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PERICOPE STUDY
CENTER FOR THEOLOGY, LRC
Third Sunday in Advent -
December 14, 2003
The First Lesson: Zephaniah 3:14-20
Sing aloud, O daughter of Zion; shout, O Israel! Rejoice and exult with all your heart, O daughter of Jerusalem! The LORD has taken away the judgments against you, he has cast out your enemies. The King of Israel, the LORD, is in your midst; you shall fear evil no more. On that Day it shall be said to Jerusalem: "Do not fear, O Zion; let not your hands grow weak. The LORD, your God, is in your midst, a warrior who gives victory; he will rejoice over you with gladness, he will renew you in his love; he will exult over you with loud singing as on a day of festival. "I will remove disaster from you, so that you will not bear reproach for it. Behold, at that time I will deal with all your oppressors. And I will save the lame and gather the outcast, and I will change their shame into praise and renown in all the earth. At that time I will bring you home, at the time when I gather you together; yea, I will make you renowned and praised among all the peoples of the earth, when I restore your fortunes before your eyes, says the LORD.
1 Zephaniah traces his ancestry to Hezekiah (1:1) and probably did his prophetic calling slightly in advance of the Josiah reform, say the decade of 630 BC. The Oxford editor notes that Zephaniah is silent in any denunciation of the king personally, and has "intimate knowledge of Jerusalem and its court circles," which together with his failure to voice concern for the poor of the land "support the inference that he was of royal descent. His main message is one of condemnation for corrupt practices and religious perversions, all of them "officially legislated against by Deuteronomy," which suggests again that he prophesied in advance of the Josiah reform (621 BC). The brief three chapters are thematically thus: the first proclaims doom upon Jerusalem for its idolatry (religious syncretism). The second extends the divine judgment to other nations, also guilty. The third, from which this selection is the ending section of chapter and book, announces comfort and consolation, as the "inhabitants of Jerusalem … rejoice that the LORD their King is in their midst to save them and gather them home. (3:20)
2 Just yesterday in Sunday School we were reading of the "Josiah reform," as prelude to the fall of Jerusalem. Among the idolatries to Baal and Asherah and "the constellations" and burning incense to Asherah from Geba to Beer-sheba … among those idolatries were the following two, which I had never known made an appearance in Israel or Judah. From II Kings 23:7 - "And he broke down the houses of the male cult prostitutes (sodomites) which were in the house of the LORD." And from II Kings 23:10 - "And he defiled Topheth, which is in the valley of the sons of Hinnom, so that no one might burn his son or his daughter as an offering to Molech." Male prostitutes in the temple of the LORD? Molech worship in the valley of Hinnom, sacrificing children in the maw of the barbarous pagan deity?
3 Josiah was himself a radically repentant man, and it counted for something with the LORD. Not much, but something. In the words of Huldah the prophetess, speaking for God: "Because they have forsaken me and have burned incense to other gods, that they might provoke me to anger with all the work of their hands, therefore my wrath will be kindled against this place, and it will not be quenched. But as to the king of Judah (Josiah) who sent you (Hilkiah the priest, et alia) to inquire of the LORD, thus shall you say to him, Thus says the LORD, the God of Israel: Regarding the words which you have heard, because your heart was penitent, and you humbled yourself before the LORD, when you heard how I spoke against this place, and against its inhabitants, that they should become a desolation and a curse, and you have rent your clothes and wept before me, I also have heard you, says the LORD. Therefore, behold, I will gather you to your fathers, and you shall be gathered to your grave in peace, and your eyes shall not see all the evil which I will bring upon this place." (II Kings 22:17-20) Josiah perished in a skirmish with the king of Egypt, in advance of the Babylonian debacle.
4 Zephaniah pronounces the familiar judgments - omitting the sodomy and the child sacrifice - and then moves to his ending, the joyous hymn of restoration. With God as both warrior and advocate, Judah shall be restored, a commentary that God's grace comes, even in the Sinai Covenant, after the judgment.
5 Molech and the temple sodomites - quite a pair. Sound familiar? Religious legitimation of homosexual behavior … sodomy in the temple, blessing a relationship in the chapel. Sacrificing children to the maw of Molech … sacrificing children unborn to the god of the Self and Self-determination. How much difference, finally? Kyrie eleison!
JLY - 12.08.03
THIRD SUNDAY IN ADVENT
DECEMBER 14, 2003
LUKE 3:7-18
The message of Jesus' birth has been told, beginning with the account of the birth of John the Baptizer. Now the story of the ministry of Jesus is beginning with the account of the ministry of John the Baptizer. This is a ministry of preparing people for Jesus' ministry, making them aware of their need for the forgiveness Jesus will be bringing and providing for them. The ministry of John is going to fade away as Jesus begins with a ministry very much like that of John but then goes on to call people to faith in himself as the fulfillment of God's promises to these people and the fulfillment of His promises to all people in the world. Luke and the other evangelists show this fulfillment in the suffering and dying of Jesus on the cross and his resurrection and in His sending out disciples into all the world in all the time before the parousia. Luke will go on to tell of the beginning of this post-Resurrection ministry in the Acts of the Apostles.
