Repent?

Scripture:

Matthew 3:1-12

Preached 12/08/2013

I don’t want to alarm anyone, but we may need to call the police.  The lectionary is trying to kill Christmas.  At the very least, it’s trying to kill our happy pre-Christmas buzz.  Seriously, have you listened to our lectionary texts these past two weeks?  Last week, Jesus was a thief, and this week, we’ve got John the Baptist, crazy guy out in the wilderness, telling us to repent.  And really, there’s nothing quite like the word repentance to get us feeling bad about ourselves, is there?  When I hear the word “repent,” especially in that format that is commanding me to repent, I feel bad.  I feel kind of guilty, like I’m being scolded for not living properly in the first place.  Like I’m being told whatever I’m doing is wrong and bad and I need to stop it.

And then, after that initial gut reaction, the very first picture that pops into my mind is some strange person on a street corner with a sign, yelling at me to repent because the end is near.  And honestly, that isn’t too far an image from the scriptural one of John the Baptist, telling us to repent because the kingdom of heaven is at hand.  He’s a crazy looking person yelling, just no sign this time.  And John’s message to us is blunt.  He definitely doesn’t sugar coat anything.  Repent, he says.  There isn’t any mention of forgiveness, or God’s grace.  His message is simply- repent.  Or, if we add back in the part we cut out, repent you brood of vipers.  It’s just too good of a line to leave it out entirely.  Lovely job lectionary.  Repent, you brood of vipers.  Just what I want to help me get ready for Christmas.

Here’s the thing though.  If you were here last week, there’s a chance you remember the sermon.  If you weren’t, or if you somehow haven’t memorized every word I’ve ever said, here’s a quick refresher.  Jesus as a thief, as the lectionary text painted him, isn’t as bad as it first sounds.  And, very similarly, this week, repentance is actually not as grim as it first sounds either.

The actual Greek word we’re working with here is metanoiete, a form metanoia.  And metanoia doesn’t have anything to do hanging our heads in shame and saying we’re sorry and having to guiltily come crawling to apologize.  Metanoia isn’t about feeling bad at all.  Metanoia repentance is about action.  Specifically, as you can see from the definitions up on the screen, metanoia repentance is about doing something different than we’ve done before. 

So today, I’d like us to take this idea of metanoia, and apply it to our Advent season, our time of preparation for Christ.  John, after all, was telling people to repent as preparation for Christ too.  He was the kingdom of heaven that was at hand. 

I know, even though I’ve just said metanoia isn’t about feeling bad, you might be feeling a little uneasy about repenting in your Christmas preparations. Before you start feeling too sad about possibly having to change what your Advent season has been about, let me add a disclaimer.  Repenting doesn’t mean you have to stop doing what you’ve been doing.  The ways you’ve been preparing this Advent?  I bet there’s a lot of good in them.  Rather than thinking of repentance about not doing certain things, let’s look at it in the positive sense—actually doing things.  Perhaps adding—adding more joy, more love, and more peace to your time of preparation for Christ. 

So, if you would please, take out that little half sheet inside your bulletin.  You should have two columns.  The first says “Advent to-do list.”  In this space, for a few minutes, write, or draw if you’re a drawer, what you still need to do to get ready for Christmas.  And be realistic, and honest.  You don’t have to share with anyone if you don’t want to, and there is no judgment on anything you write down.  This can be things like what’s up on the screen—baking, cleaning, wrapping.  Whatever you really need to get accomplished before Christmas gets here.  Try to be exhaustive too, and get down all the preparations you can think of.  Go ahead now, and take a few minutes to jot down what you still have left to do.

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Okay, now on to the second column.  Christmas Hopes.  This one, unlike the last column, doesn’t have to be realistic at all.  I would encourage you to dream big.  In that column, get down your honest deepest hopes for this Christmas.  The prompts on the screen will give you some different ways to think about this.  So if you can, in your vision of the perfect Christmas, include the day itself, relationships, and the larger community.  This can be feelings, actions, whatever is important to you.  So go ahead, and take a few minutes on this too.

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On to the third part of this little exercise.  I’d like you to work backwards a bit.  Look back at your to-do list column.  Evaluate what you wrote there.  If something on that list helps accomplish something on your hopes list, give it a star or a circle or something like that.  If it doesn’t just leave it unmarked.  I’ll give you a bit to do that.

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Okay, the very last part of this exercise.  The back of your sheet should be blank.  On there, I’d like you to write how you’d like to repent, or make a change, that will help you bring your two lists closer together.  After all, when our actions and our deep desires don’t meet, we can’t really be at peace, and this is peace Sunday, after all.  So write down how you can get a little closer to what you really, truly want this Christmas.  Maybe it’s something like baking extra cookies to share with police or fire fighters.  Or maybe it’s spending more energy on wrapping presents because you love the happiness big beautiful bows bring to your family.  Or even something like not cleaning your house as much before that big celebration so you have more time to spend enjoying the holiday lights, or in prayer. We’ll spend a few minutes on this too.

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Now, the charge for you is to go out and do what you wrote you wanted to do.  Bring a little more peace into your life by focusing your energy on that, the thing that is important to you.  It might mean Christmas will be different, and that’s okay.  This’s what repentance offers us. Freedom from doing the things we’ve always done.  We can be like that shoot coming forth from the stump of the Jesse tree reading.  We can have new life, we can move in a new direction and do a new thing because God is doing wonderful things with us. 

God is offering us more this Advent season.  More life.  More peace.  More of what Christmas is really about.  Let’s go get it.  Amen.