“In those days John the Baptist appeared in the wilderness of Judea…”
By today’s standards John the Baptist would creep people out. But no so in the first century.
He was a standard issue, first century prophet. He drank no strong drink or wine and lived in the tradition of Elijah as described in 2 Kings 1. And that made John a rather hairy fellow. Prophets didn’t cut their hair. As for eating locusts and wild honey out in the desert, John was totally dependent on God and living off the land – living in faithful relationship with the one true God.
Prophets of the time didn’t talk about the future. They recalled the past and spoke in the present. They have been described as “truth tellers of the present and past.”
That’s where we find John the Baptist – out in the wilderness continually prophesying, continually recalling the past and speaking truth about the present. This is what people were coming out in the desert, in the wilderness to see.
John’s message was simple: “Repent for the kingdom of heaven has come near.”
As we read “repent” in Matthew 11, there is much about this word that doesn’t get translated. In the Greek, this isn’t a “one and done” but rather a continuous action: repent and keep on repenting.
Commas and punctuation matters, except in the Greek where the written language was in all caps, contains no punctuation much less spaces between words. Why is this important to know about this passage? Depending upon where you place the punctuation, it can be rendered as
“The voice of one crying in the wilderness: Prepare the way of the Lord”
Or
“The voice of one crying: In the wilderness, prepare the way of the Lord.”
Which is what Isaiah 40:3 says.
As for the rest of the verse: “make straight in the desert a highway for our God.” In the desert, in the wilderness. We’ve got to go through wilderness to get to resurrection. And that is going to take faith!
It is in the wilderness that Jesus, preparing for his ministry, goes toe-to-toe with the devil. It is in the wilderness where things get worked out.
It is in the wilderness where God meets us, works things out and prepares us for ministry. It is in the wilderness where faith is forged.
Think about the wilderness times in your life. How did God met you there? How did things get worked out? How did God prepare you for the ministry to which God called you?
The image of the threshing floor brings all this preparation into focus. We might not understand the concept that John is communicating to us because we have an urban base of understanding reading about a first century agrarian society. And how many of us have visited a threshing floor in the United States?
Wheat grows on a stem and the head is the grain. These two need to be separated from each other before flour can be milled. This would take place on a threshing floor.
A threshing floor is a three-sided structure that is built in the side of a rise where air comes over it. Wheat stalks are put on the floor and beaten to separate the wheat grains from the chaff, which is everything else.
The grains of wheat are significantly smaller but also heavier than the rest of the chaff. A farmer using a winnowing fork with two prongs scoops up the wheat and chaff and throws it in the air. The breeze comes over the structure. Chaff blows away in the wind and the wheat falls to the floor to be collected, on its way to becoming bread.
We find God here standing at the threshing floor and God has put the winnowing fork in Jesus’ saving and loving hand.
There are times when we feel so beaten down, that we too, lay broken on the floor. Jesus picks us up – our good parts and our bad, our wheat and chaff – and gently throws it all in the air.
With his breath, his ruach, this Holy Spirit, holy breath of God, our chaff – all that is bad in our lives – is gently blown away.
“The spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of the knowledge and the fear of the Lord,” these same words spoken at our baptisms and confirmations place faith in our hearts and minds and souls.
The Holy Spirit blows our chaff into the fire and Jesus gathers the good part of us, which he puts into his granary and uses for his purposes.
The bad parts, the disappointing parts of us are burned with unquenchable fire and destroyed. It is in faith that we are prepared for continual repentance.
Repentance is much more than saying sorry and promising to not do it again. It is a literal turning around, complete change, go in the other direction. It’s not so much of what we are doing wrong but rather what we need to do differently.
God uses the wilderness times in our lives to point out that our way is not the way that God would have us to go and it’s time to change course.
Imagine what direction God could be point us in? What does God want us to do and be in this time and this place.
God has a dream! We hear about it in Isaiah 11. The dream of a peaceable kingdom where once there was animosity and hate, harmony and acceptance prevail.
Wolves and lambs. Leopards and baby goats. Calves and lions. Children and venomous snakes. All getting along. Changing their ways. Lions become vegetarians and share meals with oxen. All experience righteousness and faithfulness.
This is the place of justice and mercy, hope and wholeness, peace and faith.
God has a dream. The God who can raise up children of Abraham out of stones will raise up a child out of a manger who grows up to be a man on a cross for the sake of all people. And this man’s life, death and resurrection ill be the salvation for all.
So we are called by God to continual repentance, to change directions, to imagine, to hope, to be a part of God’s dream where the kingdom of heaven is so very near. Even if it’s in the middle of our personal wilderness. It is here that we will be able to hear that voice crying, “Prepare the way of the Lord.”
God is indeed doing anew thing! This is the time to dream. This is the time of faith!
Connecting life and scripture 