NewCreation

Homily for the Second Sunday in Advent Year B

Welcome, my sisters and brothers, to this homily for the second Sunday in Advent. This Sunday we're introduced to the very beginning of St Mark's Gospel, which is going to be the Gospel that's going to accompany us for the rest of this church year. So it's an important beginning. But before we get to it, I'd like to refer to our Isaiah passage, because it helps us prepare our imagination for what's going on. Let's remember Isaiah's passage last week. If you remember, it was the prophet beseeching God to stop scandalizing the people, to stop hardening their hearts, to stop leaving them in a place where they had no way of resolving their conflicts and their violence — begging God to come down and make forgiveness, make righteousness possible, make reconciliation possible. In other words, he was begging for the coming of an atonement sacrifice. And today's reading from Isaiah — Isaiah 40 — is the announcement, the prophetic announcement, that just this is coming, or has in fact already come: "Comfort, comfort my people," says our God; "speak tenderly to Jerusalem, and cry to her that she has served her term, that her humiliation is at an end" — is the Greek — "that her penalty is paid," in other words, that her sin has been atoned for, that "she has received from the Lord's hand double for all her expiations." In other words, what's being announced here is the arrival of God's great reconciliation sacrifice for God's people. And this is being done out of tenderness of heart, out of pity — seeing people lost and unable to get on together, seeing people divided and full of hatred, full of faction. So it's the announcement of that. Just before that, we get: "In the wilderness, prepare the way of the Lord" — "A voice cries out in the wilderness, prepare the way of the Lord." In other words, this is setting us up to see that the voice which is going to cry in the wilderness — that's the version of it we have in Mark; the voice cries in the wilderness in Mark — what the voice is going to tell people about is to make possible for them to begin to understand the atonement that is coming, the great sacrificial giving that's coming: how the Holy One of God is going to make himself available as sin offering, so as to set free his people from their sins, all their transgressions. That's the promise of what's coming. And it's worthwhile thinking that part of the preparing the way is helping us prepare our imaginations for how that's going to look. That's what we celebrate in Advent, if you like — allowing our imaginations to be prepared, so that we may see the one who is coming, so we may see the Holy One of God, the one who John the Baptist will later recognize as the Lamb of God coming in. Okay, now let's turn to Mark's Gospel. And this is such a treat and such fun, basically, because I wish I had much longer to talk about it, because Mark's Gospel is so concentrated. So let's just Say a little bit about what we're looking at, because for many Sundays during this coming year we'll be looking at Mark's Gospel. Remember, the Gospels are initially something like Cliff's Notes for preachers — dummy's guides to how to preach that Jesus is the Christ. And like good dummy's guides, basically it's a series of notes to remind you of exactly what's happening and why, which means that every word in Mark is deliberate. This is an extraordinary, parsimonious text, and each word has significance. We'll start looking at some of that now, just so we can get a sense of what's going on in this wonderful Gospel. So it begins with the word "the beginning," which takes you straight back to Genesis. We'll see that within the first sentence he's managed to bring out Genesis, Joshua, Exodus, Malachi, and Isaiah. So Genesis: the beginning. Malachi: the end — that's the last book of the Hebrew Bible, where precisely the sending of the messenger is repeated. "The sending of the messenger: see, I am sending my messenger ahead of you" comes in Exodus 23, where it might refer to Joshua, but here someone else called Joshua — because that's what Jesus is — Joshua is coming in. And Malachi, the very end, the repetition: "See, I am sending the messenger who will prepare the way." So "the beginning of the good news of Jesus Christ" — not the good news concerning Jesus Christ, not the good news about Jesus Christ, not the good news preached by Jesus Christ, but the good news that is Jesus Christ. That's the meaning of the genitive. The "of" is: the good news that is Jesus Christ. "The Son of God" — immediately there is given that title, a high priestly title, to tell us something about the coming in that's going to happen. "As it is written in the prophet Isaiah" — and it's much more than the prophet Isaiah, because it starts, as I say, as a compound quote which Mark gives us. It's a quote from Exodus, from Malachi, and from Isaiah: "See, I am sending my messenger" — literally "my angel" in Greek — "ahead of you, who will prepare your way; the voice of one crying out in the wilderness, prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight." We've had the passage from Isaiah, so we know what that's about. This is the one who's going to come, prepare people for the coming in of the great atonement, the great sacrifice. And then the narrative: "John baptizing" — sometimes translated "John the Baptizer" — "John baptizing appeared in the wilderness proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins." What