Advent 2B
December 7, 2014
Isaiah 40:1-11
Matthew 1:1-8
Michael and
I have been watching old episodes of the hilarious TV show, Modern Family. We recently watched an
episode in which Haley, the fashionable, beautiful 17-year-old daughter, is
trying to write her college application essay. She agonizes over the prompt, to
write about an obstacle she has overcome. She laments to her mom that they have
sheltered her, not let her experience real life, and as a result her life has
been too easy and thus she has no obstacles to write about. Her mom, Claire,
gets an idea. Her response is to look very somber and anxious. “Well honey,”
she says, “there is a reason we shielded you from the truth.” Haley looks
concerned. “Oh honey… you’re old enough, so I guess it is time you know. Come
on.” Claire grabs her keys and a very confused Haley, and they drive out into
the dessert a few miles from their suburban Los Angeles home. She brings the
car to a
Later, having
found her way home, Haley storms through the front door, with sticks and debris
hanging from her normally carefully coiffed hair. “What was that?!” she shouts.
“Are you psychotic? I had no money, no cell phone…!” Claire tells her to go
write it in her essay. “Use spell check!” she bellows. No more sheltering for
Haley. She had finally overcome an obstacle. (Season 3 episode 7)
Leaving kids
out in the desert, or wilderness, is no new idea. God uses the same one with
his own children, but for a very different purpose. ‘As it is written in the
prophet Isaiah, “See, I am sending my messenger ahead of you who will prepare
your way; the voice of one crying out in the wilderness: ‘Prepare the way of
the Lord.’”’ This powerful quote from Isaiah is how Mark decides to begin “The
good news of Jesus Christ, the Son of God.” Why on earth would Mark choose to
start his
The reason
Mark starts there is that the good news must start in the wilderness. It must
start with us realizing our need, own brokenness, our darkness, our places of
fear. If we didn’t start in the wilderness, then it would be like a plumber
showing up at your doorstep when, to the best of your knowledge, you did not
have any plumbing problems. If that happened, you would probably tell the
plumber that he must have the wrong house, and send him on his way. And would
we not say that to Jesus if we didn’t start off by realizing our need for this
savior?
Wilderness,
at least the metaphorical sort, is all around us, is it not? Mark tells us that
John was in a physical wilderness, proclaiming the need for repentance and for
baptism, but wilderness can take on all kinds of forms. It need not be a
wasteland by the River Jordan, nor a desert outside an LA suburb. Going back to
that scene from the Modern Family
episode: Haley’s mom taught her a lesson about obstacles in a physical desert,
but in a way this was symbolic of Haley’s life more generally. Haley’s
character is notoriously a girl without direction or vision or goals in her
life. She has, up to that point, lived a sheltered life where everything falls
into her lap, and indeed she has never faced the need for help or comfort. She
is not like the Israelites to whom Isaiah speaks, who have been in exile, cut
off from their roots and their history and their religious center, and who long
for the comforting message Isaiah delivers about a God who is coming to bring
them back to life. And Haley is also not like the crowds that John speaks to,
who live under the oppressive political thumb of the Romans. She is not even
like you and me – people who have lived through times of pain, spiritual
drought, confusion, brokenness, longing, and loss. She had never had a real
need in her life. She didn’t feel that need until she found herself alone in a
literal wilderness.
The
difference, of course, between Haley’s wilderness experience and the one that
John the Baptist refers to, is that in Haley’s experience, her mother leaves
her there alone to fend for herself, to find her own way home. But in our own
wilderness experiences, those times when we feel lost, abandoned, or even
oppressed by people or situations, we are promised that God never leaves us
alone. God is always there. And in fact, it is often when we are in the
wilderness, stripped of the comfort, safety, and stability of our normal lives,
that we are able to feel and perceive God’s presence most profoundly – if not
in the moment, at least in hindsight.
Why is that?
Am I alone in this experience? I have found time and time again that whenever I
am at my lowest point, when I am my most broken, my most weak, my most
vulnerable – even, dare I say, when I am the maddest at God for not being
around when I need him – it is when I am in this place, this wilderness, that I
am most receptive to God’s urgings. Maybe it is because that is when I am so
desperately searching for a godly presence. Maybe it is because my defenses are
down. But I
In my story
about Haley, her wilderness experience prepared her to write a college essay on
overcoming obstacles. For what do our own wilderness experiences prepare us? In
the words of both Isaiah and John, these experiences help us to “prepare the
way of the Lord.” Is that true?
Think about it this way: did you ever
notice the irony that when we prepare for a special guest in our home, we put
things away and get rid of clutter, and yet when we prepare for Christ as our
special guest each Christmas season, we do this by adding more clutter to our
schedules and our homes? We fill our lives with more, more, more. Yet in the
wilderness experience, we feel we are left with nothing, and so God’s presence in our hearts becomes
abundantly clear, God’s presence is
what fills our lives. Does your life this season, with all its busy-ness, allow
for the fullness of God?
Now, don’t get me wrong: I’m not
telling you to put away your trees and your garlands and your lights, nor to
cancel all your holiday parties. I have a line-up of parties myself, and we’re
getting our tree after church today. What I am suggesting is that we think
intentionally about how we might, in the words of one beloved Christmas carol,
“let every heart prepare him room.” Perhaps this can be done by remembering a
time in your life when you were in the wilderness, and remembering how Christ
was with you in that time. Perhaps it can be done by making that story not only
a past event that is never spoken of again, but rather one that is a continual
part of your continual living, a part of
However you
prepare room in your hearts for Christ this season, I hope that you will find
time to do it intentionally, prayerfully, and faithfully, remembering how God
has been in the wilderness of your life, and giving thanks for that presence.
May your Advent reflections prepare a way for the Lord in your hearts.
Let us pray…
Lord God, we often find ourselves in the
wilderness of life, feeling lost, confused, and alone. But you have shown that
it is sometimes in these weak and vulnerable moments that you do your best
work. Make us aware of your presence here, and empower us to share stories of
your presence with others whom we meet. In the name of the Father and the Son
and the Holy Spirit. Amen.
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