A, The Second Sunday of Advent - Matthew 3:10-12 "Three Fires:Destruction,Spirit,Refinement "

Matthew 3:10–12 (ESV) Even now the axe is laid to the root of the trees. Every tree therefore that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire.  “I baptize you with water for repentance, but he who is coming after me is mightier than I, whose sandals I am not worthy to carry. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire.  His winnowing fork is in his hand, and he will clear his threshing floor and gather his wheat into the barn, but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire.”

It looks like a forest full of eucalyptus trees, but on closer inspection the trees are in uniform rows and not scattered like they are in a forest.  No! These eucalyptus trees are a plantation grown for the purpose of harvesting hardwood. Because the trees were all planted at the same time they have competed for sunlight and have grown tall and straight to make good timber for construction. 

One week the plantation stands tall, and then in a relatively short time it’s flattened.  The timber is harvested.  It goes on to serve its purposes for many years to come.  But the dying limbs and leaves are pushed into piles and burnt.

The plantation forest is a dismal sight compared to its former self. The only thing left is stumps.  Over time the seemingly dead stumps show signs of life and green shoots appear.  Within a year or so, these shoots form a mass of leafy bushes growing out of the stumps.  But these eucalyptus bushes that replace the tall trunks from the tree’s former life are stunted and twisted — not good for any use.

In time the owner of the field looks to a new type of harvest, the collection of electricity in a solar farm.  But first, the stumps are laboriously and painstakingly dug up one by one and burnt with the now dying leafy bushes.  Then the land can be cleared and cleaned for a solar farm to be constructed.

Matthew’s Gospel reports John the Baptist accusing the Pharisees and Sadducees of being a “brood of vipers”, to “bear fruit in keeping with repentance”, if they were “to flee from the wrath to come.” (Matthew 3:7-8)  John refers to them as the trees at which an axe is laid at the roots waiting to see what type of fruit is produced.

Last week we heard Jesus speak about signs of his coming. With the picture of the fig sending out shoots as a sign, we hear about bearing fruit in keeping with repentance.   Here we are reminded of the fig again, when Jesus curses a fig tree for not bearing fruit as he walks the way of the cross to bear the bad fruit of humanity.

On the day after Palm Sunday, Jesus, in hunger, seeing a fig tree, “found nothing on it but only leaves. And he said to it, ‘May no fruit ever come from you again!’ And the fig tree withered at once.” (Matthew 21:19 ESV)

These decisive words from Jesus’ mouth destroy the fig tree. Similarly, John the Baptist’s words to the Pharisees and Sadducees are equally significant as he warns of their destruction without the fruit of repentance.

Three times John speaks of fire.  First, trees are cut down and thrown into the fire.  These trees are those that are not repentant.  The Pharisees and the Sadducees have arrived to see what John was doing at the Jordan River.  Perhaps some were intending to be baptised with others who were fruitful in confessing their sins.  Were they coming to flee the coming wrath through repentance, by confessing their sin?  Or were they coming to make a show before others who were confessing sin and being baptised with a baptism of repentance?  Either way John warns that the axe lies in wait!

Second, John compares his baptism of repentance with the coming of Jesus, saying, “I baptize you with water for repentance, but he who is coming after me is mightier than I, whose sandals I am not worthy to carry. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire.” (Matthew 3:11 ESV)

Here John connects Jesus’ baptism in (by, or with) a baptism of the Holy Spirit and fire.  This is John’s second mention of fire.  We know that tongues of fire appeared at Pentecost when the Holy Spirit was given.  This was good fire.  When Jesus was baptised by John in the Jordan, he was baptised to fulfil all righteousness.  The fulfilling of all righteousness meant Jesus faced the fires of hell and death at the cross and gained victory over the fires of hell that were meant for us.  This is also good fire, when we allow the judgement to fall on Jesus at the cross through our confession of repentance.  Otherwise, as John rightly mentions these fires of judgement await all those who stand stubbornly unrepentant and will be chopped down and burnt bearing their unrepentant sin.  Then the fire becomes dire and deadly!

John mentions fire a third time to the Pharisees and Sadducees after Jesus winnows the wheat from the chaff that burns with an unquenchable fire. 

Unquenchable fire paints an ugly picture of those whose unquenchable passions resist the refining fires of the Holy Spirit.  Like one in the path of a raging unquenchable bushfire, so too is one who does not allow the Holy Spirit to backburn the human heart and the unquenchable sin that lies within.

Fire may be frightening, but I put it to you, a life “without fire” can also be frightening.  Since the first humans worked out how to make fire, we rely on it for everything.  Without fire, we all bathe in cold water, all food is cold and uncooked, and warmth in winter is just a memory.  Without fire, minerals stay in the ground and never become the metals relied upon in every part of modern life.

One might think fire and peace are mutually exclusive of each other.  The three fires John the Baptist proclaims speak differently. 

