In Advent, we feel the subversive nature of following Jesus, the seduction of power, and the quiet call to walk into the wilderness.
Jesus, John, and the subversive nature of Advent
Advent 2C | Luke 3:1-6
It must be Advent 2 again, because here comes John! Reading about this wild man in the wilderness is probably the most recognizable Advent activity for liturgical Christians. We light our wreaths, we sing about a light coming in the midst of darkness, and we read about John.
This is, of course, juxtaposed by the world’s regular Advent activity of calling it Christmas! Or of getting so busy we yell at our families and begrudge having to see them because buying more junk is such a pain.
What we hear within these walls is so different from what we hear in the world this time of year. That it is so different is beyond comprehension. And, truth be told, we can start to think that what God is asking us to do is just insane. We might start thinking we’re the ones who are wrong.
No wonder we started with the end in mind last week. And no wonder we receive a herald this week. A prophecy calling us to the desert. Away from the bustle and safety of the city. Out here, to the wild lands and its disquieting stillness and its sudden noises.
Out here, something’s gonna happen.
It’s a liturgical trick the church is offering us this year.
If the lectionary were a movie, the opening scene is the threatening end, unsettling us. Last week’s gospel had Jesus speaking to his disciples about the end of things—apocalyptic talk which would frighten the viewer and prepare them for the rollercoaster ahead.
Then the screen goes black. The light filters into an already moving aerial view of a city; multiple shots of towering buildings and landmarks. The editor splices in news footage of the president, chief of staff, Majority leader in the Senate and Speaker of the House.
And then the camera slowly pans from the city, out of the suburbs and the exurbs and all our sprawl into the fields and woods, gaining speed until it comes to rest on the middle of nowhere.
And in the middle is a dot, moving…growing…two dots…now a figure…a man…homeless and wild-eyed…a stranger—the camera comes close to his face and he proclaims prophetic poetry we all would recognize, something we all know by heart. Something like King’s Dream speech.
Today we meet John! And he has something to say!
But the trick of the lectionary is that this isn’t the first time we’ve met John in the gospel we attribute to Luke.
If we back up, we’ll meet John’s father, Zechariah, and his mother, Elizabeth. We’ll meet Mary and hear of her pregnancy. We’ll get the birth stories and Jesus’s presentation at the temple.
In Luke, this announcement John is making, the path he’s looking to clear isn’t for the birth of Jesus. It’s for Jesus the man who is following behind.
This is the greatest gift of Advent.
That in spite of the world’s conviction that we need to start singing about a baby Jesus in November, Advent reminds us he doesn’t remain a baby.
In our four gospel narratives, composed of 89 chapters, Jesus is a child in just two of them.
Prepping for the baby isn’t the point. That’s not the kind of preparation John is declaring in Luke. He isn’t buying a crib or cute footy pajamas. He’s preparing the desert for the coming of Christ.
The gospel is full of reversals and juxtapositions.
There are so many, we’re pretty used to them.
And we’re used to them in our movies and literature. The rich man needs to learn the value of giving or the most generous person is the homeless man on the street. The reversal is such a trope in our culture, it doesn’t hold the same power for us.
Especially when we become so eager to reverse the reversal. We start arguing with Jesus, but the rich go to heaven, too!
But it’s a cynical mind which doesn’t listen for the genuine truth, getting lost in all the “what ifs”.
Here, it isn’t so much a reversal as it is an opening, a growing awareness. And it comes with the juxtaposition of human power and uncivilized creation.
Luke kicks it off with 7 leaders, starting with the most powerful ruler the world has known. Then the emperor’s men imposed upon the people of Israel. And then the regional authorities and spiritual authorities.
These leaders mark the place and time of these events, certainly. But they also represent the power of the empire and the collaboration which keeps the trains running on time. Those who built the roads and sanitation, who created leaps in human civil development were titans.
But the roads only go so far.
Like driving back up to northern Michigan. I take the freeway most of the way. But then I have to leave it for local highways for two hours. Then a local road. But if I’m going into the wild, I need to leave the car behind and walk between trees which hug each other and darken the floor.
This is why the wild man is proclaiming the good news.
Not news of power. Not a reversal which takes a poor carpenter’s son to the crowned heights of human power. But one which reverses and subverts that very expectation. This good news doesn’t fit on the power axis at all!
Christ’s vision is of a project which subverts these visions and expectations of power itself. A vision of a world that can’t be found from within the empire and its crown and throne.
So we’re given 7 leaders because 7 is a divine number. It’s a reminder to look for God, not in those leaders, but from the one calling out in the wilderness.
And one that calls us out into the wilderness: both metaphorically and literally. Sincerely.
A world where power isn’t transferred from one to the other but spread into every corner of the world.
Look! Open your eyes! The Christ isn’t coming in 16 days! He won’t be born in a hospital, swaddled and capped with a knit hat! He won’t spend the following decades growing up so that 30 years from now we can declare that Jesus is ready to do this thing!
John declares that the Christ is here! Look around! The God project, this Christ event, is happening and it’s on the move! Stay awake!
And the Christ event always goes against our expectations—when we expect God to show up robed in power. No! Look to the wilderness! The way is there!
The point isn’t to dwell on our postmodern understanding of reversals, but our persistent and perpetual need to praise the powerful and ignore the poor. A tendency which hasn’t changed in 2000 years.
We’re being called to look where we keep forgetting to look! To listen where our people keep forgetting to listen!
Turn to Listen
So then, when we speak of Christ coming in glory, preparing his way, hoping with joy, we don’t need to look in different places than Jesus himself told our ancestors to look. The children, the struggling, powerless, the incarcerated, the hopeless. Those with no power and no ears to hear them. Where our systems make us callous to their cries.
We turn our ears and eyes to those impoverished by a world of power and individualism and cruelty. One which would have us walk past our neighbor as our own neighbors walk past us.
And we turn our hearts to the prayer we are taught to pray. A prayer of reversing inequality into equality; indebtedness into freedom; and individual gain into communal wealth. A prayer envisioning an anti-kingdom based in love rather than power.
May this Advent season be rich with expectation and longing, full of connection with God and strangers, and emptied of anxiety and fear. May the dreams which buoy our spirits become indecipherable from the dreams God has for us all. And may the mercy of God spread before you like a path to follow.
A path which shines like a beacon of hope for all those around us afraid of the wilderness. Afraid of what they’ll find. Even when, no especially when it’s Jesus.