THE REV. ROBERTO DESANDOLI
3rd Sunday of Advent
Isaiah 35: 1-10
Psalm 146
James 5: 7-10
Matthew 11: 2-11
“Joyful News”
This morning’s “joyful” passage for the Advent of Joy gives those of us with earthly eyes a bit of a challenge.
The scene portrayed by Matthew this morning is a correspondence that takes place between Jesus Christ and John the Baptist through Jesus’ disciples.
Why do they not simply meet face to face to have a chat?
Because John is in Prison!
This Sunday of Joy is off to a difficult start. John is in prison.
Specifically, John is in King Herod’s prison after having insulted the puppet king with his bold preaching and prophesying.
But, Matthew tells us, even though John is in prison, he has started to hear rumors of Good News about this Rabbi named Jesus from the little town of Nazareth.
And so, John sends a message from his prison cell through the disciples to the mysterious Rabbi:
“Are you the one who is to come, or are we to wait for another?”
John, even though he is in a compromised position, even though he is sitting in prison waiting, ultimately waiting to die for speaking truth to power, he sends the kind of message that makes it seem as if John has the world exactly where he wants it:
“Are you the one who is to come, or are we to wait for another?”
So, are you the Son of Man that I have been preaching about in the wilderness or not?
Are you the one who is going to come and bring forth the Kingdom of Heaven on earth and release us from this age of tyranny?
Are you the one we have been waiting on, or should we just go on waiting?
What John apparently does not know, that we do, is that he has actually met this Jesus of Nazareth before. Not only has he met Jesus, but he himself baptized Jesus in the wilderness at the Jordan River; an event during which the very Holy Spirit of God descended from heaven and rested on Jesus “like a dove.”
And that, I think, adds to John’s calmness and his coolness all the more.
Notice: John does not ask “Are you the one that I baptized in the wilderness? Are you the one who was anointed by God’s Holy Spirit? Where have you been all this time?!”
But rather, he asks in so many words: “So, are you it?”
“Are you the one who is to come, or are we to wait for another?”
As I have said, it is in one way ironic that John is acting so coolly toward the Messiah:
John is in prison
John, though he does not know, is soon to be executed
John has heard rumors and wants to make sure that this Jesus of Nazareth is the real deal and yet: John is not really holding any good cards in his hand
John is actually in a lot of trouble by the standards of the world:
He is imprisoned
He is in mortal danger
He cannot even see this Jesus of Nazareth with his own eyes to make sure He is the one who John has spent his whole ministry announcing.
But, for what John lacks by the ways of this world, he has infinitely more by the standards of the Kingdom of Heaven, and he knows it.
John is one who has incredible, indomitable faith!
John is one who has been called by God to preach Good News to a people hungry for justice!
John is one who serves God so faithfully that he (seemingly) has no fear at all of earthly powers and principalities!
John the Baptist may be in prison but he is in prison for speaking truth to power, he is in prison for not taking the empire’s nonsense, he is in prison for boldly telling those who think that they can wrestle the world under control with swords and decrees that their earthly power amounts to nothing in comparison to the rule of the Kingdom of Heaven that is coming soon and very soon with the arrival of the Son of Man.
If it seems like John has no fear of earthly powers, it’s because he doesn’t! John knows by faith the Good things God is about to do in the world with His own hands, John knows that it is only a matter of time before God arrives into the world in human flesh to redeem us from all sin and restore true justice to the world, he has no fear of Kings, no fear of earthly power, or of earthly time, he is living on God’s own, patient time:
So, Jesus of Nazareth, “Are you the one who is to come, or are we to wait for another?”
John has patience for the question and John has patience for the answer; he will accept nothing less than a sign of God’s Goodness and God’s own coming to earth to be convinced that this Jesus is truly the one who has come to usher in the Kingdom.
And so, Jesus gives John the answer he has been waiting for:
When the disciples arrived to give Jesus the message from John, Jesus responds not with His own words, not with His own proclamation or His own promotion, rather He responds with an invitation for the disciples to tell John exactly what they have seen to this point in His ministry:
“Go and tell John what you hear and see: 5 the blind receive their sight, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the poor have good news brought to them. 6 And blessed is anyone who takes no offense at me.”
Jesus’ reply is, in so many words: if John wants a sign, give him a sign, tell him what you have seen, the works done, the healing, the faith in a loving God restored. Go and tell Him.
And now, hopefully, with this Kingdom vision that Jesus has given to the world, we begin to see the “Joy” that is present in this “Advent of Joy”.
The “Joy” of Advent is more than earthly happiness or earthly enthusiasm, the “Joy” of Advent is the kind of joy that points to the truth of God’s world and God’s Kingdom:
That even though there is injustice
Even though the Johns of this world are imprisoned for speaking truth to power
Even though there is earthly doubt in divine faith
Even though there is earthly impatience involved in waiting on the Kingdom
God still gets the Kingdom God wants.
God still gets the Kingdom, and the Messiah, and the messenger, and the meek who speak of his Good News.
God is not mocked by the earthly powers that seek to destroy his prophets
God’s Kingdom is not delayed one second by the taunts and the ridicule hurled at Jesus and those who believe in His salvation.
God’s Son has, all along, sought to come to bring release to the captives and liberation to the oppressed by taking on human flesh and human frailty, to the point of human death.
God’s Son: Jesus of Nazareth, Jesus the Christ, has all along come to bless the poor, to dwell with the outcast, to bring his message of hope, peace, joy, and love to those who could accept it without “taking offense” at this new way of loving and caring for the world, and indeed, the only ones who can hear this message and take no offense are those who have nothing of earthly value to lose in the Kingdom come, the rest of us will have to leave our “baggage” at the foot of the cross, (and to allow Christ to do this in us).
That is the Kingdom that Christ came to bring and the Kingdom vision that John prepared the world to receive.
In our own time, the great preacher James Forbes proclaims “No one gets into heaven without a letter of recommendation from the poor”
The Joy of this “Advent of Joy” is that John received Jesus’ letter of recommendation. The Good News that this Jesus of Nazareth is indeed the one that he has been preaching and waiting for. The one that we have been waiting joyfully for.
What greater joy can there be than to know that this Jesus we have heard about is indeed the real deal?
The one who has already begun healing the sick and the lame!
The one who has already brought release to the captives and liberation to the oppressed
The one who has already taken on the lot of the poor that the meekest and lowest among us might actually see God as was promised on the Mount of Olives?
Though Matthew ends this reading with Jesus’ promotion of John the Baptist, I would like to end this message with a focus on Jesus Himself, the one whom John pointed to his entire life.
John pointed people the way and the truth toward Jesus.
Not so that he (that is John) would gain followers but so that the poor, the meek, and the oppressed might turn around and see the face of God come into the world to save them from all sin.
Next week will be the Advent of Love, the Advent in which we focus on God’s willingness to the enter the world in the vulnerability of a child, and to sacrifice himself in order to save the whole world from sin and death.
This week though, we are called to be joyful. We are called to proclaim the joy that has come (and is coming) into the world on Christmas morning. On this Advent of Joy we are called to serve joyfully:
To serve like Christ, who bowed low and received the dirt of the world upon himself!
To serve like John, who spoke truth to power in all situations and settled for nothing less than the Good News that the messiah has truly come to save the world!
We are called to be joyful, in the truth that though kingdoms of this world will disappoint and frustrate and oppress, there is a true Kingdom that is being established in the world: right now, and in the future through the Christ Child who has come to put an end to all suffering and even death itself.
One who has set the captives free and has liberated the oppressed in the hearts of all those who believe.
Amen.
