What’s a good introduction?
Second Sunday of Advent - December 6, 2009
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Please note: The following sermon is provided as a resource for the thought, prayer, and meditation of the members and friends of St. Mark's. It is the residue of a verbal event, and thus it does not have academic footnotes and other details that would be expected in a written document. The writer gladly acknowledges the prior thought and work of many Christians before him. |
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What’s in an introduction? Quite a lot! If it is done well, it makes all that follows clearer, more easily understood and appreciated. If it is done poorly, it irritates the hearers and makes them less likely to pay attention to the main message that follows. What’s in an introduction? Ed McMahon died earlier this year. His was a recognizable name to millions of folks because of a particular job he had. For many years, people heard him warm up the crowd, get their attention, and end by saying “Heeeeeere’s Johnny!” Everyone laughed a bit, applauded, the curtains parted, and Johnny Carson strode out with a big smile to start the Tonight Show. He made a good introduction, and it was always effective. When Johnny retired, someone asked him about the secret of his success in show business and he said: “I was lucky enough to get introduced by the great Ed McMahon.” And he meant it. We’ve heard bad introductions: “Our speaker was born in Des Moines Iowa and attended Mrs. Smith’s kindergarten and continued his formal schooling at….” Everyone is already bored, and may give an audible groan. The person being introduced will have to crawl out of a deep hole indeed to get anywhere with the audience. A good introduction to a speech is a speech that doesn’t appear to be a speech, it must point to the speaker without becoming the speaker. So on the Second Sunday in Advent each year, we meet up with the introducer, John the Baptist. We didn’t come to hear him, but to hear Jesus. John makes it clear that he is not the main event; he is the “forerunner”. But we can’t get to Jesus without dealing first with this introduction. There is a problem with John’s introduction to Jesus. It breaks all the rules about how best to make an introduction. He’s not pleasant, affirming, charming, genial, gently informative, making the audience comfortable, leaving them with a laugh, or any of the usual techniques. His introduction is delivered in a near- scream: “You bunch of snakes! Who told you to look here to try to avoid the fire? His ax is in his hand; he will cut you down to the root! He is going to separate the good seed from the trash and then cast the trash into the fire! I’m not worthy to tie his shoelaces, and neither are you. You’d better get down here and get washed up. Take off those oh so fine clothes and come down into this muddy stream and get baptized. You’ve been warned!” It doesn’t take much imagination to think that the good, respectable people are quietly moving toward the exits as he speaks. And then John yells at them, “Hey, you! I’m talking about you. Don’t say to yourselves ‘we’ve got Abraham as our ancestor, or ‘my family founded this church,’ or “I tithe, and that’s enough.” I tell you, you’d better turn around right now, get washed, get right with God and each other, confess your sins and repent, so that the cacophony of your sins does not drown out the sweet word of the Messiah-Savior. I’m reminding you that if God wanted to, he could raise a new family right out of the stones in the river.” Would anyone have stayed around to hear the speaker after that kind of an introduction? Amazingly, some did; those who were stung by John’s words, realized that the message applied to them, took the message to heart, and allowed God’s Holy Spirit to begin the slow process of changing them from the inside out. Not many really heard the message, but at least a few did, and with those few, Jesus begins. We’ve had some discussion about people not wanting to come to church to hear judgment, criticism, and discomfort. Rather, folks supposedly want to be stroked, patted on the head, and told that we are just fine the way we are. So is John crazy when he says, “God demands that you be transformed, born again, done over, or else….”? By all the usual standards, yes. But in our heart of hearts, we know that John is right in what he proclaims. Grudgingly, we acknowledge that his is the message that we do need to hear. Our world is out of kilter, and I don’t mean just the stock market. Our flawed lives are like unbalanced tires that if they are ignored, wear badly as they roll along, sooner or later shake the whole vehicle, and are destroyed. When the mechanic says that it is time for drastic action, one can ignore those words of warning, but there may be serious and disastrous consequences. We wouldn’t think much of the mechanic who tells us “there is a bald spot on the tire, the sidewall is cracked, the tie rod end may fall off, the brakes are worn to the rivets, the fan belt is frayed, and there is a hole in the exhaust system right under the passenger compartment…but dangers have been greatly exaggerated and you can likely go quite awhile before really worrying about it.” We may not want to hear the warnings, but we desperately need to hear them. John the Baptizer stood up and told the contented, self-satisfied religious folk that they, especially they, needed to change; their pedigree was no guarantee to escape the penetrating gaze of God’s judgment, and that they, even the most self-indulgent among them, could be changed. Some turned away in annoyance, but some heard it as good news that day. And what about all of us gathered here today? Some have likely concluded that John is a crack-pot, a alarmist, a conspiracy-theorist whom we can ignore. But maybe, just maybe, there are some who know that John is right, who know they need to hear and heed his message, so that they can be ready to hear the one to whom John points, Jesus himself. Maybe there is someone courageous enough to know that the chaff in his/her life needs to be separated out from the good things that are said and done, the wheat of the good harvest. Maybe there is someone wise enough to know that the wild, useless things in his/her life need to be pruned off so that there is room enough for a life-giving branch to grow. Maybe there is someone who will take an honest look at his/her life and activities , and in the harsh light of what John says, realize that there are things that cannot be paid-off with money, or ignored with bravado, nor passed on to someone else’s fault. Whether one has only two thin dimes in the bank, or whether one is as rich and famous as Tiger Woods, we all need to admit that there are broken things in your life and mine. The good news of the word-pictures with which John assails us this day is that there is room and time for confession, forgiveness, and amendment of life. Learning that we are sinners can be part of the good news. It means knowing what the problem is, knowing that there is a God whom we have offended, and with whom we can be reconciled. To recognize and name the sin properly is already to name God and to open the possibility of forgiveness. On the other hand, when we deny the gravity of sin, we can only blame the mess on someone else or on random fate. The denial of sin has unleashed confusion, anger, and despair. The refining process in our lives, like the one that we explored in iron-making, is harsh, demanding, and painful, but it yields positive results. What’s in a good introduction? In this most profoundly important case, it involves more than a genial laugh and a “Heeeeere’s Johnny” from Ed McMahon. With John the Baptist it is more like a slap upside the head and a sharp “Pay attention.” But what follows will be the best news ever that you and I have thought that we didn’t want to hear. “For you,” says Jesus, “for forgiveness!, for the kingdom of God, forever”. AMEN.
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