that sound logical?

The good news might be that doing the right thing, that which is the fruit of repentance and the joy of the Lord, isn’t really that hard. What does John ask of the people but that they care for the less fortunate? If you have two coats, give one to someone who doesn’t have one. Share your food. See that the needs of your brothers and sisters are met. You’ve been blessed, so bless others.

The cool thing about John’s preaching is he doesn’t tell the tax collectors, “Quit your job and stop working for the Roman scum, you traitors!” He knows these guys are just trying to earn a living like everybody else. He doesn’t judge or condemn. He just tells them to do what they do with honesty and integrity and trust that God will provide for them. Similarly, John doesn’t call down opprobrium on the police for their brutality. He offers them the simple exhortation: do your job and don’t abuse your authority.

Is this the good news, that we already know what God asks of us? And that it isn’t all that hard to bear fruits worthy of repentance?

Christ in our hearts answers the question of what we should be doing. Did you know that 40% of all US charitable organizations are religiously affiliated? 45% of churchgoers volunteer their time in their communities, compared with 27% of non-religious folks. 65% of religiously observant folks gave to charity last year, compared to 41% of non-religious. Christians give generously to secular causes as well as to religiously affiliated charities, and the majority of refugee and migrant resettlement is done by Christian charitable organizations[ii]. Faith in Christ makes a difference, a material difference, in this world.

I rejoice to know the little congregation I pastor here in Northeast Philadelphia helps secure food for 3,500 families in this neighborhood. We give Christmas gifts to orphans. We provide fellowship space for senior citizens and a place where the addicted can come for healing. I rejoice to know we are bearing such fruits. This is good news.

The American church is changing. Congregations are closing, but I see this as the chaff being burned away. The old 1950’s notion of church being about our individual salvation is being replaced by a leaner, more socially active church which keeps asking, “What then should we do?” Yes, times change, and so will the church. We may not escape “the wrath to come,” but we don’t have to succumb to it. What then should we, as Christians, do?

St. Paul told us what to do in the epistle lesson assigned for Advent 3, Year C:

Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, Rejoice. Let your gentleness be known to everyone. The Lord is near. Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.

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[i] You can listen to this interview by clicking here: https://www.npr.org/podcasts/510053/on-point

[ii] You can check out the stats by reading this article: https://www.philanthropyroundtable.org/magazine/less-god-less-giving/

Remember the Wilderness? (Reflections on Advent 2, Year C 2024)

 

The Baptist by Titian (Ital. 1540)

“Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight…” (Luke 3: 4b)

 Location, location, location.

Martin Luther King told us about his Dream in front of a gigantic statue of Abraham Lincoln—an obvious symbol for the liberation of African Americans. Ronald Reagan called for the liberation of Eastern Europe while standing at the Brandenburg Gate. Barack Obama announced his candidacy for president from the steps of the Illinois State House, the place where his life in government began. President Biden spoke about democracy from Philadelphia’s Independence Hall. Locations have symbolic resonance, and sometimes the place where an announcement is made is just as important as the announcement itself.

Every year on Advent 2 our Revised Common Lectionary gospel pulls out into the wilderness to hear that funky, skin-wearing, bug-eating prophet, John the Baptist. I think John gave some thought to his location. He wasn’t about to stand in the temple of Jerusalem amidst all the noise and hullabaloo of that metropolitan local, and he certainly wasn’t going to preach from some dinky synagogue in some dinky town. Not old John. He’s calling people out to the River Jordan in a wild, uncultivated, and uninhabited place. Why? Because the wilderness (in Greek eremo, which means an abandoned or desolate place) reminds folks of where they came from. John’s calling them out of their place of business or anxiety or apathy and asking them to remember their heritage and the source of their faith and identity.

And John’s not subtle about this. The gospel says he’s the voice of one crying out in the wilderness. He’s not lecturing or discussing this stuff. He’s yelling it out at the top of his lungs. He’s using his passion to afflict the comfortable and startle the stupefied because these folks need a wake-up call. He’s telling them to look at themselves so they can be ready for what God is about to do.

So out they come to the Jordan. Out into a landscape that’s dry and full of bugs and critters where they can remember their ancestors. They can think about that sorry bunch of ex-slaves whom Moses led around a similar environment for forty years. They can recall the stories of hunger and thirst, hardship and battles with the folks who didn’t take kindly to a roving horde of displaced people. They can remember stories about poison snakes and God’s mercy. And they can remember that it was in that location that God gave them the Law and made them who they were—a strong nation, children of Abraham, who would be blessed to be a blessing to the world. Yes, under years of persecution and occupation they might’ve forgotten that promise. But God didn’t.

Maybe you’ve been in a wilderness of your own. Do you remember the time when everything in your life seemed crazy or uncertain? When you didn’t have enough cash or you felt you’d been deserted?

Just before Christmas 1987 two important things happened in my life. I was teaching part-time at a small community college, and I’d finally saved enough cash to move out of my parents’ home (My dad said he’d give each of his kids only four years to complete a bachelor’s degree and then he’d street us. When I returned from graduate school he had changed his mind. He did the same for my two sisters). I paid my security deposit on a nice apartment (nicer than the ones I’d lived in as a grad student, at least) and bought a whole house full of furniture on my credit card. A week later I was informed the college was cutting two thirds of my teaching load—which meant two thirds of my salary was going along with the cut. I had a nice new home and new furnishings and no way to pay for them. Bummer. There would be no Christmas tree in my flat that Christmas.

What to do? Sell everything and move back in with Mom and Dad? Or, just maybe, my choice was to grow up, get another job, and support myself like an adult. I did the latter. I took a desk job with an investor relations firm. It was boring work, and it involved an almost hour-long commute in stop-start LA traffic each way. My 1984 Ford Escort frequently overheated on the 91 freeway. The job didn’t pay much, but it kept the rent paid and the credit card bills semi-current—even though I was constantly charging for car repairs. There was no money for entertainment. I didn’t like it, but it really was the best choice. I struggled through much of 1988, but, by year’s end, I found a new calling as a secondary special ed teacher in the Los Angeles School District. That experience, seeing kids dealing with real poverty issues, led me to consider ordained ministry.

I think back on that unsettled “wilderness” time not to pat myself on the back or recall how crappy it is to take a job just because you need the money, but to remember just how good and faithful God has been to me. Sometimes God has to call us out of our hurried or anxious lives—especially at this time of year when we can so easily be preoccupied with holiday planning—and take us back to the wilderness of our lives to remind and refocus us on God’s steadfast love.

A detail I always liked about this gospel lesson was Luke’s very conscientious naming of all the potentates in verses 1 and 2. I’m certain Luke did this just to set the story in its historic context, but I think it speaks about our time, too. Pontius Pilate and Herod and Caiaphas may figure into the story later, but here Luke uses them only to put John the Baptist on the calendar. Those curious or anxious or confused folks who made their way out to the wilderness by the Jordan to hear the prophet weren’t going to hear a stump speech about how their country should be run. They couldn’t do anything about that anyway. John was calling them to address something they could change—themselves. He called them to this lonely place, away from their distractions, to confess their sins and be forgiven. That way they could make the paths of their lives straight for Jesus to enter in.

It's not a bad idea to look backward at this time of the year. I don’t mean to glorify Christmas Past like Scrooge or to get melancholy for things which aren’t as they used to be. But maybe we can get back in touch with why this time is so special and, at the risk of sounding trite, remember what it is we’re really celebrating—God’s presence among us. Remember your wilderness and the goodness of the Lord.

Happy Advent, my friend! May this season draw you closer to God and to those you love.