Scripture: Luke 3:1-6
Something you may not know about me is that when I
was younger I was a boy scout. I remember that as you try to advance through
the ranks in boy scouts, one of the first things you had to do was memorize a
bunch of different sayings. There was the scout oath, “On my honor, I will do my best
To do my duty to God and my country and to obey the Scout Law; To help
other people at all times; To keep myself physically strong, mentally awake and
morally straight.” Then there was there was the scout law, “A Scout is: Trustworthy,
Loyal, Helpful, Friendly, Courteous, Kind, Obedient, Cheerful, Thrifty, Brave,
Clean, and Reverent. There was also the boy scout slogan, “Do a good turn
daily” Out of all of them, the easiest one to remember, and yet the most
helpful saying was a short two word saying, the scout motto, “Be prepared” This
saying taught us a lot. It taught us if
you were going to go before the scoutmaster to try to meet one of your
requirements, that you better be prepared, you had better have put the work
into learning everything that you needed to know. Most of all it taught us that
when there is something happening in the future, whether it was a trip, or a
service project, or just a regular meeting, that you need to truly think of
everything that you need to do before the event, and also everything that you
might need for the event. If the boy scouts taught me anything it taught me to
be prepared.
Our
scripture this morning is all about this idea of preparation. In it, we find
John the Baptist in the wilderness and in all regions around the Jordan. His
message was simple, Christ is coming, be
prepared. He says, “The voice of the one crying out in the wilderness, Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths
straight. Every valley shall be filled, and every mountain and high shall be
made low, and the crooked shall be made straight, and the rough ways made
smooth; and all flesh shall see the salvation of God.” While many times
when we read this we think of John the Baptist as some crazy man out shouting
something new and radical that the Israelites had never heard before, this is
not entirely the case. Now I’m not going to question whether John the Baptist
looked crazy, because wild hair and eating bugs sure does give that appearance,
but what he was saying was nothing new. John was quoting scripture, Isaiah,
something that the Jews had heard so many times before. John however was taking the message to heart,
Christ is coming, and we need to be prepared.
We
are not that much different in our times now. We know the Christmas story, we
know that Christ came as a baby in Bethlehem,
we know that Christ died and rose again, and we know that Christ will
come again. When we hear it we are either like scrooges, we turn our hearts
away from the news, we don’t want to hear it or we just simply don’t care; or
we get Christmas fever, we want to sing all of our favorite Christmas tunes,
decorate our houses in special ways, and yet how often do we do this and when
Christmas passes our lives are not changed at all from the way they were before
we celebrated the Christ child? In our
eagerness to celebrate Christmas, we forget to get ready for it. We
aren’t prepared, and because of that lack of preparation, Christmas flies by,
the joy is short lived, and life continues once again how it has always been.
Do we truly take time to prepare for Christmas?
When
people hear the phrase “be prepared” there are usually two different ways of
interpreting the statement. The first is
what I will call the bomb shelter mentality. Some will hear the message of be
prepared and think that it means brace for impact. It the idea that something
devastating is coming and you have to be prepared for all the bad things that
might happen. I call it the bomb shelter
mentality, but we see the same reaction to natural disasters. The meteorologist
forecasts a huge storm or forecasts tons of snow, and everyone stocks up on the
essentials like water and non-perishable food items so that when that storm
does come, they are prepared. When many people hear the term be prepared, this
is what they think of. Even when applied to the coming of Christ, this is often
how we act. We recognize our sin, accept
Christ into our lives, and do nothing about it. We use the church as a bomb
shelter to hide in, waiting until it is safe to go back out into the world. But
this is not the type of preparation that John the Baptist is calling us to. He
says, “Prepare the way for the Lord, make straight his
paths.” This is not an invitation to hide in our bomb shelters away from
all that scares us in the world, but instead it is a call for us to go out into
the world, a prepare the world for the coming of Christ.
