Something's Coming, So People, Get Ready
Advent II
December 7, 2003

Something's Coming, So People Get Ready
by Richard Bolin

Malachi 3: 1-4 & Luke 3:1-6

Luke is a preacher who wants to make his point by telling a story. The story he tells is not a brief anecdote. It is a grand and epic tale. It is told in two volumes. The first is known as the Gospel according to Luke and volume two is titled The Acts of the Apostles.

When Luke begins his account of the ministry of Jesus he takes care to set it in historical context. "In the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar, Pontius Pilate being governor of Judea, and Herod being tetrarch of Galilee, and his brother Philip tetrarch of the region of Ituraea and Trachonitis, and Lysanias tetrarch of Abilene, in the high priesthood of Annas and Caiaphas, the word of God came to John the son of Zechariah in the wilderness..."

Like all good storytellers, Luke chooses his words carefully, crafting them to make his point more powerful. He uses the Emperor's name as a way of setting the date, "in the 15th year of the reign of Tiberius," but he also uses the Emperor's name to emphasize the fact that the story he tells affects the Empire. The events of which he speaks are of worldwide importance. Tiberius Caesar, the Emperor in Rome, probably never heard of John the Baptist preaching in the Palestinian wilderness. But Luke tells us that the ministry that began here on the banks of the Jordan River would reverberate until even the Emperor's own throne would be shaken. Luke tells the story of Jesus teaching in Galilee and Jerusalem, dying on the cross and then being raised again to life. Then, in volume two (the Acts of the Apostles), Luke shows us the followers of Jesus carrying the story of God's salvation throughout the known world. Luke finishes the grand two-volume story with Paul's arrival in Rome, the capital of the Empire, where, Luke says, Paul spends his time "proclaiming the kingdom of God and teaching about the Lord Jesus Christ with all boldness and without hindrance."

Now back there at the beginning of the story Tiberias Caesar was not at all aware of a man named John wearing camel hair preaching on the banks of the Jordan River in the Palestinian wilderness. But it's too bad that Caesar wasn't aware. He would have done well to notice. He was no doubt attending to matters of import to the Empire, but nothing he was doing would affect the empire like the words John the Baptist was preaching to the crowd.

And what did John say when he was preaching during the reign of Tiberius? He said we all need to change the way we live - even the Emperor in Rome! Why? Because God's chosen one is coming. God's truth is on the way.

Allow me to re-translate Luke's Gospel by placing it in a more contemporary context: In the third year of the Presidency of George Bush, Arnold Schwarzenegger being the Governor of California, during the time that John Paul II was the Pope in Rome and Mary Ann Swenson presided as Bishop of the United Methodists in the California-Pacific, the Word of God came to … - the Word of God came to who? Perhaps the Word of God came to Jose the son of Zapata in East Los Angeles. Perhaps the Word of God came to Mary as she shared with her friends at the SAVES food pantry in Culver City. What God is doing in overlooked neighborhoods is of greater significance than what the powerful imagine they are doing in great marble halls. The lives of persons touched by God in out-of-the-way places will finally determine the major turns of history. So people, get ready. The axis of God’s salvation history turns right here on our heartfelt response to God’s love.

The Gospel of God pays no attention to human convention and power. This is good news, but it isn't necessarily the good news we would choose. It is not so easy to blame the big shots. The Gospel of God works from the bottom up. The way we live our lives matters in the larger scheme of things.

The prophet Malachi said: "The Lord whom you seek will suddenly come to his temple… But who can endure the day of his coming, and who can stand when he appears?" The Word of God comes closer to home than we would expect this Advent season. It is good news, because it is the truth of God shining light on our lives. But it is uncomfortable news because we have become comfortable in our own darkness. The light can be shocking.

God is coming, the prophet proclaims. We would like God to come and straighten this mess out. But be careful what you wish for, because what that really means is that God will come to straighten-us out. "No, that's not what we had in mind. God needs to come and fix Congress, to set straight those Supreme Court justices."

The word of God came to Curtis Mayfield. Mixing in his mind images of the 1963 March on Washington with Martin Luther King, Jr. telling the people “I have a dream …”, remembering things his grandmother had said and preachers he had heard in black churches as a child, Curtis Mayfield and the Impressions sang:

It was 1965, and in the midst of the Civil Rights movement people felt that there was a train coming, that history was moving with a sense of inevitability. But the song goes on from there to issue a warning. The coming of the train is inevitable. The invitation is universal. But it includes the admonition to "get ready." Here is the paradox of grace, salvation by faith and the reality of sin that keeps us separated from God.

I do not find anything in the Bible that makes me worry about getting people to say the right prayer before they die in order to avoid an eternity of damnation. I do find in scripture testimony to the God of love who is always working in our lives, here on earth and beyond, always and everywhere reaching out, inviting and loving us into relationship, a patient God with whom there never comes a time when it is too late. Nevertheless, the Now of salvation is of great importance, because it is always a great tragedy that in this present moment (which is always the most important moment in eternity) … that in this present moment there are persons and communities not experiencing salvation, that individually and corporately we find ourselves separated from God’s intention for us, which is love-filled abundant life fulfilling the purpose of bringing God’s blessing to creation. Something's coming. The train of salvation is coming. There is a sense in which the train is always there and our choice to board is ever before us. But there is another sense in which God's salvation moves through particular moments in history and we are either with it or against it. The train of human rights, the train of reconciliation, the train carrying a balm for the victims of AIDS in Africa, the train of security for victims of terror, the train of renewal for a scorched earth, the train of peace traveling through war-torn countries - whether or not we are part of this train as it passes by now is of great importance for the present generation. So the prophet’s words speak to us this Advent with a sense of urgency – examine your lives now in order to be part of the salvation that God is bringing now.

Some of us know Moab as a town in Utah. In the Bible we recognize Moab as the native land of Ruth, who was David’s Great Grandmother. But the Pentagon has coopted the name Moab and used it as an acronym for it’s most frightening and destructive “conventional” weapon, a 21,000 pound 30 foot long bomb. MOAB stands for “Massive Ordinance Air Blast Bomb”, more commonly referred to as the “Mother of All Bombs.” But in truth the mother and father of all bombs, whether they be nuclear or conventional - the progenitors of armored tanks, jet fighters and attack helicopters are the handgun and the kitchen knife. The incubators of terrorist acts and military invasions are the harsh word and the revengeful heart. The violence that takes place on the world’s large stage is not different in kind or motivation from the gang violence on our streets and the domestic violence in our homes – the only difference is one of magnitude.

Likewise, the power that will overcome evil on a global scale springs from the small-as-a-mustard seed place in the human heart that loves unconditionally even as God has loved us.

The Gospel Train of Salvation is traveling from coast-to-coast, from continent-to-continent, East and West, North and South, picking up passengers and making God’s Kin-dom real from the bottom-up.

We would hope for words of truth from important leaders occupying impressive offices. But more likely the words of truth will come to us from places in the wilderness.

The word you speak this week to your children, friends and neighbors, the way you decide to spend your money, the peace you find in your own heart that keeps you centered, focused and loving in the midst of a world that is tending toward scattered, frantic and self-absorbed, this is the wilderness message that transforms the world. This is the train of salvation that is moving inevitably down the tracks to bring to pass God’s will on earth as it is in heaven. Amen.

(Comments to Richard at RICHARD.BOLIN@ecunet.org.)

Culver-Palms UMC, Culver City, California