Third Sunday in Advent
Year A, RCL
December 15,2019
North Fork Ministries
Gospel:
Matthew 11:2-11
When John heard in prison what the Messiah was doing, he sent word by his disciples and said to him, "Are you the one who is to come, or are we to wait for another?" Jesus answered them, "Go and tell John what you hear and see: 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. And blessed is anyone who takes no offense at me."
As they went away, Jesus began to speak to the crowds about John: "What did you go out into the wilderness to look at? A reed shaken by the wind? What then did you go out to see? Someone dressed in soft robes? Look, those who wear soft robes are in royal palaces. What then did you go out to see? A prophet? Yes, I tell you, and more than a prophet. This is the one about whom it is written,
`See, I am sending my messenger ahead of you,
who will prepare your way before you.'
Truly I tell you, among those born of women no one has arisen greater than John the Baptist; yet the least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he."
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As the gospel reading opens we find John the Baptist impatiently waiting in prison. Earlier in Matthew we read of Jesus’ baptism by John in the River Jordan where a voice from heaven was heard saying, “This is my son the Beloved, with whom I am well pleased.” And just last week we read about John the Baptist foretelling the coming of one more powerful than he, winnowing fork in hand, ax at his side - a Messiah who would be quick to lay waste to the hated Roman occupiers.
But now, because he continued to preach a gospel of liberation, John finds himself tossed into a Roman dungeon, awaiting judgment. Prisons in those days weren’t the long-term human warehouses they have become in the United States. Prisons were only way-stations. Prisoners waited in jails for their eventual exoneration, exile, or execution. And John, politically savvy enough to know what fate awaited him, had apparently begun to question the faith he had previously shown in the Messiah. He wonders why, if Jesus is the Christ, why he doesn’t proclaim himself King, bring Herod and the Romans to their knees, and fling open the doors of his cell so John himself can go free? And so, doubting his faith, John sends messengers to confirm his impression of Jesus as the Messiah, directing them to ask, "Are you the one who is to come, or are we to wait for another?"
John had a very clear conception of what a Messiah should be about. But what John failed to understand is that Jesus didn’t come to fulfill his expectations of what a savior should be. Jesus didn’t follow in the footsteps of John, casting judgment and loudly proclaiming God’s coming vengeance on the sinner. Instead Jesus preached a gospel of forgiveness, hope, and comfort for the afflicted. And Jesus, unlike John, didn’t adopt the prophet’s hermit-like existence in the wilderness, living on locust and wild honey. Instead, Jesus drank and ate with sinners and tax collectors, and turned water to wine and sometimes found good reason to celebrate. And Jesus did not take on the mantle of a new David. He was no warrior, gathering troops and laying waste to the Romans. Instead, Jesus taught non-violent resistance, turning the other cheek, and love for one’s enemies. This was not the Messiah that John had in mind and so he had serious doubts about the Jesus he had baptized.
Jesus answers John’s messengers this way “Go and tell John what you see and hear: The blind receive their sight, the lame walk, lepers are healed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the poor have good news brought to them.”
John Dominic Crossan has observed that in the context of grinding oppression, the most miraculous item in this list is that the poor are learning that God has good news for them.
In the United States today, the wealth gap between the ultra-rich and the poor is greater than it has been since the Roaring Twenties – almost 100 years ago now.
The supreme court ruled that corporations may spend unlimited sums of money to influence our elections, and so they do. The growing gig economy means that millions of workers toil without receiving the benefits of full-time employment. It appears that as we approach the third decade of the 21st century, as it was in the 1st, the blind will see, the lame will walk, the deaf will hear, and the dead will be raised long before the poor are likely to get an even break.
Today’s gospel reading presents quite a dramatic scene. First Jesus addresses the messengers sent by John the Baptist, describing to them the nature of his ministry to the powerless. Then, Jesus turns to the crowd that was overhearing his conversation with John’s messengers. It is often more effective to overhear the gospel than it is to receive it head on. But at this moment Jesus addresses the crowd directly, declaring that John is no “reed shaken by the wind” - probably an allusion to the reed that was stamped on the Roman coins in Herod’s day. Jesus is saying, “What did you expect? Is a prophet someone who just goes where the wind blows?” Of this prophet, Jesus then says, “Among those born of women, no one is greater. But the least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he.” Jesus is telling the people that John the Baptist is indeed extraordinary but, at the same time, he is every man.
The couriers had turned to leave and so that they could carry Jesus’ message to John, but I like to imagine that these messengers stayed around long enough to hear what Jesus had to say about John to the crowd, so that they could carry this bit of good news to John’s prison cell.
None were greater than John, and none were less. As the lowliest are lifted up, so are we all. Our fate may not be the fate of the poor or the lame or the blind. But when the blind are restored to sight, we can see. When the lame are healed we can walk. When the poor are lifted out of poverty, we are all rich.
We are one, and the hope that Christ brings to all creation, is our hope. This is the promise of Advent. Advent expectation is a promise to transform our vision, to understand in a new way, the nature of the kingdom of God.
I wonder how John the Baptist reacted when his couriers relayed the message from Jesus. After all, he is in prison, not deaf, blind or lame. And the poverty he experienced in the wilderness was a matter of choice. The messengers told him that the work of the kingdom was being done, but the work wasn’t exactly how John had imagined it.
Advent is a good time to re-imagine Jesus. As we await the birth of the Christ child, we can also imagine being made whole, as fresh as a newborn babe. But we diminish Christ when we think that he can be reduced to our vain imaginings of what he is about. We worship a living Christ - a Christ that can bridge the gap between the crushing doubts of a crazed prophet lying on the floor of a Roman prison and the despair of an impoverished immigrant mother in Suffolk County. But we are one in the spirit. And the elevation of the lowliest among us brings us all closer to the realization of the kingdom that Jesus had in mind.
“…then the lame shall leap like a deer, and the tongue of the speechless sing for joy”