Thursday, December 10, 2009

Today’s text

Luke 3:16-17

John declared before them all, 'I baptize you with water, but someone is coming, who is more powerful than me, and I am not fit to undo the strap of his sandals; he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire. His winnowing-fan is in his hand, to clear his threshing-floor and to gather the wheat into his barn; but the chaff he will burn in a fire that will never go out.'

Reflection

Sometimes you don’t get what you expect. Sometimes it’s better.

John seemed to expect a larger version of himself. What came was of a different order altogether, not a fiery prophet railing at sin but an enigmatic mystic who spoke intimately of the Father and invited souls to see the rule of forever in the work of his hands and the sound of his voice.

Some heard. Some couldn’t imagine the kingdom of God was anything like a guy who ate with chippies and Roman collaborators and gave hell to those who tried to protect the eroding moral order with God’s ancient law.

If this is a winnowing out of the unholy and unworthy, it cut in a different direction than anyone expected. Those who were in were out; those who were up were down, and those who were cocksure of themselves ended up looking into the little circle around Jesus, excluded by their own lack of heart.

It was heart more than anything else that Jesus called for. Those who could love--and see their want of love--found repentance and entrance into a circle of grace where the rule of forever is taken in with every breath.

And John is right: no one is worthy of untying the sandals of this Jesus for whom we wait and long. But it doesn’t matter. Jesus isn’t much into bowing and scraping.

He invites us near to share his Spirit, the Spirit that made the day and fashioned the sun and loved you and all creation into being.

Catch a bit of that, and you know what fire is.

Pr. David L. Miller