Passion

John the Baptist. Every holiday event needs a John the Baptist. Every worship planning team needs a John the Baptist—someone who doesn’t hold back, someone who says what he thinks, someone who believes with every fiber of his being, someone who is so vitally present that everyone else is just drawn to them. But then, on the other hand, such a person might be hard to take. He might have too many rough edges to fit neatly into your corporate image. And John dresses funny.

Do you find it interesting that Luke doesn’t seem to care about that? Matthew and Mark give a runway review of John’s accoutrements, but Luke doesn’t say a word. We’ve always assumed that Luke was writing more to the Gentile Christians, and maybe that’s why he isn’t as stressed about John’s rugged attire. But I wonder if there is a message here—a simple one, perhaps, but a good reminder that we need to look beyond the surface to hear the voice of God coming from surprising people. It’s surprising to us anyway, but not to the God who sends; the God who calls.

Luke says that John was doing what was written in the book of the words of Isaiah (Luke 3:4). John was doing the words of a prophet hundreds of years before him. He was acting on someone else’s words. But a few verses earlier, we see it isn’t Isaiah’s words that motivate John at all. I don’t know if John knew of the book of the words or not. Maybe he did; maybe he grew up in synagogue school like all the other boys his age, his cousin, Jesus, for example, who seems to know the words of the books as if he had written them himself. But I can’t see John sitting still in recitation class long enough to let the book of the words sink into him.

But Luke says it isn’t Isaiah’s words that motivate John to come out of the wilderness with his questionable sartorial sense and unusual dietary habits. No, the Word of God came to John in the wilderness. To John. Luke seems almost amazed or thinks we should be amazed. We have ruler after ruler, power and authority all over the place, but the Word of God doesn’t come to them. It doesn’t come to places of power, to places of action and might and force, to corruption and narcissism, greed and oppression. No, the Word didn’t come down there to the bright lights and big city. It came to John, in the wilderness, no less. And he got on the road, the under-construction road; he took his shovel and his dynamite and set about filling valleys and removing mountains.

No, he didn’t don a hard hat and join a road crew. He let the Word become his words, and he spoke. He invited, encouraged, cajoled, shouted, begged and pleased, pointed and accused, cried and challenged; he let the Word leak out of him in every way possible and spill out on those who gathered in front of him. The words cascaded down over them, just as assuredly as the hands full of water that he poured out on their heads. They were bathed in the words, cleansed in the words, so that they might be able to claim the Word. Because in alchemy unexplainable, his words and that water and their repentance and willingness made the Word come alive again in them. And the words and the Word together became their flesh and their bones, became their choices and their actions, their priorities and their attitudes, they lived out that Word. They became a book of the words; no, a book of the Word.

Of course, Malachi doesn’t need anyone else’s words. He was given his own. Who can endure the day of his coming? (Malachi 3:2) “You want it how clean?” Malachi was writing in the post-exilic period, meaning that people had just returned home after being exiled in Babylon. The word “Malachi” means “my messenger” - so it might have been that the author was telling his own story. He was the messenger who was coming before the Lord to call people into right living. He says there are still expectations; there are still standards. God calls God’s people into clean living, whole and healing relationships, service that builds up rather than tears down. God’s law is still a measure by which ethics, or behavior in community, is judged.

It sounds like a threat. Malachi has a supporting part in Handel’s Messiah. Most of the text of that great choral work is Isaiah and the Psalms. But there are a few other scriptures tossed in there. Malachi appears early in the work, setting the stage for the coming of the Messiah. “The Lord whom ye seek shall suddenly come to His temple,” sings the bass in a recitative, “ev’n the messenger of the Covenant, whom you delight in, behold, He shall come, saith the Lord of Hosts.” A recitative is sort of a mixture of speaking and singing; a straightforward, but rhythmic presentation of the text with simpler musical accompaniment—sort of a “here it is” approach, a “get ready” move from one idea to another. But then, the bass continues in an aria singing, “But who may abide the day of His coming, and who shall stand when He appeareth? For He is like a refiner’s fire.” An aria is a longer exposition, with repetition and elaborate musical accompaniment. And a bass voice. A deep bass voice, Darth Vader deep, that sounds ... ominous, scary; a warning or a threat. “Who may abide?” Not you, surely. Not me.

That is one reason we choose to skip Advent and get right to Christmas. This getting ready thing can be difficult. Painful. We don’t like the idea of being washed with fuller’s soap, whatever that is. It reminds me of Lava Soap. Remember that? You knew you were dirty if it took Lava to get you clean.

While we might be able to wriggle out of the fuller’s soap reference due to cultural ignorance, we all know what fire is. Refiner’s fire - means even hotter. It is burning away impurities. OK, we might come out better, stronger, cleaner, but still ... Who would choose such a process? Who can endure the day of his coming?

We can. That’s the message here. That’s Advent in a nutshell. Who can endure? We can. No, really. We can. Because we are not alone. Because the one who calls, the one who brings the soap and stokes the fire, is the one who walks with us. Emmanuel means God-with-us.

Someone once asked why Malachi talks more about silver than gold. Gold is more valuable, isn’t it? Gold is the best, the top of the line, the ... uh, gold standard. Yet, silver appears twice. Well, they argued, silver is more labor-intensive in the refining process. In refining silver, the smith has to stay close. You can’t put silver in the fire and leave it alone, it has to be attended. You have to stay close enough to watch. The silversmith must lean in, risking the heat, wary of the impurities spitting hot molten silver onto exposed flesh. Jewelers say you can always spot a silversmith by the scars.

God-with-us. That is the promise hidden within the threat (or what sounds like a threat anyway). Who can endure? We can because God is with us. In the struggle and the joy; in the pain and the celebration, God is with us. The birth we celebrate at Christmastime is not an ancient remembrance of a long-ago event, but a daily promise and a constant presence. Be born in us, we pray. And fit us for heaven. Fit us for heaven.

“Mom clean” is the clean that will pass the inspection, pass the judgment of Mom. That’s the definition. In practice around here, however, what it really means is the clean that happens when Mom joins in. Who can endure the day of his coming? We can, because the Lord rolls up the divine sleeves and reaches into the corners of our lives where we’ve let the clutter of our brokenness accumulate, convincing ourselves that we were clean enough. But it doesn’t measure up to those standards. So, together, we set about the business of cleaning, of healing, of repairing so that we can present to the Lord in righteousness; so that our lives can be Mom-clean, Emmanuel clean.

It isn’t easy, this cleaning process. It takes time and effort and blood and sweat and even tears sometimes. And then you wonder if you’ll ever be clean; if the task of shoveling out the detritus of living in this world will ever be done. How will we know? What will be the sign that we are Mom-clean?

The silversmith will tell you that the metal is ready to be worked into shape, to be used for the jeweler’s purpose when he can see his face reflected. When all the world gives back the song, that now that angels sing: that’s when we’ll know. When our lives shine with the presence of Emmanuel. When the heartbeat, the passion of our worship, becomes the passion by which we live every moment of our lives. When we all sound like the prophet Malachi or the forerunner John the Baptist. When we lean into our faith so completely that it consumes us and ripples out to transform the world around us.

Rev. Dr. Derek Weber, Director of Preaching Ministries, served churches in Indiana and Arkansas and the British Methodist Church. His PhD is from University of Edinburgh in preaching and media. He has taught preaching in seminary and conference settings for more than 20 years.