At West Point, weekend passes were a rare treat. Because West Point was located just an hour north of New York City, one of my favorite places to go when I got a weekend pass was into the City. Now, because I had no money, when I went to New York City, I would stay in the least expensive hotel I could find on Times Square. I remember one weekend—it was cold, so maybe it was around this time of year—I had a weekend pass, had gotten the cheapest hotel room on Times Square, and I remember waking up Sunday morning. I was bleary-eyed and maybe a little hung over, and I got up to go get some donuts and juice at a corner market, and I was planning on taking my breakfast back to my room.
I remember walking down the stairs of the hotel, going out into the street, and turning the corner. When I turned the corner, there was this guy, right in front of me, looking right at me. He had a scraggly beard, a knit cap, long coat, knit gloves cut off at the fingers, and he held in one hand a big, floppy Bible. And he looked right at me, and he said, “REPENT!”
“REPENT! The KINGDOM of HEAVEN is at hand! Bear fruits WORTHY of REPENTANCE! Already the AXE is at the root of the tree-- REPENT! The fiery furnace is prepared—REPENT!”
Man. He was looking right at me! I was a little embarrassed, but I was also a brand-new Christian, and I took everything seriously. I figured this has got to be a sign from God. I didn’t know quite what this sign meant, but I knew that this guy was placed in front of me on this bleary-eyed Sunday morning when I wasn’t at church, but instead I was at Times Square- recovering from the night before.
I was embarrassed, and I didn’t know quite what to do with the encounter, so I sort of made a wide arc around him, made it to the market for my juice and donuts, and went back to my hotel room. But that guy has never left me. He appears every year, this time of year, in the second and third Sundays of Advent—I cannot get rid of him. He shows up in church, and he shows up the month before Christmas, when I would much rather not think about this guy; I would much rather think about Santa Claus, who is the nice, cozy, bearded guy who shows up this time of year, and I’d much rather be shopping, and listening to Christmas carols, and feeling warm and fuzzy about things.
But instead, I come to church, and there’s this guy shouting at me, “REPENT!” John the Baptist embarrasses me. He’s an embarrassment because he’s just so weird and I don’t know what to do with him—he’s like the crazy uncle that shows up for Christmas, and I’m just as happy if the crazy uncle chooses not to go to Christmas services with me, because then I don’t have to explain him to my friends… But he shows up, with this message, “Repent.”
I used to hate that. But each year, I grow to appreciate John the Baptist more and more, and now I love John the Baptist. Now, I don’t know if I could have a Christmas without John the Baptist. Part of what I love about him is that he’s just so earnest. He’s serious about what he has to say, and he is telling me that something is coming. Something is about to happen, and he does not want me to miss it. It’s really easy for me to miss it. This time of year, I’m so amazingly busy, my list of things to do is just huge. I have to get the tree, I have to decorate the tree, I have to do all the shopping, I have to get cards, I have to write the cards, I have to plan the parties, I have to write sermons-- all of this stuff!
And I’m in this kind of rat maze, trying to run through all the things I have to do to get ready for Christmas, and it’s so easy for me to forget that Christmas is coming; so easy to forget to be ready; and I need this John the Baptist to plant himself right in front of me as I round the corner from November to December, to look me right in the eye and say, “REPENT! Wake up! Don’t let Christmas pass you by!”
What’s really sad is that I get whiny about Christmas, because I have so much to get done to prepare for Christmas. I remember a couple of years ago, I walked into Chapter One Books, which is one of the bookstores in Sun Valley where I came from, and the owner of this bookstore is a dear friend of mine, and a very devout Buddhist. It was about a week before Christmas, and I was chatting with Cheryl the owner, and I was just whining. I’ve got four Christmas Eve services, I’ve got all this stuff I have to do; and she walked around the counter, grabbed me by the shoulders, and she shook me! And she said, “Brian! This is your feast!” It’s like she took me and slapped me in the face- “Snap out of it! This is your feast! Celebrate it!”
For me, that’s what John the Baptist does. He shows up to say to us, “Wake up! Something important is coming! Wake up!” I’ve even grown to love what he says—Repent. He preached a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins; repent for the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand; repent!
