The Road to Christmas
Dr. Larry Thorson
12/03/06

Matthew 3:1-12

1 In those days John the Baptist came, preaching in the wilderness of Judea 2 and saying, "Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near." 3 This is he who was spoken of through the prophet Isaiah:
       "A voice of one calling in the wilderness,
       'Prepare the way for the Lord,
       make straight paths for him.' "

4 John's clothes were made of camel's hair, and he had a leather belt around his waist. His food was locusts and wild honey. 5 People went out to him from Jerusalem and all Judea and the whole region of the Jordan. 6 Confessing their sins, they were baptized by him in the Jordan River.

7 But when he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees coming to where he was baptizing, he said to them: "You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the coming wrath? 8 Produce fruit in keeping with repentance. 9 And do not think you can say to yourselves, 'We have Abraham as our father.' I tell you that out of these stones God can raise up children for Abraham. 10 The ax is already at the root of the trees, and every tree that does not produce good fruit will be cut down and thrown into the fire.

11 "I baptize you with water for repentance. But after me comes one who is more powerful than I, whose sandals I am not worthy to carry. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire. 12 His winnowing fork is in his hand, and he will clear his threshing floor, gathering his wheat into the barn and burning up the chaff with unquenchable fire."

Today’s New International Bible

Twenty one more days to finish your Christmas shopping. Twenty one more days to decorate your space for Christmas. Twenty one more days of Christmas music. Twenty one more days to decide whether this is going to be a great Christmas or a “good golly is it Christmas already?” kind of Christmas. We are on the road to Christmas, 2006.

There’s something about every Christmas that I dread. When we lived in Dallas it was my wife’s staff Christmas party where I had to stand around and try to talk to people who didn’t have anything to talk to me about. But then there was my staff party where we always had to play the “Anonymous Gift Exchange” game where people could swap unpopular gifts for popular gifts. Somehow every year without trying I always brought the most unpopular anonymous gift of the year that everybody traded away.

Of course then there was always hanging the Christmas lights. In Chino Hills I would back my truck up to the garage door, put a ladder on the back of the truck, climb to the top, reach up, balancing on one leg while hanging the lights at the peak of the house. Or the prayer meetings I would hold outside of a crowded mall on Christmas Eve praying something like “O God, please help me to find something in this mall that will help and not hinder my reputation as a carrying husband, father and son.”

There’s something about every road to Christmas that I dread. If I focus on those things this face becomes the face of Dr. Ebenezer Scrooge. I know, because I’ve seen his picture in the mirror.

Ironically the Christmas story in the Bible has that same phenomena of something dreadful in it. We like the part about the baby Jesus and the animals in the stable, shepherds in the field, and wise men following a star. It’s pretty. It’s cozy. But Jesus had a cousin born about six months before him whose story is also on the road to Christmas. His name was John the Baptist and every road to Christmas has to stop and see John the Baptist.

Now John was a little different. For one thing he lived in the desert on wild honey and locusts. He also only wore camels’ hair. That’s just weird. But it was his message that was most radical. “Repent and be baptized.” If he had lived in the 60’s they would have called him a hippie and expected him to live in Berkeley. He was a religious radical and the thing we don’t like about radicals of any sort is they upset our status quo. Like is tough enough without having to get our status quo turned over.

Yet the road that leads to Christmas always must meet John the Baptist, hopping mad, preaching fire and brimstone with an axe in his hand, screaming, "Repent!" You cannot get to Christmas without encountering John the Baptist. He is as the Nashville First Presbyterian Church pastor Todd Jones says, “the root canal of the Advent Season! If you need one, you have to have it, but who looks forward to it?”
John the Baptist is the last person we want to see! Some of us have gone to great lengths to avoid his message, leaving churches of our childhood where fire and brimstone burned scars into our tender young souls; switching off radios and TVs so we won't get yelled at by still another preacher; ignoring those billboards and bumper stickers that provide some variation of the message, "Turn or burn!" Over the years, John the Baptist's hell fire brand of Christianity has been used to threaten us, scold us, and frighten us silly, even when it’s true.

But John’s purpose and his message is clear: The Lord is coming to judge the world. He is coming to decide who is on the side of God and who is not. It’s not that John hates the dead wood, the garbage in the way; but he’s clear he has a job to do, to preach the way of the Lord, to cut a path that will be a highway to our God. To do that, he will cut away everything in the way.

