Advent 3 2017
It always seems odd to be remembering John the Baptist on the 3rd Sunday of Advent when pink candle is lit. Today is Gaudete Sunday – the Sunday of Joy. It is the Advent equivalent of Mothering Sunday – a day of refreshment when the feeling of penitential preparation can be relaxed a little. It’s all a bit lost on us these days as Advent is swallowed by Christmas and we don’t do a lot of penitential preparation. Today we needn’t worry about this – we can all have day off penance. Maybe this could remind us to try to fit in a little penance and spiritual preparation in the few days left before Christmas itself.
John drew a lot of attention to himself in some ways. We’re told that crowds went out into the desert to hear him preaching – maybe to have a look at this strange, wild man. But John most definitely wasn’t there to draw attention to himself – he pointed always away from himself and towards the Messiah, whose coming he pronounced and anticipated. You can imagine him being rather frustrated by all the attention he received – his whole message was about someone else, but people came in droves to have a look and a listen.
John is often described as the person who bridges the Old and New Testaments – in style he is very like the prophets of old, but he faces towards the Messiah. He faces also towards us – as if he looks towards Jesus from one side and we look towards Jesus from the other. We hear so often that we must imitate Jesus – follow him and be more like him. But John is also a good model for us – someone we can emulate. For John was a witness – a witness to the Messiah – to Jesus Christ.
These days of celebrities and politicians dominate our news. For them any attention is good – bad publicity is still publicity: fake news still keeps them in our minds and on our TV screens. John shows us a different way. It’s not that we become invisible. Our characters are important, flawed though they are. But it’s that ‘we’ aren’t ‘it’ – we’re not supposed to be the centre of attention, not supposed to seek the limelight or hog the show. We are witnesses – people who point beyond ourselves to the one for whom we wait this Christmas.
Witnessing, I think, is a challenging business. In Greek, the world is ‘Martur’ from which our word ‘Martyr’ derives. This suggests what a serious business witnessing has been in the history of Christianity – many have lost their lives witnessing to Jesus – pointing in his direction. This is another indication that ‘witnessing’ doesn’t make you invisible even when you know you’re not the point. Witnessing can result in hostility.
Witnessing doesn’t necessarily mean preaching or shouting – you occasionally come across Christians who wave their big black bibles around and stand on street corners shouting out: most people seem to avoid them, and I think sometimes this is the intention – they become ‘martyrs’ in the slightly twisted sense of the word – people who seek to fail because it makes them feel righteous – better than everyone else. Witnessing can be done without speaking – by the values we hold, the way we live, what we prioritise.
It seems to me, however, that there is an ever widening gap between the truths Christians live for and the values of society. Many people no longer understand why we do what we do – we may need to explain. I sat next to someone at the school Christmas extravaganza who was laughing at the children who had learning disabilities. It left me infuriated and sad. But maybe I should have explained that, in the Christian faith, and in a Christian school, those who are the most vulnerable are the most precious, and are treated with the greatest respect.
It’s as if we need to draw up a list of things that we take for granted, that may need explaining to those who have never been influenced by the Christian faith. Maybe Michael and I will highlight some of these things in 2018 – to bring them to the top of our consciousness so we can explain – witness – to the things Jesus showed us.
One of our Uniformed organisation eladers had a recent experience which highlights another Christian value – one that has already cropped up in this sermon. Someone was angry because his child hadn’t been chosen for the privilege of taking home the pack mascot.
This shows the huge gulf between the ‘me me me’ and competitiveness of our modern culture, and the values of supporting and helping others which are at the heart of the Guiding movement. So here is another thing to which we can witness, something we can explain – that in God’s values those who serve and help are the greatest. The first shall be last. Those who push themselves to the front will find themselves at the back.
Maybe you might see these things at work in the world around you this week. Maybe you can witness to the way Jesus showed us. Maybe this week YOU can be a martyr – in the good sense of the word.