O come, O come, Emmanuel. Amen.
“What should we do?” That’s the question that Christians continually wrestle with. God the Father is the Creator of heaven and earth, and what should we do? Jesus Christ is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world, and what should we do? The Holy Spirit dwells within each of us, and what should we do? Embedded within this question is the assumption that faith is more than a set of ideas or a side to be on, rather faith has implications for our lives. The Churchy way of saying this is that faith is incarnational – meaning that faith is about physical things, that faith is embodied, that faith is observable. And so we always have that question– what should we do?
There
was a young man who was largely wasting his time at university – more
interested in parties than studying. He didn’t have a care when it came to
responsibility or religion. In his early 20s, many of his friends were moving
towards political office and he figured since his family could bankroll a
campaign for him, he might as well. So there he was, a young man in Parliament,
but not really sure what it was all about. One summer, he took a trip around
Europe with a friend, a friend who happened to be a Christian. Eventually,
their conversations turned to faith and this young man slowly realized that his
resistance to faith was gone and, at the age of 25, he was converted to
following Christ.
Christianity
though is not a status, not an achievement to file away. The idea of Baptism as
being “born again” really is a good metaphor because, in the same way that
birth signals the beginning of a process of growth and learning, Baptism is to
be the beginning of growth in Christ, not the end of it. For this young man,
his conversion to faith did not give him an immediate sense of peace or
purpose, rather it provoked deep and unsettling questions in his life. He
wrestled with the question – “what should I do?”
At
first, he considered a career change, thinking he had to get out of the messy
world of politics and pursue ordination. But a friend convinced him that he
should use his position and influence for the glory of God and the alleviation
of human suffering. From then on, he knew what it was that he should do.
William Wilberforce gave his life to making sure that slavery was abolished.
Each year in Parliament, beginning in 1788 he introduced legislation to abolish
the slave trade. For 18 years in a row, his motion was defeated until it
finally passed in 1806. But he did not stop there, he then pushed for the
abolition of slavery in all British territories, an Act that passed just four
days before his death in 1833. Wilberforce also championed the work of the
Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals and supported missionary
efforts so that all might know of God’s amazing grace. I’m excited that as a
part of our icon project, we will have the legacy of this saint here in our church
as a great example of what happens when we ask the question “What should we
do?”
What
I so appreciate about Wilberforce is his persistence and resolve. For nearly
two decades, it seems as if his efforts were going nowhere – he was coming up
against the barriers of partisanship and prejudice. As Mother Teresa once said,
“We do not need to do great things, but rather small things with great love.”
Wilberforce came and saw the difference that Christ makes and it made him
different as well.
This
is exactly the sort of action that John the Baptist has in mind when people
came to him and asked him what they should do: if you have two coats, share
one; if you see someone hungry, given them food; don’t steal or extort from
others. None of these is a huge ask. What we are to do isn’t to eliminate
poverty or hunger, but care for those around us. These are incarnational
responses – it’s more than sympathizing with people and saying “Yes, I know
that hunger isn’t fun, but God will one day feed us all.” Sure, that might be
true, but what we are to do is to feed the hungry. Will Willimon has written
that one of the problems with modern Christianity is that we’ve psychologized
the Gospel – turned faith into a thought, feeling, or a mood. It’s not that
Christianity has nothing to do with our thoughts and feelings, it certainly
does. But more than that, faith in Jesus Christ is about our bodies.
Our
Collect this week opens with the bold prayer for God to stir us up. When
something gets stirred up, it means that things are unsettled, uncomfortable,
and rearranged. In the words of John Lewis, this is a prayer asking for God to
make some “good trouble” in our lives. That’s what happened in Wilberforce’s
life – God stirred things up and turned things upside down. And when it comes
to what God would have us to do, things being unsettled and stirred up often
comes with it. When God stirs us up, it disrupts our routines and plans. Maybe
things won’t go as we’ve planned when we take the time to serve those around us
instead of just our own interests. Maybe we’ll be put in some situations where
we aren’t comfortable. Maybe we’ll have to take some stands that aren’t
popular. Maybe we’ll have to use our power and privilege on behalf of those who
have little or none. As we’re drawing nearer to Christmas, this is what God did
by coming among us in Jesus. God came in the flesh not to make us feel better
about ourselves, but rather to stir things up so that the Kingdom would come on
earth as it is in heaven.
The
problem is that we’re really good at not being stirred. We like the status quo
and will safeguard it at all costs. Maybe we know that our institutions have a
legacy of racism, maybe we know that we need to get serious about making
changes to our lives and economy to deal with climate change, maybe we know
that if we want to church to continue we will need to support it with both
financial and physical participation, maybe we know that the way to make our
community stronger is to volunteer with Communities in Schools or Rowan Helping
Ministries – but our plates are already pretty full. For the most part, things
are working well for us right now, so we aren’t looking for things to get
stirred up. Sure, maybe tweaked here and there but not stirred up. As simple as
it might be to give a coat or not defraud people, it isn’t always easy and
doesn’t always come naturally.
