Zechariah wasn't a bad fellow. He and his wife, Elizabeth, obeyed God's laws
and lived the sort of life God wanted to see God's people live—just and
compassionate lives. But their lives
were not perfect. Elizabeth could not
have children—a condition which caused them great sadness. Even after much prayer, no baby came.
Then one day when Zechariah was performing his priestly
duties in the Temple of the Lord, he was chosen by lot to burn incense on the
altar. Even a priest doesn't expect an
angel to appear when you're busy with your work—and Zechariah was no
exception! Raddling Zechariah's
composure, that angel, Gabriel, brought a divine message concerning Elizabeth's
gift of a special child.
When you see an angel, it's best to listen carefully and not
talk back or question. But
Zechariah—despite his religious training—blew it. Gabriel told Zechariah that he and Elizabeth
would conceive a son whom they were to name the child, John. John would become a mighty prophet like
Elijah.
“How can this be, because my wife and I are old,” Zechariah
challenged Gabriel. So Gabriel silenced him
until the child was born. Zechariah
returned home after his Temple duties ended, and, indeed, Elizabeth became
pregnant. But all this time Zechariah
still could not speak.
Finally, their son was born.
On the day the baby was to be named and circumcised, the neighbors asked
Zechariah what the baby should be named.
Elizabeth had said to call him John, but no one thought that name was
appropriate, because he should be named after his father. Then Zechariah asked for writing
materials. At last he acted on what
Gabriel had told him he must do. As
Zechariah wrote, “His name is John,” his power to speak returned.
His first act was to praise God and proclaim God's prophecy
for Israel and for John—who John was to become and what this meant for
Israel. When we read Canticle 16
together this morning we were reading Zechariah's prophecy that began, “Blessed
be the Lord, the God of Israel, he has come to his people and set them free . .
.”
In order to be set free we must be bound or hemmed in by
something that we cannot overcome by ourselves.
This past week I went to see a musical adaptation of Charles Dickens
story, “A Christmas Carol.” You remember
Ebenezer Scrooge, don't you? Bound by
his need for security that turned to greed, he was set free by “spirits” who
visited him one night and showed him his life's past, present and future. The
visions into which the “spirits” led him created a change inside his
spirit. He began to change when he
encountered the ghost of his dead business partner Jacob Marley in chains. He
continued to repent when he realized the harm his greediness had caused. As he repented his greed, he found that his
spirit now embraced generosity. And with this change came a freedom to love, an
emotion he had driven out of himself in order to never be vulnerable.
But now we need to get back to Zechariah: he had over nine
months to contemplate how his distrust of God's messenger kept him from
acknowledging God's love and God's power to redeem a most distressing
situation. We see him act to repent and repair
his sin of mistrust when he followed Gabriel's directive and named his son,
John.
How appropriate that inviting people to repent becomes the
theme of John's ministry. The Gospel of
Luke tells us that John “went into all the region around the Jordan proclaiming
a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins.” John's preaching aimed to set people free
from the bondage of their sins. What was
binding these folks? Was it greed? Was it failing to honor one's responsibility
in relationships? Was it stealing or
lying or worse? Was it worshiping
someone or something other than God?
The interesting thing about John's preaching, however, was
its pointing beyond itself. The
repentance John called for had a purpose—to prepare for something that would
happen next. Zechariah's prophetic song
put it this way, “You, my child, shall be called the prophet of the Most High,
for you will go before the Lord to prepare his way.”
To prepare for the Lord—that is also a theme of our season
of Advent. Consider this: to prepare for
Jesus' coming we must repent of what is binding us and keeping us from building
“a level highway” for God right into our hearts and lives.
What binds us and keeps us from being free and fully
prepared to welcome God into our hearts and lives? We wouldn't ever think of ourselves as Ebenezer
Scrooge—we are not miserly misanthropes!
No, of course not! But perhaps
like Scrooge we put up strong defenses against loving God and loving our
neighbor too deeply, because such love makes us vulnerable. Do we fear being fully known by God? Do we fear being too transparent to our
neighbor?
If repentance means turning away from such defensive fears
and turning toward an attitude of gratefulness to God and compassion toward our
neighbor, then our repentance will not be based on shame or guilt, but on a
desire to prepare ourselves to see and welcome Christ—as Celtic Christians
would say, to welcome Christ in friend and stranger.
May this Advent be such a time for us—a time repent of the
fears which bind us. And through this
repentance free ourselves—free to be ready to receive Christ and then free to
manifest Christ in all we say and do.
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