Creekside Church Sermon of December 14, 2003 "Thanks, I Needed That!" Luke 3:7-18	Rev. David Bibbee
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Everybody loves stories. It doesn't matter how old you are, or if you are degreed or a drop-out. Your class, race, religion, culture-- it doesn't matter. Just say, "Once upon a time…" or, "Once there lived a…" or, "Long ago in a galaxy far, far away," and people will listen.

Across time and cultures, stories have common elements. One is TENSION. There is a mission to be accomplished, but someone or some thing attempts to thwart the goal. Prince Charming must wake Sleeping Beauty with a kiss, but first he must slay the dragon--fire-breathing, of course. Dorothy must follow the yellow brick road to the Emerald City and hitch a ride with the Wizard back home to Kansas, but the Wicked Witch of the West does everything in her power to stop her. Indiana Jones is after the Holy Grail, but he must fight bandits and brigands, supernatural forces, and lots of Nazis to get it.

A similar thing happens on our way to Christmas. Like the shepherds, we make haste to go to Bethlehem, running over the hills in the starry night to see the great thing the Lord has made known to us. But on the way we are stopped like traffic at a toll booth by an intimidating man with a thundering voice and hair going every which way.

Its HIM again-- John the Baptist. Every year in the biblical texts of Advent we run into him, ranting and raving like a tent revival preacher who got out on the wrong side of the bed. Before we get to tidings of comfort and joy we must hear the messenger sent to prepare us for the coming of the Lord. "REPENT, for the kingdom of God is at hand. You better be ready. He's not coming to rearrange the furniture. He has a pitch fork in one hand and a flame thrower in the other. He'll burn everything that isn't worth saving. He'll separate the fruit that's fit for the kingdom and the rest will go up in smoke.

PREPARATION: a word heard often before Christmas, but the preparation John has in mind has nothing to do with baking enough cookies, buying enough wrapping paper, and making sure there are plenty of AA batteries on hand. John's preparation involved repentance, getting washed up, turning your life around; getting in sync with the kingdom the Lord will bring about. Alcoholics Anonymous calls it, "Taking a fearless moral inventory."

The baptist's message is NOT one we are eager to hear--not with ten days to go until Christmas. Be grateful that I'm in the pulpit and not him. Now and then I get letters and e-mails from free-lance preachers who want to speak to you. "Spirit-anointed, Bible-centered preaching," their resume says. "Will ignite your church with Holy Spirit power." You wouldn't be interested in preachers like this-- men who wear much after shave and comb their hair with buttered toast. You don't like preachers who holler themselves hoarse, beating you up because you're not living the way Jesus wants you to. I've never asked anyone like this to preach to you.

The only exception I made was three years ago when Sue Noffsinger's friend, Victor Burson, called and said, "I don't know why, but God told me I'm supposed to preach to your congregation." "He did?" "That's right. I'm supposed to talk with you about it. I've never done anything like this before." When I discovered the passage he picked was the same one I selected for the Sunday in question, I said, "Well, I haven't done anything like this either, but if God told you, who am I to say no?" Victor did a fine job. It was a leap of faith for him. And he was nice to you. He didn't call you names or anything.

But you wouldn't want John the Baptist in this pulpit. Most churches wouldn't want him in theirs, either. You want a credentialed preacher to address interesting subjects and issues with which you agree-- someone to comfort you and give assurances that your priorities are just as they should be. But if this is all I do, I'm doing you a disservice. If I'm not telling you get cleaned up; if I don't push you to conduct a moral inventory, diagnose your heart problems, or suggest taking an axe to what needs removed from your life and burned, you will miss what makes the message of Christmas such a wondrous thing.

A man was walking through an unfamiliar part of town when he saw a sign that said, "Truth Shop." He entered and a pleasant saleswoman asked, "What kind of truth do you wish to purchase, partial or whole?" He replied, "The whole truth, of course. No deceptions for me, no defenses, no rationalizations. I want my truth plain and unadulterated." She directed him to the other side of the store where the salesman showed the price tag for whole truth. "It is very high, sir." "How much?" the man asked, determined to have it, whatever it cost. "It will cost your security, sir." The inquirer left with a heavy heart because he needed the safety of an unexamined life.

Do you remember that dramatic courtroom scene in the movie, "A Few Good Men"? Tom Cruise plays Lt. Kaffee, a Navy lawyer who interrogates Marine Colonel Nathan Jessep, played by Jack Nicholson." The lieutenant keeps pressing-- "I want answers, Colonel." "You want answers?" "I think I'm entitled," Kaffee says. "You want answers?!" Colonel Jessep replied. "I want the truth!" Then Colonel Jessep shouts the memorable quote: "You can't handle the truth!"

Truthfulness and honesty are the tools necessary to prepare is for the coming of Christ-- honesty to God and honesty to ourselves about ourselves.

On Saturday night I take to my sermon manuscript. I tidy up the grammar, fix the run-on sentences, and do a safety check. "You can't say that! What were you thinking? You better take that paragraph out. You just finished remodeling the house and John starts college next fall. They will tar and feather you then put you in front of a firing squad! Kiss the Chex-Mix and cookies you get at Christmas good-bye." Too many pastors talk themselves out of saying what God wants said. We like comfort as much as you. I can hear John yelling, "Sure you're supposed to comfort the afflicted, but you've also got to afflict the comfortable. No wonder your church doesn't pose a threat to anyone.

