“Stirrings”
OT Lesson: Isaiah 11: 1-10
NT Lesson: Matthew 3: 1-12
Dr. Matthew Brown
Chalk it up to the mystery of
testosterone, but as a child I remember that one of my favorite television
shows was NFL Presents, featuring the over-dramatized collection of the
previous week’s highlights of action in the National Football League. The haunting horns of the orchestral
background music; the actual game time groans and shrieks evoked by the
slamming of behemoth bodies at the line of scrimmage; the super slow-motion action that we would
thereafter mimic as we were tackled by the living room sofa.
Do any of you remember the
mellifluous, oaken tones of John Facenda’s voice, a voice and a script that
made a pre-game coin toss sound as earth-shaking as the meeting of Macarthur
and Hirohito at the end of WWII. “The
gritty-gridiron warriors skidded across the frozen tundra of Lambeau Field, a
fog of freezing breath rising toward the high noon sun whose light reflected
glory off the metallic paint enveloping the heroic helmets of the combatants.”
And O how he would wax
philosophic if perchance one of these intrepid football legends had played
through an injury. I remember when Larry
Wilson, the lion-hearted defensive back of the St. Louis Cardinals played
through part of the season with, I believe, two broken arms and a fractured jaw
that had been wired shut. John Facenda’s
description lifted the hard-nosed
Of course, broadcasters have
always lionized those immortals who could deny the pain and play on ... ignore
the circumstances and persevere ... stay the course. It is certainly a laudable quality that
sometimes is in too short supply. As a
father, I know how often I’ve uttered those three words of great parental
compassion, “Suck it up.”
Deny the pain and play on . .
. Ignore the circumstances and persevere . . . stay the course. It is a quality we admire in others and covet
for ourselves. And yet, as with many of
life’s gifts, that which is an asset can also become a liability; that which is
a gift can also become a fault. Our
ability to block out pain, discomfort, distraction can also become a refusal to
recognize the symptoms of an illness, the cracks in the glue of a relationship,
the folly of a destructive course of action, the voice of a different
viewpoint, the cries of those who suffer the consequences of our
decisions. It is one thing to be
steadfast. It is quite another to be
steadfast in the refusal to recognize that something may be wrong.
They say that what separates
us from the other vertebrates is the capacity for reflection. Yet, for all our navel gazing, we tend to
resist the reflection that would prompt redirection - often the very
redirection we need.
How adept are you at heeding
the stirrings within you signaling that all is not right, those fleeting
moments when the light of truth flashes across the contradictions in your life,
in this world. That ever-so-brief
awareness of how poorly you treat those around you; those scant seconds when a
news story afflicts you with the reality of the injustices and inequities in
our world.
This week I read about a set
of baseball cards that sold for over $800,000 and a used bat selling for over
$1,000,000 and just last week two of our members were having to pull a bunch of
donated clothes off the Haiti bus because the large sizes would never fit
anyone in a country where hunger is a way of life ... and death.
Are we paying attention to
the stirrings within us, pointing out the contradictions in our lives and in
our world, calling us to repentance?
Every year it happens. Every
year, just as we’re decorating the trees, pulling out the Christmas music, and
ordering the Wisconsin Cheeseballs for the neighbors, we get that awkward visit
from the strange and bellowing prophet of Advent. The voice of one crying in the wilderness an
odd one at that. John the Baptist, the
loud messenger who interrupts our Currier and Ives Christmas season with his
gesticulating manner and his intimidating warnings and calls to repentance.
John the Baptist brings to
mind the angry, hollering self-appointed prophets you cross the sidewalk to
avoid at Trade and Tryon or at the pit in Chapel Hill, who hope to scare you
into heaven. Yet, it is not a fair
comparison. Yes, John, appeared a little
odd and he certainly avoided the whole “meek and mild” thing, but those who
came out to hear him would have recognized that he wasn’t outfitted like a cave
man but rather was dressed in the uniform of Elijah, the great prophet of the
Covenant. And it is important to note
that they came out to see him. Unlike
the street preachers you and I avoid and ignore, the people, the crowds from
They packed lunches, they put
on their hiking sandals, they endured the whines of their children (“How long
until we get there?”), they came out to hear John, paying attention to the
stirrings within them, telling them that something was just not right in their
lives. O, there were others who came out
those days, self-satisfied and self-righteous and superior, and they would be
the ones who would be the target of John’s angry words of warning. But for the most part, the people were
heeding the hunch that even if they weren’t on the wrong track in life, the
wheels were certainly straining against the rails.
