The Third Sunday of Advent-The Rev Melanie Lemburg

 Advent 3C_2021

December 12, 2021

 

        “What, then, should we do?”  John the Baptist has burst onto the Advent scene in full force today, calling his listeners (and maybe, us?) “a brood of vipers” and challenging them to repent to prepare for the coming of God’s messiah.  “What, then, should we do?”  They ask him not once, not twice, but three different times.  And it could just as easily be us asking the question with sincerity, a little bit of hope, and a whole lotta longing. We wouldn’t mind repenting, we’re just not really sure how to do it. “What, then, should we do?”

        The Old Testament scholar Walter Bruegemann writes this about prophets: “A prophet is someone that tries to articulate the world as though God were really active in the world. And, that means on the one hand, to identify those parts of our world order that are contradictory to God, and on the other hand, it means to talk about the will and purpose that God has for the world that will indeed come to fruition even in circumstances that we can’t imagine. So, what that gives you is both judgement and hope.”[i]

        So, when the people come to John the Baptist in today’s gospel reading, and they continue to ask him again and again…”What then should we do?”,  John’s great gift is that he is a person of vision who knows exactly who he is (not the Messiah but the one pointing to him) and that he has a very clear understanding of who his listeners are and clear vision who they could potentially be.  He sees the shortcomings and the possibilities of each of them and of the world around them.  He tells each one what they need to do in order to bear fruits worthy of repentance, and each prescription has to do with looking outside of themselves and their own issues and treating others with justice and mercy, gentleness and charity. 

        The poet Audre Lord wrote to her friend and fellow poet, Adrienne Rich: “Once you live any piece of your vision, it opens you to a constant onslaught of necessities, of horrors, but of wonders too, of possibilities.”[ii] 

        That is what John the Baptist offers his hearers:  “possibilities”.  It is the possibility of the good news—how we can be, how we will be changed for the better.  The prophet invites his audience to open their eyes to the challenges and the possibilities of the world around them and to live more fully into the hope, the possibilities.  He invites each one to become a little prophet in their own lives, holding in tension the challenge and the possibility and becoming a part of the Kingdom of God in how they contribute to bringing the possible to fruition. 

        What, then, should we do?  May we open our eyes to the world around us-to both the challenges and the possibilities.  May we hear the invitation of the prophet to let go of those parts of ourselves, those “things that we do again and again that do not help deepen life.”[iii] And may we offer to God and the world around us “the fruits worthy of repentance”-obeying the call to look outside of ourselves and our own issues and treating others with justice and mercy, gentleness and charity.   May we be God’s agents of hope and of possibility in a world where we believe God continues to act.

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[i] –Walter Brueggemann and Kenyatta Gilbert, What Does It Mean To Be Prophetic Today? From the daily email of Inward/Outward Together—Church of Our Savior Washington DC

[ii] From a sermon I preached at St. Peter’s by-the-Sea, Gulfport, MS on December 13, 2009

[iii] https://unfoldinglight.net/2021/12/06/pruning/