What I love is that the word “repent,” the Greek word metanoia, really means to think of the world differently. To think of your life differently. Or another way of putting it is, get out of your mind.
This time of year, my mind gets filled with all of my anxieties. For some people it gets filled with sadness, or heartbreak, or a sense of scarcity—I don’t have enough time, I won’t have enough money, I don’t have enough whatever—get out of your mind. Look at your world in a new way, so that you can be released from all of the things that keep you living your life too small. That’s what the “forgiveness of sins” language is about. Look at your life in a new way, so that you can be released from the small ways you choose to live your life. This time of year, John the Baptist is inviting me to look at my list of things to do in a new way.
What if I looked at everything not as chores, but as sacraments? What if each card was a prayer? Each party was an opportunity to encounter Christ? Each gift was a sacred offering? What if I look at my life in a new way? What if I become free from the small ways I live my life? The Kingdom of Heaven is at hand, right here. If I could just stop freaking out about things enough to see it…
Then John the Baptist goes on to say that even the little choices you make in your life, the little choices you make in your day today—to share your food or to not share your food; to share your clothes, to not share your clothes; to share yourself, or to not share yourself with someone you encounter—even those little changes can manifest the Kingdom of Heaven in your life. So pay attention.
I’ve even grown to love the words that John the Baptist says about separating the wheat from the chaff. Let me tell you how I’ve come to love that passage, that image, that notion. I was invited to officiate at a burial, about six years ago. It was for a woman I’d never met; her name was Irene. I’d never met the family, they weren’t members of my congregation, but a friend of mine who ran the local funeral home needed someone to officiate at the burial, and the family had no minister. So he called me, and I agreed. I met with three members of Irene’s family, and we met briefly just to go over the service. We all sat down, and they said, Irene was mean.
Not only, they said, was Irene mean, but she managed to alienate everyone she met, the older she became. They told me this sort of as an apology, because they didn’t know if anyone was going to show up for her service. We planned the service, and it was going to be in the chapel in the funeral home, which had room for about 30 people. I remember that day, putting on my vestments, getting ready, walking into the chapel, processing up the aisle, turning around, and looking out over the congregation. There were only three people present.
It was around this time of year, and the reason I know it was around this time of year is because I was pondering this John the Baptist text, in preparation for giving a sermon on it. In this burial service what came to mind were these words about Christ separating the wheat from the chaff. I want to tell you that that is not a normal text for a burial. Normally priests don’t preach about Christ separating the wheat from the chaff at a burial! But that lesson came to mind with a new understanding-- it wasn’t Christ separating the bad people as the chaff, like Irene, from the good people, when we die.
It was rather Christ peeling the chaff away from each of us. The image I received was of Christ peeling the chaff away from Irene, all of her wounds, and scars, and rough edges, peeling that away, so that the beautiful child of God that was buried deep within could finally be free. The image I had was of Irene finally being free, and being able to live, and being able to love, and accept love, and be loved; of Irene finally whole. I was able to share that image with the family, and I believe that process is true for each of us. That when we die, Christ will peel away the chaff.
In my mind, it’s going to be a painful process for me, because I like my chaff. I like my curmudgeonly bits, and I’m not going to want to let them go. But they’re going to be peeled away, and they’re going to be burned in unquenchable fire, so that the true me can come alive.
In Christ, the only judgment is mercy, is life, is wholeness. That mercy and life and wholeness is available to all of us; is given to all of us when we die. The thing is, John the Baptist doesn’t want us to wait that long. He doesn’t want us to have to wait until we die. He’s trying to tell us that the Kingdom of Heaven is here, right now, and we can choose to let that chaff be burned away. We can choose to let Christ resurrect our true selves right now, and we can begin by paying attention as we move toward Christmas, toward this feast where Christ is born anew within us. If we make space in our hearts for that to happen, if we pay attention to that space, and pay attention to the little choices we make to love or to not love in our days…
John the Baptist comes every year and reminds me of this. I try; Christmas comes; I’m reborn; and then a couple weeks later I forget. I get back to my old habits, and again next year John the Baptist shows up, plants himself right in front of me, and says “Wake up! We get to do this again!” And each year, my heart can open just a little bit more, I can pay a little better attention, and Christ gets to be born again, and again, and again. We just have to repent. Amen.