The first fire is the promise of destruction for all those who reject the two fires that follow.  Rightly, this fire fills hearts with fear.  As Luther says of Holy Baptism in his Small Catechism, “our sinful self, with all its evil deeds and desires, should be drowned through daily repentance; and that day after day a new self should arise to live with God in righteousness and purity forever.”  In other words, in the face of this fire, we flee to the cross as knowledge about our sinful selves is daily brought to light.  Like the Prodigal Son in whom the Holy Spirit wins out over the human spirit, you and I are prodigals brought to a right mind and daily returned to the graciousness of God the Father, in his Son Jesus Christ!

We are returned to the second fire which John proclaims!  This is the baptism of Jesus in the Holy Spirit and fire.  In fact, this second fire is essential to overcome the first fire! 

In his baptism Jesus was baptised into the fires of humanity’s sin — your sin!  Having put aside his divinity as the Son of God, as the Son of Man in human flesh in his baptism he received the Holy Spirit on which he relied, to sinlessly be the sacrifice for our sin — your sin! 

Just as under the old covenant God lovingly consumed the sacrifices for the atonement of sin by fire, God joyfully receives the sacrifice of our sinful pride, as we confess our sins in repentance.  Humility is a small price to pay for the reception of Jesus Christ’s sinless death,  for our sin that deserves death and the eternal fires of hell.

In light of Jesus’ sacrifice, the need to make fiery sacrifices under the Law is finished.  All who know their works are not good enough for salvation would agree this fire is very good.  Just like fire is very good for cooking food, washing oneself, and for feeling warm!  The fire of the Holy Spirit that allows us to burn our sins in repentance through Christ is truly very good.  This fire makes us warm when we are cold!  It makes us warm in Christ, as he takes the coldness of death on himself on the cross.

Where the forest, the plantation of Israel was destroyed and thrown into the fire, Jesus has become Israel for the repentant, and we the church are his body of repentant confessing believers.   Jesus is Israel’s shoot from the stump of Jesse, and now stands as the tall, towering trunk into which the church is grafted. 

The Spirit of the Lord that rested upon him, rests upon the repentant church.  This is the Holy Spirit that gives wisdom and understanding, counsel and might, knowledge and fear of the Lord to the body of Christ – his holy church.  Despite our humanity looking like a fruitless fig tree, Jesus does not judge us by what he sees or hears, but by his righteousness sifting the wheat of Holy Spirit-germinated righteousness from the chaff of our humanity.

This brings us to the third fire after Jesus winnows or sifts us.  As we live in Christ, daily allowing the death of self in our baptism and being raised to life in the resurrection of Jesus, we are refined  by the fires of the Holy Spirit in Jesus’ death and resurrection.  The fruit of the Spirit is sifted from the chaff of our humanity.  We are being constantly pruned and used as pieces of Holy Spirit-treated timber for the building of Christ’s church on earth. We are Holy Spirit-refined wheat, cleansed to be germinators of God’s word wherever he’s put each of us in this world.

The Advent candle of peace is lit!  Let the peace of God burn in you as the Holy Spirit leads you in your repentance and confession for the forgiveness of sin.  You have been grafted into Christ to bear the fruit of Christ to others.   In the name of Jesus Christ, you are fruitful — let grace and peace be multiplied in you as the Holy Spirit makes him known to you. 

Let the Holy Spirit make you fruitful and faithful in Christ!  May his fire warm your heart, refine your spirit, and strengthen your witness. And may the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus, now and always. Amen. 

A, The Second Sunday of Advent - Romans 15:1-7,13 "Advent Pleasure"

God has placed you and me, on this earth, at this time, and in this place, we know as Australia.  Living in Australia, along with the rest of the western world, we are privileged to experience a lifestyle that many in the world don’t get to experience.  We have been blessed with prosperity that gives way to pleasures, people in other parts of the world would not even be able to begin to imagine.

At this time and in this place, with this privileged prosperity and its pleasure, people are experiencing suffering at a level never experienced before.  The pleasure, privilege and prosperity that is our expectation from life, takes the prosperity, the privilege, and the pleasure for granted, rather than receiving these things as a gift with thanksgiving to God. 

At this time and place we find our pleasure no longer gives pleasure, our privilege reveals selfish partiality, and our prosperity exposes our poverty.  We suffer at the hands of our pleasures to such a degree, people in other parts of the world would not even be able to begin to imagine.

Advent is the season for hope and peace, joy and love.  A season for waiting.  A season of patience.  A season to depart from the darkness and be delivered into the light of new life.  And a season of expectation to receive and pass on the gift of forgiveness.

John the Baptist came baptising with a baptism for repentance.  There was expectation the Messiah, was coming.  Israel and the Jews had not experienced any revelation from God, for approximately four hundred years.

There was hope, and where there’s hope one prepares oneself for what one is waiting.  Expectation of the Messiah meant many were flocking to the Jordan River, where John was baptising with a baptism of repentance. 

Over the course of one thousand years, the Israelites lived in prosperity, privilege, and pleasure, given by God through King David and others.  But in the time and place of John the Baptist this was all just a distant memory.

The pleasures of Israel no longer gave them pleasure.  The privilege given to the people of God was lost.  And the prosperity of God’s chosen nation, was taken and tossed about between the powers that overran them.