was John up to? You'll see this — the clothing will help. "And people from the whole Judean countryside and all the people of Jerusalem were going out to him and were baptized by him in the river Jordan confessing their sins. Now John was clothed with camel's hair with a leather belt around his waist, and he ate locusts and wild honey. He proclaimed: 'The one who is more powerful than I is coming after me. I'm not worthy to stoop down and untie the thong of his sandals. I have baptized you with water, but he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit.'" So what's John doing? First of all, he's in the wilderness. This is the place that the scapegoat was sent out to. This was the place of wildness, of impurity. It was also the place of protest. It seems that what John is doing is challenging the Temple establishment by setting up a baptism. Baptism was, properly speaking, the rite of ordination of priests. That's what happens in the book of Leviticus — you can see it quite clearly set out there. There's a kind of a washing. It is different from the purity washings, the washing of the priesthood. So there's some suggestion that John is relocating the function of the Temple. This is a protest against the Temple, their rite of atonement conducted by corrupt priests, that was not in fact producing the breaking of heart of the people. What's he doing? He's standing in this deserted place announcing this washing. But he's standing in this deserted place as someone impure. He doesn't come, if you like, as a good one dressed in fine raiment, the kind of thing that a priest might do. He's coming dressed in camel hair. The camel was an impure beast — couldn't eat camel. The camel was not a sacrificial beast and it was not an edible beast. It was impure. So he's dressed in camel hair. He's eating wild honey. That's just a hint that he's Samson. Samson, if you remember, killed a lion, and bees made wild honey in the lion's carcass, and he gave it to people without telling them that it was impure, because it was from a carcass. So he's a person who eats impure food. He's eating locusts — you're allowed to eat locusts. Again, his eating locusts would have been a memory of the Exodus from Egypt, the plagues of Egypt. The number of points that he's fulfilling here: he's dressed in camel hair, a remnant of the patriarchal lifestyle, the nomadic… Lifestyle from before the settling in Jerusalem. In other words, this is a strong protest gesture. But it's not just protesting against — it's doing something instead of. Is it the real thing that the Temple was supposed to be doing? It was supposed to be covering over people's sins, actually producing repentance in our heart. And yet John knows that he's not the real thing yet. He's preparing the way for the real thing. What's interesting is that this impure person — this, if you like, potential scapegoat, because that's what he is — he's an impure person in the wilderness, and yet he's trying to offer people the way through to the promised land, that which they can only get through to through repentance, through being washed. And he does this by the Jordan. And remember, the Jordan was where Joshua took the people through, with the priests barefoot in the midst of the Jordan, holding the ark. So what is John the Baptist doing? He's saying, "I'm not Joshua. I'm preparing the way for Joshua." The real Joshua, the real angel who is going to come in — that's the one whose sandal I am not worthy to untie. It is interesting that he mentions the word sandal. It's not merely a gesture of saying, "Well, I'm less than even the lowest of his disciples." If you read the passage about Joshua and the priests crossing the Jordan with the Ark of the Covenant, you'll be surprised by how often their feet are referred to. Their feet are a big part of the story. John is saying, "Actually, I am preparing the way for the feet of the one who is going to stand in the Jordan. I'm not worthy of it." But the one who's going to stand in the Jordan — were the priests who stood in the Jordan. And they held the ark, and while they held the ark, all the people were able to pass through. And then when all the people had passed through, they with the ark came onto dry land. As soon as their feet touched dry land, the Jordan returned to its flow. So what's John the Baptist doing? He's saying, "I'm preparing the way, but fairly soon, of the priest who bears the ark…" That's to say, the Holy One of God is going to come, and I'm not worthy to prepare the way for him. "I've baptized you with water" — in other words, this is just the beginning, this is just to point you the way to what's going to come. "But he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit" — in other words, he will turn you into the ark of the covenant. His presence will be the presence of the Holy One of God, and that one, that one will baptize you with something that is simply out of my depth, simply something beyond anything that I can compare or even imagine. But I'm here to try and open up the way for you. So let's hold on tightly to these things. John symbolizing the patriarchs: Elijah, because of the leather belt; Samson, because of the honey; the flight from Egypt, because of the locusts — and really challenging the Temple establishment. So next Sunday we'll see how the Temple authorities react to this, and we'll be able to be taken further into our imagination of the one who is coming in. In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.