Prepare Him Room

Sermon, December 11, 2011, Advent 3

Rev. Dr. Craig Strobel

LUKE 3:7-18

3:7 John said to the crowds that came out to be baptized by him, "You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come?

3:8 Bear fruits worthy of repentance. Do not begin to say to yourselves, 'We have Abraham as our ancestor'; for I tell you, God is able from these stones to raise up children to Abraham.

3:9 Even now the ax is lying at the root of the trees; every tree therefore that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire."

3:10 And the crowds asked him, "What then should we do?"

3:11 In reply he said to them, "Whoever has two coats must share with anyone who has none; and whoever has food must do likewise."

3:12 Even tax collectors came to be baptized, and they asked him, "Teacher, what should we do?"

3:13 He said to them, "Collect no more than the amount prescribed for you."

3:14 Soldiers also asked him, "And we, what should we do?" He said to them, "Do not extort money from anyone by threats or false accusation, and be satisfied with your wages."

3:15 As the people were filled with expectation, and all were questioning in their hearts concerning John, whether he might be the Messiah,

3:16 John answered all of them by saying, "I baptize you with water; but one who is more powerful than I is coming; I am not worthy to untie the thong of his sandals. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire.

3:17 His winnowing fork is in his hand, to clear his threshing floor and to gather the wheat into his granary; but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire."

3:18 So, with many other exhortations, he proclaimed the good news to the people.

A few years ago as the world watched the beginning game of the World Series in San Francisco there was suddenly an interruption of the opening interview. The screen blinked and went blank. When the program resumed: A Special News Bulletin. The San Francisco metropolitan area had experienced a serious earthquake. Maybe you remember this. We all watched the live pictures as the huge fire in the Marina area burned. A remote camera crew was there and we saw the firemen fighting the fires. One scene that was most arresting, however, was a group of people standing around just looking at the destruction and looking at the fire. All of a sudden a cop came up to the crowd and yelled out to them: “What are you people doing just standing there. You must get prepared immediately. Go home and fill your bathtubs up with water. Be prepared to live without city services for 72 hours. The sun will set in another hour and your time is running out. Go home and get prepared!”

A long, long time ago a man came on the scene by the name of John the Baptist. John's message was not told in soft monotones, but rather there was an urgent screaming in his voice. “Why are you not getting ready?” he yelled to the people of Judea and beyond. Why are you just standing there? Don't you see that your time is running out on you? You need to be preparing the way. You need to make the path straight. Go and get ready.

Another way to think about this is that John is telling us it’s time to do a little housecleaning. I don’t know about you, but there have frequently been times in my life in which I needed a little help in cleaning my house. It’s not that I couldn’t clean it myself, it’s just that I needed the proper motivation. What I have found works the best is to invite people over to my house. That way I knew I had to get things cleaned up: wash the dishes and put them away, clean off my kitchen table from all the mail and papers that seem to spontaneously collect there, sweep the floors, maybe even mop, clean the bathrooms – you get the picture. The right motivation leads to impressive results.

Well, John the Baptist is essentially saying the same thing: prepare your hearts, get your lives ready because company is coming, a very special guest is coming to your home. Get it ready!

John is talking about housecleaning of an internal sort, only he uses the language of repentance. Repent means to turn, turn one’s mind, change direction. But John says that just changing the direction one’s mind is headed is not enough. We need to bear fruits – not just changing ideas, not an intellectual exercise.
Actions and mind together: brain research shows ideas flit around the outer layers of the cerebral cortex, but for thoughts to habituate into behaviors, they have to imbed in the neural circuitry a little farther down. When we engage in behaviors that match our intellectual commitments, then the ideas become behaviors and even habits. Habits of the heart. Changing our actions reinforces our intellectually-made commitments.
“Get ready! Be prepared! Prepare the way! Clean up your house because a special guest is coming!” John says. But who is this guest? One who will baptize us with fire and the Holy Spirit. Someone who will immerse us completely in the power of God Almighty. John says that Jesus, this burning fire, will gather the wheat and burn the chaff. This is what Jesus does, he gathers all that is good and holy within us and he burns away all that is false, that is destructive, evil, sinful. Everything that will hold us back form a full and clear relationship with God, Jesus will clear away, if we let him in. that’s what John is telling us.

What might that mean for you? What might it mean to make room in your life for Jesus Christ? Let me tell you about what it did for one man.

Some years ago a military airplane crashed at Sonderstrom Air Force Base in Greenland. Twenty-two people were killed. The runway and the nearby fields were strewn with bodies. It was a tragic and horrible moment. There was only one chaplain on the base at the time… and the entire burden was laid on him to bring comfort and the Word of Christ to a shocked community staggered by the horrendous accident. But there was little time to mourn that day. The grisly task of gathering up and identifying the bodies needed to be done.

And so, the chaplain, along with a young lieutenant who had been assigned the duties of a mortuary officer and a group of volunteers went about the awful business of picking up the mutilated bodies and trying to identify the dead, so that their families and loved ones back home could be notified. The people worked in shocked silence well into the night until they almost dropped from fatigue. When every last remnant of death had been picked up, they each went silently to their individual rooms.

That night, after midnight, there was a knock on the chaplain’s door. Outside stood the young lieutenant, the Mortuary Officer. He said nothing. He just stood there and wept. After some moments, the young lieutenant spoke through his tears and he said to the chaplain, “As we were picking up the bodies today, I realized something. I realized that the only other people out there with us were the people who go to church here. I have always been an unbeliever, and I used to ridicule these same people who were out there with us. Yet they are the only persons who would, or perhaps could, do what we had to do today. It must have been their Christian spirit that could help them see beyond the horror to the hope.”

That tragic day turned around the life of that young lieutenant. From that time on he was a new man. Christ was born in his heart because Christians around him living out the deepest commitments of their faith. They were bearing fruits. From that time forward, he took an active part in the Christian ministry of that base. The power of the Christian Hope had changed his life.

If you want to give your loved ones a great Christmas present this year, give them the gift of Christian Hope. Once each year, Christmas comes along to renew our hope and to remind us that the darkness of this world cannot overcome the light of the world.

This is the one who is ready to enter our world. This is the one who stands at our door and knocks. So this Christmas, if he is not a regular guest in your house, I would like to extend you an invitation to let him in. Get yourself ready. Clean up your house, but let him in. Christian mystic Angelus Silesius said it doesn’t matter if Jesus were born a thousand times in Bethlehem if he is not born in your heart.