Luke 3:7-18

“Now is the winter of our discontent / Made glorious summer by this sun of York..”1 This week winter came roaring into Owosso and whatever fantastic, private hopes we had that the weather would stay mild vanished with a blast of 14 degree arctic wind. Isn’t it often the same in life? We roll along through the pleasant seasons until we are surprised by the onset of a winter of bleakness. The world goes cold; everything is difficult. When the cold is a matter of weather, we get out our hats and gloves and heavy coat; when the cold is inside, when souls turn grey, we seek look for something to light the fire again.

Last week we heard the story of John the Baptist’s message of repentance and I suggested that repentance is the way toward peace. Today we hear the specifics and this strange final note: “..he proclaimed the good news to the people.” [Luke 3:18]. Is John’s message good news? Is it joyful news? Is it joy we can share?

Luke is writing about people almost a century before, as Jesus is born but he is writing for people near the end of the first century, people shivering in a spiritual winter, wondering how to find the way forward, perplexed about their purpose. The great shining promise that animated the very first Christians, that Jesus would return before they died, any day, any hour, had worn off in time passed and in the passing of the first generation. How to live in the mean time?—that is the great question they face. How to live in the mean time?—how to put into practice every day the teachings of Jesus? They do live in a mean time, a time of change, a time when many are being persecuted for their faith, many are in conflict with family members. Old institutions are collapsing; new ones are strange. In that sense, it is not so different than our own time.

So Luke has reached into the great tradition of stories in the church and lifted up this story about John the Baptist and the beginning of Jesus ministry. There is John, Luke tells us: see him?–a wild, strange figure on the banks of the Jordan, the river Israel had to cross to come into the promised land. He looks and smells like the desert: camel hair garments, wild honey and roast locusts for food. He preaches repentance as the right response to the time: spiritual change that leads to behavioral change, doing new things as a way to experiencing a new spirit.

It’s not a general message. He gets specific in a way preachers are always reluctant to do. Details always get you in trouble. “Whoever has two coats must share with anyone who has none.” Wow. Ouch. The thing is, I have more than two coats, I have coats for different purposes. I have blue blazers, the uniform of small town business and professional guys; I have a black leather jacket that lets me look professional and stay warm in the spring and fall. I have a blue down winter coat and a heavier beige one. Three suit coats, a couple of jackets. It’s no wonder a lot of preachers stick to pointing their fingers at people who do things they don’t do; here I am having to deal not with you sins but with me. Ouch. “Whoever has food must do likewise.” Well, there, that’s a little easier, with Jacquelyn gone so much, our cupboard is pretty bare. I can manage that one I think. Could we just slide by the coats? Tax collectors in the period were famous for extracting outrageous interest; soldiers often demanded protection money. I’d much rather talk about how they should behave better than about the coats. I don’t take bribes; I certainly don’t get protection money. Thank God he didn’t mention wedding fees.

Will giving a coat away or passing out food save the world? Of course not. But then, John says, we’re not expected to save the world. The people who heard him wondered about world saving too: “...all were questioning in their hearts concerning John, whether he might be the Messiah...” That’s not my job, John replies; God is sending someone much more powerful to do that, and so he did, and so he does, and so he will. What’s the point of all this food and coat distribution then? It is to give us a path, a way to change ourselves so that we look more like Christ. For the true appearance of Christ isn’t that long haired, blue eyed picture hung on the walls of so many Sunday Schools; the true appearance of Christ is the joyful gift giver, hope giver, peace bringer who will shortly appear right there at the Jordan among these people who are busy changing their direction. Just as we reshape our bodies by going to the gym, we reshape our spirits when we change our lives this way. And when we do, we discover the fierce joy of walking God’s path.

• Little Women is a wonderful book about a Massachusetts family in the early 1800's, focusing on the three girls in the family. They don't have much money and their food is plain and in small portions except on Christmas. Then, they have a wonderful breakfast with buckwheats and syrup and special pastries. One Christmas the girls awake to find their mother gone to help sick children at the home of an even poorer family. The girls wait patiently for her return, smelling the wonderful aroma of their special breakfast. Finally, the door flings open and their mother returns.
  "Merry Christmas, little daughters! I'm glad you began at once, and hope you will keep on. But I want to say one word before we sit down. Not far away from here lies a poor woman with a little newborn baby. Six children are huddled into one bed to keep from freezing, for they have no fire. There is nothing to eat over there, and the oldest boy came to tell me they were suffering hunger and cold. My girls, will you give them your breakfasts a Christmas present?"
  They were all unusually hungry, having waited nearly an hour, and for a minute no one spoke, only a minute, for Jo exclaimed impetuously, "I'm so glad you came before we began!"
  "May I go and help carry the things to the poor little children?" asked Beth eagerly.
  "I shall take the cream and the muffins," added Amy, heroically giving up the article she most liked.
  Meg was already covering the buckwheats, and piling the bread into one big plate.
  "I thought you'd do it", said Mrs. March, smiling as if satisfied. "You shall all go and help me, and when we come back we will have bread and milk for breakfast, and make it up at dinnertime."
  They were soon ready, and the procession set out. Fortunately it was early, and they went through back streets, so few people saw them, and no one laughed at the queer party.
  A poor, bare, miserable room it was, with broken windows, no fire, ragged bedclothes, a sick mother, wailing baby, and a group of pale, hungry children cuddled under one old quilt, trying to keep warm.
  How the big eyes stared and the blue lips smiled as the girls went in.
  "Ach, mein Gott! It is good angels come to us!" said the poor woman, crying for joy.
  "Funny angels in hoods and mittens," said Jo, and set them to laughing.
  In a few minutes it really did seem as if kind spirits had been at work there. Hannah, who had carried wood, made a fire, and stopped up the broken panes with old hats and her own cloak. Mrs.March gave the mother tea and gruel, and comforted her with promises of help, while she dressed the little baby as tenderly as if it had been her own. The girls meantime spread the table, set the children round the fire, and fed them like so many hungry birds, laughing, talking, and trying to understand the funny broken English.
  "Das ist gut! Die Engel-kinder!" cried the poor things as they ate and warmed their purple hands at the comfortable blaze.
  The girls had never been called angel children before, and thought it very agreeable, especially Jo, who had been considered `Sancho' ever since she was born. That was a very happy breakfast, though they didn't get any of it. And when they went away, leaving comfort behind, I think there were not in all the city four merrier people than the hungry little girls who gave away their breakfasts and contented themselves with bread and milk on Christmas morning.

There is joy waiting in the Christmas time; there is joy shining in the Christmas lights. When we make our direction God’s way, when we determine to turn our eyes from the advertising to the star, then indeed, though, as here, we “leave comfort behind”, we will see for ourselves God’s joy. Amen.

First Congregational Church UCC
Owosso, MI