In this time and in this place, you and I suffer at the hand of pleasures that no longer please, you and I suffer at the hands of prosperity that no longer prospers, and you and I suffer at the hands of privileges that enslave.

Perhaps like the Israelites it’s time to turn from what’s within to that which we have been without!  What is it that you have been without?  Hope?  Peace?  Joy?  Love?

Instead of hope, our society today promotes, wanting without the waiting.   Patient expectation through endurance and encouragement, waiting for the fullness of time, where a community wills one in its group to grow and mature, is impatiently shoved out of the way.  Growth and development are trampled, along with fellowship and community building, in favour of instant gratification. 

The problem being since what is wanted is easily gotten, easy come - easy go, the mirage of desire moves and something else is wanted.  Impatience prematurely gets what it wants and wastes unripe fruit.  Without waiting, one does not learn to be satisfied with what one has been given, by God.

Instead of peace, our society today promotes a peace that builds walls.  When these walls are built by us in the name of peace, fellowship is broken, and individualism ends up oppressing us.  One ends up locking oneself in on oneself.   We become slaves to the darkness within, and stuck there, find a whole bunch of loneliness and despair. 

Instead of joy, our society today promotes, sickly sweet happiness.  In one’s impatience we can’t wait for the fullness of time.  We eat unripe fruit, and it sours the second it hits our palette.  So, we go looking for artificial happiness.

Happiness is different to joy.  Joy is built by people in community creating fellowship, while happiness can be celebrated by an individual without any outside influence.  Artificial happiness is saccharine and extreme and it’s usually found to be a cover for loneliness and despair.

Instead of love, our society today promotes unleashed desire.  Rights revealing what is wrong with us and our society, while our wrongs are recognised as right.   Love is no longer about sacrificed and service, but rather about satisfaction of feelings. 

However, two things are experienced when love is centred on the self.  First, confusion and chaos rules as each person’s love competes for supremacy.  Second, people seek satisfaction that’s never fulfilled.   The more one desires this kind of love, the more allusive love proves to be!

In the season of Advent, in this time and place in history, we find ourselves between two competing realities.  The hope, peace, joy and love of Christ’s coming has been departed from and  forgotten in favour of the advent of new and renewed human ideals. 

So, what have we found there?  The advent of new and renewed ways of suffering!         

Now we might think this is a terrible thing.  It might be, if it continues to deliver us into the darkness of ourselves.  However, this is also the time and place of great opportunity for true hope, peace, joy, and love, in its advent through Jesus Christ.   Jesus says, “Behold, I stand at the door and knock.”  (Revelation 3:20a ESV)

Every day and in every place, Jesus, through the power of the Holy Spirit, meets you in the suffering of those in our society.  Jesus makes his Advent to them through you, allowing the Holy Spirit to bring sufferers to the Advent of Jesus’ suffering and death for true hope, peace, joy, and love!

Saint Paul describes Jesus’ Advent of knocking and waiting in this way, “We who are strong have an obligation to bear with the failings of the weak, and not to please ourselves.  Let each of us please his neighbour for his good, to build him up.  For Christ did not please himself, but as it is written, ‘The reproaches of those who reproached you fell on me’”.  (Romans 15:1–3 ESV)

While we please ourselves, we follow the ways of the world, in the same way as did the Israelites.  One’s suffering at the hands of seeking these pleasures, is a reminder Jesus continually sends the Holy Spirit knocking on our doors.  To enter and forgive.  To restore and return us through Jesus’ suffering and victory on the cross.  To see in our forgiveness, the pleasure of God to forgive those who have not the will nor the way to turn to the Saviour who suffered for humanity.

Just as those waited for the coming of a messiah in the time and place of John the Baptist, we continually wait for the final Advent of the Messiah, Jesus Christ.  As we wait for this final most glorious and treasured advent, like those in John’s day, we allow ourselves to be prepared for Jesus’ final victorious Advent.  

The Holy Spirit prepares us by leading us from our sinful suffering into the Word of God, where we endure and are encouraged.  This is also the place and the time in which Jesus makes his Advent through us.  He returns us to his first Advent where he saved us through our baptism into his death and resurrection.   

As we rightly suffer reproaches for being in Christ, know the reproaches of those who reproach you fall on Jesus.  Paul points us to God and his word, “For whatever was written in former days was written for our instruction, that through endurance and through the encouragement of the Scriptures we might have hope.  May the God of endurance and encouragement grant you to live in such harmony with one another, in accord with Christ Jesus, that together you may with one voice glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.  Therefore welcome one another as Christ has welcomed you, for the glory of God.” (Romans 15:4–7 ESV)

The strange thing that occurs when God leads us from our suffering as a result of seeking our pleasures to suffering for the things that please God, we find ourselves waiting in hope, living in peace with joy and love, for those who suffer at the hands of seeking their pleasure, as well as with those who suffer seeking to please God.

As puzzling and paradoxical as it might seem in this Advent, this is the profound prosperity, privilege, and pleasure God seeks for all who suffer within, without him!

May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that by the power of the Holy Spirit you may abound in hope.  (Romans 15:13 ESV)

Amen.