Sermons

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Meditation: He Comes
December 16, 2001
Sunday night advent service
Pastor Dan Baumgartner

Matthew 11:2-6

In the bleak midwinter, frosty wind made moan;
earth stood hard as iron, water like a stone.
Snow had fallen, snow on snow, snow on snow.
In the bleak midwinter, long ago.

The choir's beautiful song reminds us that waiting is a hard thing. Anytime. I remember living in Minneapolis about this time of year. The snow began to pile up in feet, the ground was rock hard underneath, the lakes so frozen you could walk or skate -- or drive! -- on them. It seemed hard to imagine that we would EVER see spring bursting forth again. We waited and waited.

In this scripture, John the Baptist was waiting. Not the wild-eyed prophet John, but a much more reflective, subdued John writing from prison, where he knew full-well he might lose his life. And so he sends his followers to ask Jesus: "Are you the Coming One?" It's almost a title, this "Coming One" that John asks about. "Jesus, are you THE ONE?"

Why does John ask? He had baptized Jesus, had heard God'·s voice break through the clouds at that baptism, had pointed at Jesus and told people "Look! The lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world." And yet -- Jesus seemed to turn out differently than even John had imagined. John thought about power, swift justice, judgment, the axe at the root of the tree. John's Messiah would come to destroy evil. But Jesus came -- less visible, more personal -- different. In that way, John's experience is no different than ours. Jesus OFTEN turns out to be different than we thought. We think Jesus will reflect an angry God, but find grace. We think Jesus will be demanding, yet he comes to us gently. Yet when we think He will ask for nothing, He demands EVERYTHING.

Jesus answers John not with a clear "yes" or "no." Instead, he tells John's disciples: "Go back and tell John -- what you hear and see."

Now, what is it that people had HEARD and SEEN in Jesus? If we looked back through the gospel of Matthew, we'd find what Jesus said in chapters 5-7 -- the Sermon on the Mount, where Jesus puts heart and intention to the Law. If we looked in chapters 8-9, we'd find a long list of miracles that Jesus did. But Jesus instead said something John would have recognized (Isaiah 35, 61, 29): do not the blind see? the lame walk? lepers get cleansed? the deaf hear? even the dead raised -- and the poor have good news preached to them. These are the things of the kingdom. Not what John expected -- but almost like Jesus said "Not by might, not by power, but by my spirit says the Lord" (Zech 4:6).

Jesus says, "John, the things you hear and see -- these are the things of the kingdom -- for yes, I have come."

In 1974 the Catholic writer Carlo Carretto wrote a book called "The God Who Comes." Let me read a little to you:

The whole story of salvation is the story of the God who comes.

It is always He who comes, even if He has not yet come in His fullness. But there is indeed one unique moment in His coming; the others were only preparations and announcement.

The hour of His coming is the Incarnation -- God is made man in Christ. The invisible, intangible God has made himself visible and tangible in Christ.

If Jesus is truly God, everything is clear; if I cannot believe this, everything darkens again.

I think John the Baptist would have echoed that same thought. John was waiting and hoping that the glimmers of light around Jesus would keep the dark away. "Are you The One to come?"he asked.

"What do you hear? What do you see?" Jesus asked him.

He asks us the same questions. Are WE waiting for the real One? What do you hear? What do you see? Are lives changing? Are eyes opening? Are ears unplugging?

Let me close with just a little more from Carretto:

God is always coming, and we, like Adam, hear his footsteps.
God is always coming because He is life, and life has the unbridled force of creation.
God comes because He is light, and light may not remain hidden.
God comes because He is love, and love needs to give of itself. God has always been coming; God is always coming.

In Jesus Christ -- God comes. Amen.