When Good News Is Bad News
December 14, 2014
Mark S. Bollwinkel
As we heard
last week the Advent season doesn’t begin with manger scenes and wise men but
the urgency of God’s future. John the
Baptist announced, “Prepare ye the way of the Lord”. John fulfills the prophecy of the Old
Testament that a voice in the wilderness will announce the coming of the new
messiah.
Two
thousand years ago John the Baptist was drawing significant crowds of faithful
to his baptism for the repentance of sins in the river Jordan
Of the
Christ, John the Baptist will say, “The one who is more powerful than I is
coming after me; I am not worthy to stoop down and untie the thong of his
sandals. I have baptized you with water;
but he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit.”
Sandals
were the most common form of footwear in the ancient near east. Most often made of leather, sandals had a
simple sole with straps around the ankle.
The poor or those in mourning went barefoot. Shepherds, soldiers and those traveling
required good sandals to withstand the stones and thorns along the way.
Remember that public sanitation,
sewer systems and toilets are modern inventions. In Jesus’ day, and well into Renaissance
European history for that matter, human, animal and material waste was
discarded along the streets and roads.
One’s feet, even with the best of sandals, were commonly covered in dirt
and filth.
It was the custom to take off one’s
shoes and wash one’s feet when entering a house or worship area. Slaves were assigned to take off the
master’s or mistress’s sandals and clean their feet after a journey out of the
house. Touching another’s feet was a
degrading act in part due to the contact with the dirt and filth of everyday
travel. This is why it is so shocking
when the sinful woman cleans Jesus’ feet with expensive ointment and her tears
and then dries them with her hair (Luke 7:36-f). This is why it is so startling that Jesus
insists on washing the feet of his disciples before the Last Supper (John
13:1-f).
When John the Baptist says he is
“unworthy to even untie the straps of Jesus’ sandals” he is speaking as if a
slave to a master. John wants to make
it clear that for all his piety and popularity he is not the messiah. And he wants to make it clear just how holy
this Jesus really is; in other texts he will call Jesus nothing less than the
“Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world.” (John 1:29)
John the Baptist is dressed for the
part of an apocalyptic herald rejecting modern convention and living an ascetic
life dedicated to God’s future. He is a
wilderness man, clothed in camel’s hair, leather belt; eating insects and
honey. He can see the day dawning
when love will rule the human heart. In
the coming of the messiah social injustice and spiritual corruption will be
rooted out. He is dressed for the
journey of faith in God’s promised future and he is ready to give his life to
it.
How about us?
Is our
faith best represented by a sandal or a dress shoe, for example?
You know the kind. The kind of shoe you pull out of the back of
the closest for special occasions, blow off the dust and polish. These aren’t your most comfortable
shoes. They don’t get much use. Made of fancy leather they are probably
stiff. After wearing them your feet hurt. These are the kind of shoes that you sigh
with relief when you take them off. But
you’ve got to have a pair like this for business meetings, or weddings,
funerals or church on Sunday. These are
“what will people think” shoes if you don’t wear them to the appropriate function.
In the Kudzu comic strip Rev. Will
B. Dunn assigned to pastor a wealthy congregation explains to a colleague, “You
can’t judge a wealthy person until you’ve walked a mile in their Gucci’s!”
Are we dressed for the journey of
faith in dress shoes? Used for appearance and not much for practice?
How about work boots?
Work boots are tough, sturdy shoes
made to take a beating. Their soles are
rippled with texture so to grip slippery surfaces. Many will have steel plates in the toe. Shoes like this will often be scarred or
stained from the effort. They can be
extremely comfortable but are not the kind of shoe you wear to a party, to your
Mom’s Thanksgiving Dinner or to church on Sunday; what would people think?!
If we wear work boots on the
journey of faith we are committed to putting our faith into action, to the
mission of service and the efforts of compassion. If we wear work boots on the journey of
faith we have little time to pray in silence, to read a book or to waste in the
comfort of a sanctuary. Changing the
world is what faith is all about for the “work boot” faithful. If Jesus
is coming we have to look busy, preparing the way for the coming of the Lord.
Or maybe our faith is best
described in a running shoe.
The foot race is one of the Apostle
Paul’s favorite metaphors for the journey of faith; “I have fought the good
fight. I have finished the race. I have kept the faith. Now there is in store for me the crown of
righteousness, which the Lord…will award to me on the day and not only to me
but also to all who have longed for his appearing.” (2 Tim 4:7-8, also note, I
Cor 9:24, Gal. 2:2, 5:7, Heb. 12:1)
Paul isn’t thinking of a sprint or
a dash but the marathon race, the endurance race in life and faith. One needs light weight but strong shoes for
a distance run. Soles that can take a
beating. Leather that won’t weigh you
down. The goal of such a journey is the
crown of righteousness, the reward for enduring hills and valleys, good days
and bad. It takes commitment and
training to run a marathon, good nutrition and coaching. You can’t do it alone. Whether you are slow or fast makes no
difference. Simply crossing the finish
line with your head held high is all that matters.
John the Baptist is dressed for the
journey of faith, a faith born in the passionate conviction that God’s promised
future was dawning in the life of Jesus of Nazareth. He didn’t feel worthy to untie the straps of
Master’s sandals, as if he, John the Baptist, were nothing more than a
slave. Yet that Master will honor John
and all of us by his own humility and love.
This Jesus will invite us to sit at his feet and learn (Luke
10:38-f). This Jesus will wash the feet
of those who follow him.
Let me digress for a moment.
Have you ever had to tell someone
something you knew they didn’t want to hear?
Such as during an employee’s evaluation and review, or in a dispute with
someone in your family, or telling a friend he has got a problem which everyone
is aware of but him?
It is tough to be honest. Especially about painful issues.
One of the
most famous of the Peanuts comic strips has Linus giving Charlie Brown this
sage bit of advice, “”I don’t like to face problems head on. I think the best way to solve problems is to
avoid them. This is a distinct
philosophy of mine. No problem is so big
or complicated that it can’t be run away from!”
Know any people like that?
We put up with lousy relationships
for years because we’re afraid to express our needs to our partners. We learn to live with alcohol or drug
dependency supported by family and friends in a denial system where they feed
the habit because confronting it would be too painful.
David Myers writes in his book, Your
Better Self, that we are a culture which avoids direct responsibility for
our actions. We accept credit for
success and blame others for our failures.
Athletes will credit their skills for a victory but blame officials or
the weather for a loss. Myers documents
the descriptions of auto accidents from victim insurance forms, with words such
as:
-“An invisible car came out of
nowhere, struck my car and vanished”
-“A pedestrian hit me and went
under my car”
-“As I reached an intersection, a
hedge sprang up obscuring my vision and I did
not
see the other car”
It is hard to listen to the
preaching of John the Baptist this Third Sunday of Advent. This is Christmas time. We want to hear stories of the Baby in the
Manger, the Star in the East, Shepherds and Angels. Now is the time to hear the Good News that
God loves us just the way we are, so much so that God becomes one of us. And it is wonderfully Good News!
But it can be bad news for those
who worship power and privilege. It can
be bad news for those whom greed is the measure of wealth. It can be bad news for those convinced they
have all the answers and don’t need anybody else in their lives.
Here on the third Sunday of Advent
we find John the Baptist, shouting from the top of his lungs, that to get to
the manger we’ve got to go through the desert.
So what will it be? Sandals.
Dress shoes. Work boots. Running shoes.
What shoes are we wearing for the
journey of faith?
Amen.
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