This
type of preparation I like to call the special guest, or with my particular
situation, the wedding preparation. As
most of you know Heather and I are getting married next October. While that
seems like so far away, it is unbelievable the amount of preparation that goes
into that day. First we picked a
location, we wanted somewhere that had been special to both of us, and so we
decided to pick the church at Randolph-Macon since after all that is where we
met. Then we had to pick a date, which seems simple enough until we found there
were a lot more factors to consider than we thought. We knew we wanted a fall wedding,
but since our wedding was on campus we had to plan the wedding around Parent’s
Weekend and Homecoming. Columbus day is also one of the best days for business
at my dad’s work, and since he works off of commission we didn’t want to do it
on that day either. We found that something so simple as picking was actually
quite difficult. Next we have to make
invitations, get bridesmaids dresses, rent tuxedos, find decorations, figure
who is participating in what parts of the ceremony, including who is going to
officiate. We have to find somewhere to go for premarital counseling, decide
where we are going for the honeymoon, and whether or not we can afford it, find a photographer, find a caterer or
someone in our families who will cook for the reception, and it seems as though
the list for preparation goes on and on and on. All of this leading to a
wonderful day in which we can finally celebrate together in the joy of
marriage.
This
is more of the preparation that John is calling us towards, this is more of the
preparation that Advent calls us to partake in. Now the keen observer may start
to wonder, “wait a minute, I thought Advent was a time of waiting,
anticipating, not rushing, I thought Advent taught patience. How can all of
this work be part of patience? That is an excellent question to ask, how does
all of this preparation fit into the purpose of Advent? It is for this reason
that I chose the example of a wedding, I didn’t just choose it because it is on
my mind, though that is true as well.
In
my example I described a special day, a day of celebration, and that will
forever change the lives of not only Heather and me, but our family and close
friends as well. With a day like this, the first instinct is to go ahead
already and do it. Certainly we could have, we could have gone to the
courthouse and eloped so that we could be married today, we could have had a
quick, small wedding, and trust me it has been tempting, both of us want that
day to be here already, but we know that in order for us to make the wedding as
meaningful of possible we have to be patient. In order for us to truly be ready
for marriage, there needs to be a time of engagement. But as I said earlier
this engagement period has not been a time in which we just sit on our hands
waiting for the day in which we are married, it is a time that helps us truly
understand and prepare for that special ceremony and what it means for the rest
of our lives.
Christmas
and Advent are very similar. Christmas is that wonderful celebration that we
all look forward to, it is that feast that will forever change the lives of
those who celebrate it. Christmas is like the wedding, but like the wedding
there needs to be a time to prepare, and wait, to anticipate what Christmas
really means for our lives and to get ready for
that transformation. This time, this engagement period is why we
celebrate Advent. Just as Heather and I
are taking time to prepare for marriage, just as we will take premarital
classes to help strengthen our relationship, so too during Advent we need to
take time to strengthen our relationships not only with each other, but also
with God. Advent is a time for us to prepare our hearts and our souls for the
gift of Jesus Christ, sometimes that includes confessing our sins and
repenting, sometimes that means bringing our burdens before his feet. That may
mean that we need to truly reflect on what our relationship with Christ is
like. Do we pray, if we do, do we pray enough? Do we pray earnestly and
truthfully? Are following the call that
God has put on our lives, or do we keep ignoring it, or putting it off until
later?
Advent
is not only a personal preparation, but it is a time in which we are called to
prepare others for the good news of Christ’s redeeming love, of Christ’s
arrival on Earth. Just as Heather and I prepare to share the joy of our wedding
with others, Are we preparing others for Christmas. Are we telling people about
the good news? Are we inviting others to church, or to our Christmas programs? Are we feeding the hungry, healing the sick,
visiting those in prison, advocating for the end of oppressive systems in our
nation and around the world? When Christmas day comes will we be ready? Will we
have done our part? Will people truly believe that Christ has come to Earth to bring love and justice to all, because
they have experienced it through us? When a child opens up their gift on
Christmas morning and gives their parents a hug and tells them thank you, will
that parent be able to give thanks to God because that gift was only possible
through Christians who believe that all should be able to experience the joy of
Christmas. Maybe the biggest question is when Christmas passes, when it is time
to take down our trees and our lights, when the shops and malls are no longer
decorated with the seasonal cheer, when the novelty of whatever gifts we
received that year has worn off, will our lives have been transformed, and will
we have helped to change the life of someone else. Will Christmas mean anything
to us? If in your heart the answer is no, then maybe we need to take this time
that we have now, this time of Advent to truly prepare for Christmas. Not hurry
or rush the coming of Christmas, but take time to prepare for it. Take time
make straight the paths for the Lord, so that when it comes, and rest assured
it will come, we will be prepared for Christmas, that the joy of the season
will forever transform our hearts, our souls, and our minds.
No comments:
Post a Comment