12-1-14 - Into the Desert

Black Friday is past. Colored lights are blinking on every other house. Must be about time for John the Baptist to saunter out of the desert just as our consumer frenzy churns toward its apotheosis, to remind us that it’s Advent – and that “theosis” might more properly be used to refer to God.

“John the baptizer appeared in the wilderness, proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins.”

We only seem to let him out once a year, this not-so-cuddly prophet of repentance. Repentance is not much in vogue, and John is more than a bit odd, in his weird attire and diet of locusts and wild honey. We could consider him a proto-vegan, but for the camel skin coat and leather belt he sported (makes him sound like a proto-Ralph Lauren… not! )

But John is where all four gospels start to tell “The Good News of Jesus Christ, the Son of God,” as Mark begins his account. John is the one sent to “make ready a people prepared for the Lord,” as the angel Gabriel told his father Zechariah when announcing John’s improbable conception. (Luke 1:17) Zechariah himself sings out when John is born:

"And you, child, will be called the prophet of the Most High; for you will go before the Lord to prepare his ways, to give knowledge of salvation to his people by the forgiveness of their sins." (Luke 1:76-77)

This would suggest that repentance is our entryway into the “knowledge of salvation.” Repentance is a pre-requisite to feeling the need of salvation – what do we need saving from? If we feel we’re hunky-dory without Jesus, there was really no need for him to have bothered with all that incarnation, crucifixion, resurrection and redemption business. We have to buy some level of estrangement with God, and accept some degree of human culpability for the state of the world, in order to think about salvation. 

Accepting those realities is repentance. Repentance doesn’t have to be a laundry list of personal sins and short-comings. It is an awareness of being less than what we were created to be, and a desire to invite the kind of healing that remedies the fault.

So let’s begin Advent with repentance, since that is John’s specialty. Like those who traveled out of the their safe zones to go see him in the wilderness, to hear his call to repent, to receive his baptism of cleansing, let’s wander away from our patterns of stuckness, our self-justifications, our self-saving strategies, and ask the Holy Spirit to show us how we have grown apart from God. We might try this each day this week, and see what gets freed and released.

Where does our pride kick up? Where do our relationships cause us to wince or get defensive? Where is shame rooted in us, a deep sense of unworthiness? We can bring it into the light of God’s love, feel the feelings related to each root of bitterness, and begin to release it to God for forgiveness and healing.

The forgiveness has already been given. The healing begins as we accept the forgiveness and desire new growth.