Rethinking our position
Advent 3 Luke 3: 7-18
13 December 2009
We cannot get any closer to Christmas without considering the last of the great prophets in Israel, John the Baptist. He shall forever be associated with one word above all others: repent. This word appears in several different contexts: repent, for the Kingdom of heaven has drawn near; a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins; and bring forth fruits worthy of repentance, as we have heard today. What does the word, repent, really mean? It means a change of mind, a change of heart, a willingness to take into consideration information not previously received or understood, perhaps a sense of regret for having been on the wrong track, and a new direction for one’s life. Repentance and conversion, then, are similar words. In fact some of our translations of the Bible interchange them.
Other prophets had preached similar things before, but what lent urgency to John’s message of repentance was his understanding that the long-awaited promises of God were about to be fulfilled. There was no time left for dallying and pretending: God was about to act and the Kingdom was finally coming. I am impressed with Dallas Willard’s paraphrase of the expression, “repent, for the Kingdom of God is at hand.” He says something like, “Reconsider your position now that the interactive life with God is available to you.” Of course, John was offering people something that was only on the verge of being fulfilled: it was Jesus who made this interactive life with God a full reality—being both God and Man—and began his ministry with the same slogan. John the Baptist is at the very edge of the new age, the age in which the life of the Kingdom is available to all who will rethink their positions and take the appropriate action.
He gave some explicit directions, however, to those who heard his preaching and were serious about what that rethinking might demand of them. The fruits worthy of repentance were the kinds of actions that showed that one’s heart had been changed—one had been, or was in the process of being, converted. His advice to tax collectors and soldiers and the other ordinary folk who came for baptism was to engage in a radical kind of generosity and compassion.
Do we need to hear about repentance and conversion again, after most of us have spent so much time involved in the Church over the years? Do you remember the model we call the “Benedictine Promise”? It aims to describe a way of thinking about being in a place in an interactive life with God. ( A copy in your bulletins) First there is Stability: I am convinced that God is in this place and that I can find Him here amongst the people he has placed me with. Second: Obedience: I realize that I must listen to God and to others in the place where I am because God’s will for me will become clear as I receive what God and my neighbors have to give me. Third: Conversion: I shall have to reconsider my position from time to time in the light of what God’s will is for me and make the necessary changes in my life which have become clear to me.
Conversion is an on-going process and is related to the root idea of repentance: constant rethinking of our positions in the light of the availability of God’s eternal kind of life, which we can know more intimately, and to which we can respond more obediently.
There is a wonderful picture of this kind of life in the 30th chapter of the prophet Isaiah. Here is the way the verse is usually translated: “For thus said the Lord GOD, the Holy One of Israel: In returning and rest you shall be saved; in quietness and in trust shall be your strength. But you refused.” Here is another one: “For Lord Yahweh, the Holy One of Israel, says this, “Your salvation lay in conversion and tranquility, your strength in serenity and trust, and you would have none of it.”
These words came to Israel in a time of difficult circumstances, both political and social—it was, in other words, the normal human condition in this world. What God wanted the people to do, made known through prophets and the wise, was available information. He wanted something different from his people than they wanted to give. He wanted to use them for his large salvation-historical purposes. They wanted to manage their own affairs towards their immediate safety and prosperity. “The Sovereign Lord, the Holy One of Israel, says to the people, “Come back and quietly trust in me. Then you will be strong and secure.” But you refuse to do it.”
Come back, return—these are the root ideas of repentance and conversion. Rethink what you are doing in the light of what God’s will is. He wants you to be quiet, trusting, restful, and confident in His power and mercy. Your strength to do his will is determined by your ability to wait for him, to be calm and at peace in His presence. If you are going to do God’s will, then you shall have to be empowered by God Himself to do it, to find your strength in Him. But you shall not find that strength if you are off making your own plans, devising your own schemes.
The ancient Israelites didn’t listen. They went off to make their alliances with Egypt hoping to ward off the power of Assyria (that was the original context). By their willfulness they brought down upon themselves their own destruction, when what they needed to have done was wait and trust in God. “Blessed are all who wait for him,” says Isaiah at the end of this chapter. The commentator says it was a kind of wistful sigh over what might have been.
Repentance and conversion lead us to confidence and rest in God, to the quietness and trust that shall be our strength. We shall still have enough to do: this is not a recipe for laziness or lassitude. But we need to act as God directs and wait until the right moment. Of course, we all have our normal work to do in the meanwhile, but how shall we do it? In the quiet confidence and trust in God from which come our true strength? Do we really believe that we save ourselves by our hard work? Or that in returning and rest we shall be saved? “Blessed are all who wait for him.”