“Repent,” John would
say. “Repent, for the
To repent means to turn - a
redirection of vision, of focus, of action, of priority. The people “gathered at the river”, their
sandals all lined up on the shoreline, knew that something was askew in their
world, in their lives, and so they came, the Spirit of God already at work
within them, recalibrating their compasses for a new direction.
And the direction toward
which John was pointing them was the kingdom of God that would be revealed in
Jesus Christ, a kingdom so poetically described by that earlier prophet named
Isaiah: “The wolf shall dwell with the
lamb, the leopard shall lie down with the kid, the calf and the lion and the
fatling together, and a little child shall lead them. The cow and the bear shall graze, their young
shall lie down together; and the lion shall eat straw like the ox. The nursing child shall play over the hole of
the asp and the weaned child shall put its hand on the adder’s den. They will not hurt or destroy on all my holy
mountain; for the earth will be full of the knowledge of the Lord as the waters
cover the sea.”
What a marvelous vision: natural enemies living in peace, even
community, with one another; the vulnerable at play - protected, safe in the
places where their lives had earlier been threatened.
Yet, as a child once said in
response to a children’s sermon on this vision, “Well in the Bible it says they
will rest together. But in real life the
lion would eat him!”
Sometimes the gap between
this world and that kingdom seems impossibly inaccessible, but John’s message
and the promise of this season is that with Christ, through Christ, in Christ
we could begin reaching across the gap.
It is a clarion call to live with purpose. What do we say around here? What do you read on the new sign as you leave
this place? “Joyfully responding” with
love and grace to what God has done, is doing, and will do through Christ. “Though the wrong seems oft so strong, God is
the ruler yet.” And so we live and work
towards that day when the children of
It is time to turn again and
live toward the vision of that kingdom.
It is time to turn from what is to what is possible in, through, and
with Christ. It is the purpose Christ would
enflesh and would flesh out for us a little later in Matthew through the Sermon
on the Mount:
“Blessed are the poor in
spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. . . Blessed are the meek for they shall inherit
the earth . . . Blessed are the peacemakers for they shall be called children
of God.”
Turning from what is to what
is possible through Christ. Living with
Kingdom purpose.
This week I read one of those
first person articles in Newsweek that highlighted the need for a shift of
direction, a paradigm shift, if you will - which is really what repentance is.
The writer’s photo showed a
beautiful, impeccably dressed and accessorized young woman sitting on the bank
of
I wouldn’t doubt that she
gained early entry to the finest of schools.
I wouldn’t be surprised to hear her tell of student exchanges in exotic
places and late nights spent studying for her class on the French
impressionists or writing her application for law school. And she had made it.
But listen to this. She writes, “No one can complain about parents
who started sentences with ‘When you’re president...” But we are now discovering the difficulty of
deciding just what makes us happy in of world of innumerable options.”
So, she has everything... but
a purpose. Salon highlighted hair, a
killer resume, and a Coach leather briefcase - No purpose. And she’s fretting over not being happy
because she has too many options.
Hmmm? Maybe she would be the
among the crowd heading out to the wilderness, the thought stirring within her
that something is just not right. Maybe
she would be traveling with that crowd yearning to hear John’s challenge of
repentance, coming to understand that repentance is not so much about avoiding
punishment but establishing direction, purpose, hope. Some day the wolf will lie down with the
lamb, the child will be at peace in
I read Jenny’s story and
John’s challenge and, you know, I couldn’t help but think of us living down
here in Type A Town. Did you ever notice
that people don’t saunter through Target.
Stand out of the way, they’re on a mission for Fabric markers, Poster
Board, and Socks! My children will be a
success! But will they have a
purpose? Isn’t that more important than
whether Junior will get a turn on Safety patrol? Can we see the larger picture? Can we stop trying to raise kings and queens
long enough to make that turn so that we and our children can see the king and
catch the vision of and live toward Christ’s kingdom? If we’re going to be “driven”, let us turn
(repent) and drive toward that.
“The wolf shall dwell with
the lamb, the leopard shall lie down with the kid, the calf and the lion and
the fatling together, and a little child shall lead them. . . They will not
hurt or destroy on all my holy mountain; for the earth will be full of the
knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the sea.” Amen.
Sources:
Matthew, Tom Long
Newsweek,