The
problem is that, as the Collect puts it, we are “sorely hindered by our sins,”
or as John the Baptist says, we are a “brood of vipers.” I know that’s not
language we often hear today, but it’s not a compliment. Vipers are poisonous
and, at the time, were thought to kill their parents after birth. Even today,
we call people who are morally suspect “slimy snakes.” The perennial problem is,
as St. Paul puts it in Romans 7, that “I do not do what I want, but I do the
very thing I hate. I can will what is right, but I cannot do it. For I do not
do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I do.” When we look at
our world, we see a lot of people hungry without food, a lot of people without
coats, a lot of people who have been defrauded and oppressed by the very
economic systems that have made us comfortable.
Now,
what makes Christianity unique and beautiful is that the response to this
reality is not “Try harder and do better.” If it were simply a matter of our
will, we would have unlocked heaven on earth a long time ago. Christianity
acknowledges that while we might be doing our best, our best isn’t perfect. But
our imperfection, our flaws, our resistance to being stirred up is not damnable
but redeemable in God’s mercy. The best we could do is to baptize things with
water – to wash the dirt off things, at least temporarily. It’s like those
wonderful few minutes each week where there isn’t a single piece of laundry to
wash, dry, or fold. Isn’t that a nice feeling? But it never lasts for more than
a few hours.
John
the Baptist tells us though that the one who is coming isn’t going to baptize
us merely with water, but rather with the Holy Spirit and fire. Sure, water
gets things clean for a bit, but we all know that you can’t wash a dish once or
take a shower once and never do it again. Scholars think that John might have
been a part of the Essene community that lived near the Dead Sea where
they took cleanliness seriously – partaking of ritual baths daily.
Jesus
though comes as one who immerses us not in water, but in the Holy Spirit. Yes,
we still use water in baptism in the same way that we use bread and wine at the
Eucharist, but we know that the bread and wine are not merely bits of grain and
fermented grape juice but rather the Body and Blood of Christ, and in the same
way the water of baptism is the means by which we are immersed by the Holy
Spirit. And John tells us that the Holy Spirit is associated with fire.
Taking
a bath is one thing, but being cleansed by fire is another. Fire is cleansing
and it is transforming. In the fifth book in the Chronicles of Narnia series,
CS Lewis writes about this sort of Baptismal purging and perfecting. There is a
character named Eustace who really is a self-righteous brat. His greed leads
him to try to steal a dragon’s treasure which ends up turning him into a dragon.
The Christ figure, the lion Aslan comes to his aid and leads him to a pool of
water where he can be restored.
Eustace
recounts the event, “The water was as clear as anything and I thought if I
could get in there and bathe in it that I would be better. But the lion told me
I must undress first… So I started scratching myself and my scales began coming
off all over the place… But just as I was going to put my feet into the water I
looked down and saw that they were all hard and rough and wrinkled and scaly
just as they had been before... Then the lion said, “You will have to let me undress
you.” I was afraid of his claws, I can tell you, but I was pretty nearly
desperate now. So I just lay flat down on my back to let him do it. The very
first tear he made was so deep that I thought it had gone right into my heart.
And when he began pulling the skin off, it hurt worse than anything I’ve ever
felt. The only thing that made me able to bear it was just the pleasure of
feeling the stuff peel off… And there was I as smooth and soft as a peeled
switch and smaller than I had been. Then he caught hold of me – I didn’t like
that much for I was very tender underneath now that I’d no skin on – and threw
me into the water. It smarted like anything but only for a moment. After that
it became perfectly delicious and as soon as I started swimming and splashing I
found that all the pain had gone. And then I saw why. I’d turned into a boy
again.”
When
John the Baptist says that “His winnowing fork is in his hand, to clear his
threshing floor and to gather the wheat into his granary; but the chaff he will
burn with unquenchable fire,” his saying a similar thing – that God is going to
transform us. And then Luke adds, “So, with many other exhortations, he
proclaimed the good news to the people.” Being baptized with fire and the Holy
Spirit, having the scales of sin ripped off of us is Good News. Perhaps not
pleasant news, but Good News.
Our
resistance to being stirred up will be burned away. The things that we have
done and left undone have been taken care of by Christ. We are not beholden to
our mistakes, we are not defined by our failings, the record against us has
been expunged. Indeed, we might be as guilty as a brood of vipers, but through
the grace of Christ, the Holy Spirit still dwells in us and works through us to
bring forth the fruits of the Kingdom. Through us, God’s grace is brought to
all of the corners of the earth.
So
what are we to do? By faith and through grace, we can pray that bold prayer
asking for God to stir us up, and then when we feel things being stirred, retreat
not to safety and comfort, but rather know that God will keep us secure in “the
peace of God, which surpasses all understanding.”