Back again to Luke's account of the beginning of ministry as translated in the English Standard Version (© 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a division of Good News Publishers). In the opening verses he has established the time in relation to the rule of Rome and its subordinate governments.
3:7 He (John) said therefore to the crowds that came out to be baptized by him, "You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come? 8 Bear fruits in keeping with repentance. And do not begin to say to yourselves, 'We have Abraham as our father.' For I tell you, God is able from these stones to raise up children for Abraham. 9 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.
10 And the crowds asked him,"What then shall we do?" 11 And he answered them, "Whoever has two tunics is to share with him who has none, and whoever has food is to do likewise." 12 Tax collectors also came to be baptized and said to him, "Teacher, what shall we do?" 13 And he said to them, "Collect no more than you are authorized to do." 14 Soldiers also asked him, "And we, what shall we do? And he said to them, "Do not extort money from anyone by threats or by false accusation, and be content with your wages."
15 As the people were in expectation, and all were questioning in their hearts concerning John, whether he might be the Christ, 16 John answered them all, saying, "I baptize you with water, but he who is mightier than I is coming, the strap of whose sandals I am not worthy to untie. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and with fire. 17 His winnowing fork is in his hand, to clear his threshing floor and to gather the wheat into his barn, but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire."
18 So with many other exhortations he preached good news to the people.
It may be presumed that the people who came out to be baptized by John were paying attention to his call to repentance and therefore were at least beginning to face the reality of their sin and rebellion. If the baptism did not give forgiveness it did proclaim the need for forgiveness, for the whole Old Testament presented calls to repentance and confession of sin as the response of God's prophets and other spokesmen from Moses to Zephaniah (First Lesson) to the sin of God's people. John tells the people who have come out to admit their sin that this admission is not a matter of words only but it must involve all of life. Their repentance is to be shown in actions.
Those coming out to John were Jewish people and may have thought they were sinful people in a fortunate position because they were descendants of a man to whom God had given a promise. That promise belonged to his family also, and they were part of the family. It is one thing to face the possibility of destruction and hopelessness and another to face destruction if there is hope of escape because you are part of a special family. How lucky to be children of Abraham!
John's response to them is that they should not find their hope in their ancestry. If all God wants is descendants of Abraham he can turn the rocks on the floor of the desert around them into such. He is looking for people with Abraham's trust in God (Cf. Rom 4; Gal.3) rather than Abraham's blood, and where the former is missing the blood will not save one from God's destroying.
How lucky we are not to be atheists or Muslims or pagans but part of the Lutheran tradition of the Christian Church with a background of many generations! Could God produce that out of stones? Well, . . . perhaps. What is the good fruit in our lives that could keep us out of the fire? "What then shall we do?"
For the crowds of his day John had an answer. He did not suggest great deeds of daring but simple, everyday actions. Like sharing extra clothing or extra food. Note his definition of "extra". Is it the stuff we take to Goodwill? That is usually things we want to get rid of because they are taking up space that we could use for new clothes, things that will fit us better and keep us from being reminded that so much of our food is extra food we keep on hand and cannot ignore. It is stuff that we should not have bought in the first place and never needed. We give a shirt or blouse that just does not quite match the other things we have. He suggests sharing the things you feel you need but could do without if you had to. Think how much space that would leave in our closets.
John's response to tax collectors and military catches them where it hurts too. What could he say today to preachers and teachers, even retired ones, before he sends us with his word for other people? And where is the satisfaction in proclaiming the law to CEOs if we have to be content with our wages first?
Where did John learn so much about what was in the hearts of all those various kinds of hearers? He had been a child of Abraham but he had never been a tax collector or a soldier. It could be that he had looked into his own heart and had faced what he found there, a sinner, a viper, who had heard and felt the warning to get out of the way of the Wrath-to-come called "God". It was one sinner sharing the warning with other sinners.
There is such satisfaction in proclaiming God's law, giving warnings and condemnations, because we can understand that so well. It is so meaningful, and when done well it attracts followers. The people who heard it from John speculated that he might be the Messiah they were looking for. Perhaps it was a blessing from God that he let John be put in jail because people liked the discomfort John was able to evoke in them. It could keep them from hearing his real message.
John was sent to tell these people of the one mightier than him who was coming. It sounds like Jesus will be an even greater proclaimer of the law, able to make people burn with a fire that will never go out but will rid the world of sinners.
But the gospel according to Luke does not tell the story of a destroyer of people but a Savior of people - "To you is born this day in the city of David a Savior . . ." He does not destroy people but He is destroyed for people on the cross. The chaff He will burn is not the sinners but their sin and the guilt from it.
The call to repentance of the Advent is not the end of the story but the preparation for the call to forgiveness and faith and hope. It is a call to judgment on us but then also to see that judgment carried out on the Savior born for us. It is the ministry of Jesus that makes it possible for Luke to say that John's call to people to repent was preaching good news. It was that only as Christ brought that call to its goal in His forgiveness. It is the goal of Advent too. And it is the goal of our preaching, to preach good news to the people.
WEM
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