pat loughery

Tonight in our small group we talked about the ways that we’re hoping to grow in our faith during this season. Although we’re all at different places in our faith walk, we’re all seeking something, responding to something and hoping for something. We’re longing for something more and better.

This idea fits well into the season of the church calendar – Advent. In the Orthodox and Celtic churches, Advent is a 40-day preparation period before Christmas, much like Lent is a 40-day preparation period before Christmas. In much of the church, Advent is 4 weeks long and is a time of hopeful expectation.

This season asks us to prepare ourselves for the arrival of Jesus in the Christmas celebration. We remember and we relive the arrival of God’s imminent presence among us in the person of Jesus.

Each of the four Gospel stories introduces the arrival of Jesus among us – two with what we think of as Christmas stories (Matthew and Luke), and the other two with different perspectives. Our group will look through these stories, and tonight we began with the version in Mark.

In this story, my favorite desert monk, John the Baptist, announces the arrival of God’s imminent presence on the planet in stark terms.

1The beginning of the gospel about Jesus Christ, the Son of God.

2It is written in Isaiah the prophet:

“I will send my messenger ahead of you,

who will prepare your way”—

3″a voice of one calling in the desert,

‘Prepare the way for the Lord,

make straight paths for him.’ “

4And so John came, baptizing in the desert region and preaching a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. 5The whole Judean countryside and all the people of Jerusalem went out to him. Confessing their sins, they were baptized by him in the Jordan River. 6John wore clothing made of camel’s hair, with a leather belt around his waist, and he ate locusts and wild honey. 7And this was his message: “After me will come one more powerful than I, the thongs of whose sandals I am not worthy to stoop down and untie. 8I baptize you with[d] water, but he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit.”

Mark 1:1-8

John’s announcement is: Sweep the paths; bulldoze the roads; whatever is between you and your God, clean it up. Repent, confess, be baptized. Prepare for something transcendent.

And John’s method is important also: Renouncing power, status, position and authority, John lived simply, scavenging from the land, and pointing his hearers away from himself and to the One who was coming.

May we say and do likewise.