Get Set!

Rebecca Sheridan
Sunday, December 8, 2024
Luke 3:1-6

    When I was in seminary, we lived in the neighborhood next to where the Obamas lived in Chicago at the time when he was president.  Chicago traffic can definitely rival New York’s.  What should take you half an hour to drive can take 3 or more hours at the wrong time on the wrong day.  And worse was when President Obama came to visit.  They would close even parts of Lake Shore Drive for the president’s motorcade to make their way to the Obama house.  Taking the train, even walking, was faster to get where you needed to go on those Chicago presidential visits.  No matter how you felt about Obama’s presidency, NO ONE appreciated a presidential visit day because of the traffic.
    Today we hear John the Baptist echoing the prophet Isaiah’s call to prepare the way of the Lord – make his paths straight – smooth the rough ways, fill the valleys, make low the mountains –so that all flesh can see the salvation of God.  What a lovely image of a clear, smooth, unclogged road way that leads directly to Christ.  John uses this road work metaphor in preparation for Christ’s coming.  He calls us to do some spiritual road construction.  It is important to know that even in Jesus’ time, those in power, the rulers of their day, would call for special road construction to be done so that they could travel for celebratory parades and more easily move military troops into battle.  Like a presidential motorcade, you can only imagine the royal entourage of the equivalent of the secret service detail, the armed guards, the ladies and gentlemen in waiting, etc. that these royal highway processions required.  Everyone else was probably left off to the side of the road, waiting for these higher ups to pass by, grumbling about the road being closed with congested traffic.
    In our gospel, Luke identifies very specifically the political and religious authorities who were in charge, who may have ridden in these royal processions during Jesus’ time.  He lists these people by name.  But then, he points out that the word of God comes to John, son of Zechariah, in the wilderness.  The word of God comes not to the powerful, but to a relative nobody from nowhere off the beaten path, way beyond the side of the road – in an area where there in fact are no roads, yet.  In this wilderness around the Jordan, in the farms, villages, and outskirts, to ordinary people, John proclaims that Christ is coming.  He encourages people to prepare for Jesus the Messiah by being baptized, repenting, and receiving God’s forgiveness.  It is in this area of the Jordan by the river where we’ll hear in this same chapter 3 of Luke that John will baptize this Jesus, the one he is calling people to prepare for.  Today, John asks us also to consider how we prepare a way for people to receive Christ, making a way smooth and straight, unclogged with busy traffic.
    Just as John proclaims the coming of Christ out in the wilderness among the ordinary, Advent is about preparing for the good news that Christ comes as a real human being, to live with us in the real messy world.  God becomes flesh for us!  His way that he prepares for is a different way from the rulers of this world: the way that leads to the cross – a road of suffering and sacrifice that leads to everlasting life.  Last week, we talked about remembering to get ready for Jesus spiritually in the midst of a very busy holiday season.  Advent preparation reminds us to tend to our inner spiritual life and personal relationship with the Lord.  Today, John the Baptist also points us outward to the needs of the world, especially to those on the margins.  John encourages us to hold on to the hope that the world is not yet as it should be, but Christmas is coming!  Christ is coming soon. We prepare by looking at the many gifts God has given us to care for our neighbors with the love of Christ in acts of service; to make a difference how and when we can, even though we know we can’t solve all of the worlds problems.
    For example, we recently got to take a trip into the city as a family, and my nine-year-old daughter was especially struck by the number of homeless people we saw lying on sidewalks and in Penn Station – she said she counted five.  I’m so used to this sight in the city that I didn’t pay attention as much as she did.  In fact I am embarrassed to admit I only noticed one man, jaded and hardened New Yorker that I am!  The next day, playing at the park, she wrote with sidewalk chalk, “Help the Homeless!” in big letters.  I could tell seeing so many homeless people really made an impact on her.  I tried to talk with her about why it is so difficult to help some homeless people – mental illness, drug and alcohol addiction, and so on, and why we try anyway to support nonprofits who work to combat homelessness and do what we can.  It is difficult as a parent to see your child realize the world as it is is not as the world should be, but I was also encouraged by her desire to do something, and her compassion for people who are in fact still human beings created in the image of God, whom I certainly struggle to love.  We prepare a royal highway for Christ by also going to the outskirts, the edges, the wilderness where the ordinary people are longing for good news and hope, and finding ways to serve and love as Jesus loves.  We prepare by not letting ourselves become too apathetic or careless about the needs of others, no matter how old and jaded we get!  We prepare by looking to Christ as our hope for a weary world longing for hope, peace, love, and joy.
    When we think of the state of the world, Lord knows we have some major road construction to do.  Thanks be to God, this is why Jesus comes; in a lowly manger which was a container for animal food, Christ is born, to ordinary people, for ordinary people so that ALL flesh shall see the salvation of God.  Christ is coming as a different kind of ruler, on a different kind of royal way, where the road will be clear for all people to see the salvation of God.  As I joked, when we imagine the way clear on Grand Central Parkway, or sailing by on the George Washington Bridge, that is when we know that Christ is coming near.  Jesus comes to unclog our hearts, open our eyes to the needs of our neighbors, and promise that all the rough and crooked ways will be made smooth. Thanks be to God!  Amen.