That was radical because most of the people in that day thought they were in pretty good shape with God. Sure they did wrong things from time to time but hey that’s what they had sacrifices for. A savior, who needs one, I’m already saved, I’m a Jew. That’s what they thought.

This last week Rick Warren, author of the Purpose Driven Life had a conference on Aids at his 20,000 member mega church in conservative south Orange County. He invited both conservative and liberal politicians including the very pro abortion, pro gay liberal Democratic senator Obama of Illinois as well as scientists, doctors and others to speak at this conference.

Observers say his lineup of speakers for the conference will cost Warren considerable influence among conservative Christians including his own Southern Baptist Convention. But he did it because his wife read an article about the devastation of Aids and traveled to Mozambique to see it first hand. While there she met an African woman dying under a tree of Aids, her family and church having rejected her and cast her out of their life. Kay Warren had always felt very justified and forgiven of her sins but when she thought about this woman’s situation she realized her church’s silence about Aids was the equivalent of what this woman’s church was doing to her. It drove her to repent of that behavior. That conference last week was the Warren’s way of repentance.
John the Baptist came to point out to people like us who feel very justified and forgiven of our sins that they needed a savior. They weren’t ready for the coming of a savior baby and neither are we when we enter the road to Christmas. That’s why we always have to stop and visit John the Baptist. Now I don't know anyone who looks forward to judgment. The Greek word for judgment is the same word that gives us the word criticism. And who enjoys criticism, as valuable as it may be? Receiving criticism makes me depressed.

But we have to face God someday. We can’t put it off forever. You and I both know we’ve done some sinning. We have to deal with our sin. There’s no use denying it. Think of it as we have a court date coming up.

Think of the judge on that court date being the toughest, most unbending judge in the legal system. You’re not going to be able to hire a $500 an hour lawyer to convince a jury and this judge to pardon your sins. You’re going down with the death penalty. It’s a slam dunk deal.

I’m sorry to put it that way at Christmas but we’re going down. That’s the message John the Baptist came to deliver. “Repent." It means literally to turn around, to change. People came by the hundreds to hear his message and then to turn around from their sins and to seek after God.

You’re not going to turn around if you don’t think you need turning around. Rick and Kay Warren didn’t see that they were doing anything wrong. They were church people forgiven of their sins. The problem with church people and that’s what I am, is that we ministers tell you over and over that Jesus took your place in the court room and took the penalty of your sins. We say that so often you start to think that you’re forgiven because you are a church person. So you don’t get convicted of anything that you’re doing wrong. Repentance doesn’t mean to feel chronically guilty, or to wallow forever in your own shame. It means to change! C.S. Lewis says, "Repentance is not something God demands of you before He will take you back; it is simply a description of what going back is like." Which is to say that Jesus loved you with His all so that His love would bring out the best, and not the worst in you. And maybe that best in you begins with changing your picture of who God is. Maybe we need to repent, or change who we believe God to be. God is just and hates sin, the sin of church people. God says give generously to his work, at least 10% of our income, but we’re afraid we’ll run out of money and we don’t even give 4%. That’s sin. God says to treat everyone with respect that they might see God in us and then we deride and insult the server at our table or the person behind the counter because they weren’t as fast as we liked. That’s sin. We put people down and make fun of them behind their backs. That’s sin. God says to share our faith with others but we won’t even invite someone to church. That’s sin. I’m not even touching how we deal with the homeless.

Acts of sin separate us from God. The road to Christmas always takes us past John the Baptist. You can’t get to the savior without passing the prophet. The message of the prophet John is repent, turn from the evil things you are doing. The specific message from the prophet to church people is “Produce fruit in keeping with repentance” . Don’t say “I’ve been a good member of a church for years, I don’t need to repent. Because it won’t do any good.

If today you are not convicted of anything that you need to repent of then you’re not ready for Christmas. You’ve hardened your heart against God. You have 21 days to get ready for the Savior. I urge you to be honest and each day this week to ask God what separates you from him and then to ask him to help you change that.

The Christ came to give us a life jacket in a big dark ocean. Repentance is the daily admitting that you need a life jacket and you need saving.

Listen how theologian Mary Ann Ashcraft puts it: "To get ready for Christmas, God undressed! God stripped off His finery and appeared naked on the day He was born." How can we do any less?! Stand naked, honest, open today, before Jesus, with no pretensions of your own goodness, and let God judge you worthy of the greatest gift you could ever receive! AMEN.