Luke 3:1 6 Matt Mardis-LeCroy Des Moines, IA December 6, 2015 I. Disturbing the Peace I don t know what happened. I used to be young and fun. No, seriously: I can prove it. I used to live in downtown Des Moines. And not just downtown Des Moines, but Court Avenue, in what is somewhat euphemistically known as the entertainment district. I had been living alone in a four-bedroom parsonage on the north shore of Long Island big house on a quarter-acre lot but when Mary Beth and I moved to Des Moines, we only had eyes for downtown. As one realtor put it, we weren t buying a condo; we were buying a lifestyle. It was a lifestyle that suited us well no snow shoveling, no grass cutting, no maintenance; plenty of bars and restaurants within walking distance; plenty to see and plenty to do. It suited us so well right up to the moment when Ellie was born. I love her, but she really put a crimp in that whole lifestyle thing. And after Ellie came along, Mary Beth got a little how do I say this gently? obsessed with Ellie s sleep. Box fans. White noise machines. In some obscure catalog she found these curtains, curtains that must have been designed by NASA or DARPA or the NSA; black hole curtains, curtains that seemed to absorb all light. I get it. She was a new mom; she wanted her baby to sleep. But one thing kept interfering: the
Des Moines Register. Every single morning, 4 maybe 4:30, the delivery person for the Register would come stomping down the hall, hurling huge piles of pulp at our neighbors doors. Always, always the performance concluded with a great slamming of the hallway door on the way out a door that just happened to be on the other side of Ellie s bedroom wall. Up to this moment, I did not really know the woman I had married. She seems nice, but make no mistake: Mary Beth can be one fierce mama bear. She initially planned a stake-out. She would set her alarm for 3:45 and come running out of our condo to confront the noisy newspaper person. But that plan fell by the wayside new mothers do need their sleep and so she settled for a note, a note that she would carefully compose and then affix to the hallway door. It was direct and eloquent and cold-blooded. I never heard that door slam again. And I learned two very important things: My lifestyle was pretty much over. And Mary Beth will not tolerate any disturbing of the peace. II. So I wonder what Mary Beth might make of John the Baptist. It is more than a little ironic to read this text on this day. On the second Sunday of Advent, a day devoted to peace, we hear about John the Baptist, the great disturber the peace. Advent initiates a new church year and that means readings from a new Gospel. Today s text is so typical of Luke. It opens with a litany of government officials: In the fifteenth year of the reign of Emperor Tiberius, when Pontius Pilate was governor of Judea, and Herod was ruler of Galilee and etc. Seems strange, but here is the point: Luke wants to establish that this is no fairy tale, no story set a long time ago in a galaxy far far away. (That s December 18). No, this story that Luke is telling? This really happened. In a specific place, in a specific time, in the world that we inhabit, the word of God comes to John in the wilderness. So John becomes an itinerant evangelist a big striped tent, some folding chairs, a PA system. And he goes all around the region of the Jordan, calling people to be baptized as a sign of their repentance. He calls people to get ready for what God is about to do.
And what, precisely, is God about to do? Well, it s not entirely clear but it sounds big. Prepare the way of the Lord, make God s paths straight. Every valley shall be filled, and every mountain and hill made low, and the crooked shall be made straight and the rough ways made smooth and all flesh shall see the salvation of God. i A voice cries out. But what is John trying to tell us? What is this really about? Disturbing the peace. III. It s like we always say at Plymouth: God is still speaking. And in the wilderness, John just shouts what the Spirit whispers in his ear: It s about revolution. God is about to take the world that we know and turn it on its ear, turn everything upside down. Mountains made flat; valleys filled in; the crooked made straight and the rough places plain. A whole new world. ii God knows we could use one. The world that we have got doesn t seem to be working very well. Yet again this week, we are shocked and sad in the aftermath of a mass shooting. We can take the names of those we lost in San Bernardino, and add to the longlist of names from Colorado Springs, from Charleston, from Newtown, from Aurora, and from so many others. We have been before. We ve been here far too many times. But this time feels different, at least to me. This time it feels divisive. We aren t just scared anymore; we are angry. And we are venting our anger in increasingly bitter arguments, ugly arguments filling up my Facebook feed, trending on Twitter, dominating our politics. Arguments about gun control. Arguments about this whole business of expressing of thoughts and prayers in the aftermath of a public tragedy. Arguments about our nation s immigration policies and our stance toward refuges and who should be our next President. I have strong feelings on every single one of these topics. But this morning, I don t feel like arguing. This morning, I think we need to take a step back, to focus on a larger point. The
larger point is this: the world as we know it is badly, badly broken. The world as we know it does not serve the purposes of justice and peace. The world as we know it is nowhere near the world that we have been promised. This world does not work. That is why a new one is on the way. And that is what John is trying to tell us. Out there in the deserted places, far from the center of things, John comes crying out about a whole new world: a world without violence, a world without hatred, a world without fear. A world where there will be no more Sandy Hooks, no more Charlestons, no more San Bernardinos. A world where we do not learn to hate one another and fear one and kill another. A world where all of God s children where all of God s children will live together in safety and sharing and peace. That world is coming. But will we be ready for it? That is what John wants to know. And here is the problem. Please watch this next part very closely. This world may be badly broken but it s working pretty well for me. I ve got a great family, and a great job. I ve got a roof over my head, a closet full of clothes, too much to eat. Economists tell me that I belong to the wealthiest one percent of all people living on this planet today. iii So this world that we ve got this badly broken world is also and at the same time a world that has been very good to me. I think that is why John shouts so much. He worries about me. He worries that I will miss out on the new things God wants to do. He worries that I am too comfortable, too cozy, too complacent with the world as it is. John wants me to be ready. That is why he is disturbing my peace. And that may be the best thing that ever happens to me. IV.
This is a season that promises peace on every billboard, in every ad. Contented families in matching sweaters. The perfect gift, just the thing I wanted. Peace can be yours for a price. Swipe your Visa card right here. And it is so easy it is so seductive to snuggle in and settle down and suppose we are at peace here in the world that we ve got. But are we? Do we want to be? Do we want that kind of peace? Or are we ready for something different? I used to be at peace or so I supposed. I came and went as I wanted. I slept in on the weekends. Sometimes I had cereal for dinner. I used to have a lifestyle. And I thought I was content. But then along came this tiny, red-faced screaming little person. 6 pounds, 5 ounces. She turned my whole world upside down. I'm not young and fun anymore. I had to move to the suburbs. My whole world changed. And I am so grateful. A voice cries out, telling us to get ready for a tiny event with enormous consequences. The baby born in the manger will take the world as we know it and turn it into the world that God has promised. A voice cries out, disturbing our peace. Will we be ready? I guess that is why we are here. Thanks be to God. Plymouth Congregational Church United Church of Christ 4126 Ingersoll Avenue Des Moines, Iowa 50312 Phone: (515) 255-3149 Fax: (515) 255-8667 E-mail: mmardis-lecroy@plymouthchurch.com
Notes i The voice in the wilderness is a surprisingly difficult question in biblical interpretation. Is the way of the Lord to ii The image in this citation of a road engineer, shouting out orders for the construction of the royal road of the Lord. Divine highway construction! Luke Timothy Johnson. The Gospel of Luke. Sacra Pagina, Volume 3. Daniel J. Harrington, S.J., Editor. (Collegeville, MN: The Liturgical Press, 1991), p.64. iii For more, see this article from Foreign Policy: http://foreignpolicy.com/2012/02/27/were-all-the-1-percent/