HOW DO WE GET TO THE BIRTHPLACE OF THE MESSIAH?
A Sermon on Repentance
TEXT: "As it is written in the prophet Isaiah, 'See, I am sending my messenger 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."'" -- Mark 1:
SCRIPTURE READING: Mark 1:1-8
How do we get to the birthplace of the Messiah? When Eula and I went to the place where Jesus was born, we booked a Delta flight to New York City. Then we took Israel’s El Al to Tel Aviv. Then we rode an air-conditioned bus up through the hills, bypassing Jerusalem, and then into the tourist trap called Bethlehem. That’s the way you get to the birthplace of the Messiah.
If you were to ask the people of Jesus’ day how to get to the birthplace of the Messiah, they would say, First, you go out into the desert and find a man named John the Baptist. You have to listen to him because he is the one who is preparing the way for the coming of the Messiah. You can’t get to the Bethlehem without going through John the Baptist.
All four of the gospels of the New Testament say the same thing. Each one of them emphasizes the ministry of this prophet out in the desert wearing camel hair and eating wild honey and locusts. He proclaims a message that is vital for the coming of the Messiah. He says, "Repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand." Mark says simply that he was in the wilderness "proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins."
The short Gospel of Mark doesn’t give us much to work with in celebrating Christmas. There is no word in Mark of a lovely manger with animals around. There is no mention of Mary going to visit Elizabeth. There is no discussion between Mary and Joseph about the virgin birth of Jesus. There is nothing about shepherds on a hillside or wise men who come to Bethlehem bearing gifts. There’s not much in Mark that will help us with the Christmas pageant.
Mark jumps right in with the story of John the Baptist out in the wilderness. John the Baptist’s message is one we need to hear because it gets back to the basics of what faith is about and the basis of the coming of Christ at Christmas. This is Mark’s Christmas story.
It is easy for us to get distracted this time of the year. We think about the decorations we have put up, the parties we have to attend and prepare for, and the gifts we have to buy. We get so distracted by the trappings of Christmas and forget the basics. Christmas is not about all of that. Christmas is about tuning our spirits to the coming presence of God.
John the Baptist will not let us forget the basics. He says the thing we need every day of the year, but especially now at Christmas, is repentance. Repentance is not a word we like to hear at Christmas. We prefer to sing the sentimental Christmas songs and not think about things like sin, repentance and forgiveness. Far too often we forget that we need to repent of our sins and turn to God.
The primary meaning of the word "repentance" is turning -- turning away from our sins and turning to God. I picture a toy top spinning so fast that you can hardly see it spin.
Is that the way we turn to God, turning quickly like a top? Perhaps some do -- I have known a few. But I suspect most of us turn the way a large ship does. A gigantic ocean liner may take two or three miles to make a turn. That’s why preparation for Christmas takes a while. How long does Christmas actually take? It’s over in one day. It doesn’t take long to open the presents and acknowledge that the Christ child was born. Like many things in life, the preparation takes a while.
How long does it take to paint a bedroom in your house? The actual labor may not take more than a couple of hours. What takes so long is the preparation. We have to pick out the paint, looking at several colors, and then when we get it on the wall it doesn’t quite look right. We have to make a trip to the hardware store to buy the rollers, the brushes and the tape. We have to tape off the windows and the baseboards. We have to move the furniture and put down a drop cloth. It can take you a month to paint a room!
The same thing is true with Christmas. All the preparation takes a while because we are like the ship that slowly turns to God. We are not really like the top that spins in one place. It takes a while to turn our spirits toward God. Repentance means changing. Repentance is turning toward God. Repentance is turning around and making our life different than it is. Repentance is turning away from our sins, turning away from our focus on the things of the world.
We’ve talked a lot about repentance ever since we began the Rise! Shine, Central. A lot of people wanted to see immediate results. We want it NOW. We are learning that Rise! Shine, Central is about changing each of us from what we are to what we are capable of being. Repentance means change. Repentance means changing the way we are and turning to a new way. Rise! Shine, Central is not a program -- Rise! Shine, Central is a process of change. I think that maybe the greatest weakness in the modern church is that we think change comes about immediately when we walk down the aisle.
That kind of change is a prominent theme of the preaching of those first Christians in the book of Acts. When Peter first began preaching, he says that we need to deal with sin before new life comes in our hearts. In Acts 2:38, Peter says, "Repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ so that your sins may be forgiven; and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit."
Then in Acts 3:19, Peter says, "Repent therefore, and turn to God so that your sins may be wiped out, so that times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord, and that he may send the Messiah appointed for you, that is, Jesus.." Notice that the repentance, the change, come to fulfilment with the Christmas event. That verse sums up Christmas.
Later, when Paul was preaching in Athens before the Areopagus in Acts 17, he says, "While God has overlooked the times of human ignorance, now he commands all people everywhere to repent, to change!
One of my favorite stories is in the setting of a small country, white-frame church. It seems that the paint was about gone on the old church. The people asked the pastor what to do. He suggested that they have a work day on the coming Saturday and paint the church. The people agreed.
On Saturday the eager crowd started painting the church, but as the afternoon wore on they realized that they would not have enough paint to finish the job. They asked the pastor what to do. He said, "Well, this is a water-based paint so let’s add water and thin the paint some. Maybe we will have enough to finish that way."
Sure enough, they were able to finish the paint job. As they departed for the day, the people took one last look to admire their handiwork. The church looked beautiful. But not long after they left, a huge thunderstorm broke over the church and a downpour washed most of the fresh paint off the church.
When the people arrived the next day, they were understandably distraught. They asked the preacher what they were going to do now. The preacher, in his best, ministerial voice replied, "RE-PAINT and THIN no more."
I love that story because while it is funny, it is no joke. Repentance is not a joke. John says it is the key to preparing our hearts for the coming of Jesus. Times of renewal and change, John says, depends upon our repenting and turning to God. If we want to find the refreshing spirit of Christ, if we want to find the true meaning of Christmas, if we want to really experience the joy, peace, and hope of Christmas, John says that it all begins with repentance. It all begins with changing.
Repentance is an uncomfortable subject, isn’t it? But John the Baptist doesn’t mind making people uncomfortable. He preached in the desert, an uncomfortable place. John wanted to make people uncomfortable, to make them think about their lives, how they honored or rejected God. John called the Pharisees and Sadducees a "brood of vipers" because they believed they didn’t need salvation. They didn’t need to change. They didn’t feel that they had sinned. They refused to let God work in their lives. In telling people to repent, John was asking them to take another look at their lives, to be honest with themselves and with God, and to change; to turn around and live a life that reflected God working in their hearts and minds.
It isn’t easy. It isn’t easy or comfortable to make change. It takes an act of will for us to make a turn. It means breaking old habits. It means admitting that we have been wrong, and, believe me, this is never easy. It means breaking old habits. It meas admitting that we have been wrong, and this is never easy. It means losing face. It means starting all over again, and this is always painful. It means saying I am sorry. It means recognizing that we have the ability to change. These things are terribly hard to do. But unless we turn we will be trapped forever in yesterday’s ways.
Every day we need to pray that God will help us change; that God will help us change from immaturity to sensitivity, from hostility to love, from pettiness to purpose, from envy to contentment, from carelessness to discipline, from fear to faith. We need to pray that God will help us change from our own self-centeredness to become men and women who truly seek god’s guidance in all of our relationships, to all of our thoughts and to all of our deeds.
How do we get to the birthplace of the Messiah? We begin by changing. We begin by turning our hearts and lives around toward God.
Hear the words of John the Baptist: Come now! Repent, for the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand!
