Lent: Day 5

As I'm currently fighting a bout of insomnia, it seemed a good time to return to my erstwhile Lenten discipline... which is now over a week behind. I've decided that, though there is a good chance I shalln't finish these IN Lent, I will make it all the way through, even if I'm a little late.

Luke 3:1-20

What I love most about this passage is how easy it is to alternate between cheering for John and wincing at his indictment. On one hand, we want to rally behind his call for social justice and repentance. Yeah, you dirty tax collectors, stop extorting money from poor folk! Yeah, you selfish rich dudes, stop bogarting all the tunics! But then John gets all "prophety" on us. Jesus has a winnowing fork and he's gonna clear that threshing floor and burn up all the chaff. Yikes. Ease up John! Next you'll be telling us that Jesus came to bring not peace but a sword. That'd be ridiculous!

There's a tendency in Christian piety that goes all the way back to Marcion whereby we want to separate out the nice bits of God's love from the icky parts about judgment and condemnation and such. This lives on in any effort to put all the "vengeful" stuff into the OT and pretend that NT is all puppies and bunnies. But the orthodox Christian faith proclaims that the unapproachably holy and righteous God is also the incarnate loving God: you can't have one without the other. We see the truth of this affirmation here in John's prophesy. Jesus is bringing you the Holy Spirit. He is also bringing fire, and not just that strange warmth of Mr. Wesley's heart. Jesus brings a purifying fire that will refine us... painfully if need be.

Notice how Herod reacts to this message. Luke Johnson's translation of the passage has Herod "shut John up in prison." How often do we what to "shut John up?" Give us the good stuff John, but save all that judgment burny stuff for the fundies! No, if we are to embrace the Gospel, we must wrap our hearts around it all. We may legitimately personalize or spiritualize it, turning it into a meditation on our own growth in virtue and the burning away of all our moral impurities. That is a valid reading, I think. What we can't do, though, is ignore it, dismiss it, or lessen the severity and urgency with which John preaches.

We are in Lent. We are lying on the threshing floor. And we pray to Christ to sift us, to judge us, and to burn up our chaff in a smoky offering of repentance.