The temple had some pretty good preachers, but not many people went to hear them. The multitudes hiked into the arid, barren wilderness to hear John. It wasn't that they enjoyed being called a sack of snakes. They knew they needed it.

Do any of you remember the old commercial where the just-shaven guy was whacked across the face with a palm full of after shave lotion and said, "Thanks, I needed that."? Sometimes preachers treat their people as though they can't handle the truth. Waiting for Christ's advent, we have to take the truth.

Before new life will come, the axe must be applied. Someone has to say, "The Emperor has no clothes." We need to be told when we're living off of "past performance" and not "present passion." If an individual or group sows seeds of discord and divisiveness in the church, they must be accountable for their unacceptable actions. If we are not in harmony with Christ and others; if bad choices are being made, then, in the words of David Augsburger, we must "care enough to confront."

Lots of homes get a vigorous cleaning in December, especially those hosting Christmas gatherings. All surfaces are sparkling. The odor of candles, Pine-Sol and Pledge permeate the air. The good china is on Christmas place mats. The ceramic nativity figures are straightened up. The host want everything to be "just right" when company comes.

"The One we've waited for is coming-- I'm not fit to untie his shoe laces. He's coming. Get your things in order. Pick up the clutter. Get a through cleaning before the doorbell rings." The multitudes cried out, "Tell us what we have to do!" John said, "Get that coat out of the closet you hardly wear and give it to the man living on the streets. Give half of your pantry to the hungry, for starters. Repent. Get down here in this river and be baptized because the coming One will baptize you with fire."

Getting ready for Christ's coming involves more than conjuring up warm, spiritual feelings. It means heeding the warning. He's coming with a pitch fork and there is going to be fire.

I knew a couple that was chronically late for church. Regardless the weather, they showed up twenty minutes late. You could set your watch by them. They walked in at 9:50 a.m. I got the nerve to ask the Mr. Why they were always late. He shook his head and said, "It takes the Mrs. Forever to put on her make-up." She appeared to apply the make-up with a putty knife. People who had known here for years had never seen her without cosmetics, and were curious what she really looked like.

On Monday I scanned the check-out line tabloids at Meijer's. The headline was, "STARS CAPTURED WITHOUT MAKE-UP." Of course, the pictures of Barbara Streisand and whoever else those other women were, were not flattering. Do you know how they looked? Like the ordinary, average people pushing shopping carts around the store; like "one-pant-leg-at-a-time people." People like you and me who know they aren't the people they should be.

If I said that John the Baptist was preaching here next Sunday, would you come? Probably not. If the word got out, multitudes would show up because they want to be ready, because they're willing to handle the truth, and want to experience personal transformation.

What if I said Joan Chittister will preach next Sunday? She's a Benedictine nun and a social psychologist. Sounds tame, huh? She's a female version of John. She's a devout woman whose faith compels her to speak her mind, no matter who is listening. "Nowhere in the Bible does it say Jesus didn't want to rock the boat," she says. She has challenged the Catholic hierarchy on its stance against the ordination of women. She criticizes the institutional churches of our country that aren't speaking out on the urgent issues of our day-- churches which she says, "are run by establishment-comfy, offering-conscious clergy who would rather bind up the wounds made by the system, but do nothing to change the system that is doing the wounding."

In a recent address to 4,00 Presbyterian women, Sister Joan told what a trillion dollars could do. Listen closely. If you were to count a trillion one dollar bills, one per second, 24 hours a day, it would take 32 years to count it all. A trillion dollars could buy a $100,000 house for every family in Kansas, Missouri, Nebraska, Oklahoma, and Iowa and put a $10,000 car in each home. With the money left over you could build 250 $10 million dollar hospitals and 250 $10 million libraries, one for every city in those states. There would be enough left over to put in the bank, and from the interest alone, pay 10,000 teachers and 10,000 nurses and give a $5,000 bonus to each family in those five states.

To put it into perspective, our government has spent over one trillion on the Star Wars defense system that most respected scientists say can't work. We put more money into weapons than all human development programs put together. And one out of six Americans can't afford insurance, and Medicare benefits are being cut and schools are being told to make do with less money.

Jesus said, "The truth will make you free." And someone added, "But first it will make you squirm" What we need is not always what we enjoy. Holding the light of God's truth up to you and me, the church, and our society casts dark shadows. And yet, as much as we dread the thought of standing before God, stripped of our worldly recognition and possessions, and rationalizations, defenses, and hollow pretensions, there is also a part of us that wants it. With only a little file folder of credits and a file cabinet full of debits we will stand there. Yet unnerving as the thought is, we want to be known, not as we think we are, but as we really are.

Multitudes went to hear John, not preachers like me. They didn't go to the wilderness just to be scared for entertainment the way some people do on roller coasters. They wanted to now the truth about themselves and what was needed to change. John's job was to get us ready for the featured attraction. He is not our judge, thank God. Jesus is. He baptizes with fire, not a destructive fire, but the fire that melts us down, purifies, refines, and makes us malleable.

We can stay as we are, keeping a safe distance, and approach the celebration of Christmas as we have before, or we can decide not to run. We can hand ourselves over, and as one insightful person said to God in a prayer:

"Here I am, see me the way I really am, tell me the whole truth about myself, refine me, transform me, baptize me with the Holy Spirit and with fire and damn the torpedoes. I give up trying to figure out how good or bad I am. I give up trying to be God. You be the judge. You be God. You have better credentials anyway."

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