further reflection:
1. Describe an “ending” (perhaps painful) in your own life, without which you’d be a very different person.
2. With Augie, what place in your neighborhood would you like to photograph each day at the exact same time?
4. The Ax at the Root
“Even now the ax is lying at the root of the trees” (Matt 3:10).
I remember this guy named Gus while hiking the Appalachian Trail through Pennsylvania over thirty years ago. My wife, Cindy, and I were on a rather remote section of the trail, hadn’t seen anyone all day, rounded a bend, and out jumped this crazy-looking guy from the bushes, waving a machete. I was certain, at first, that we’d entered a dark scene from a Stephen King novel. Who in the world carries a heavy machete on the trail except someone with a screw or two fairly loose?
But Gus was a harmless, if rather eccentric, sort of guy. We’d startled him. He hadn’t seen anyone for a couple of days. We hiked with Gus for most of a week and came to like him very much, admiring his knowledge of plants. The following winter we received a post card from Key West, but haven’t heard from him since. I still think about Gus from time to time as I come upon a blind curve on trails I happen to hike.
*
John the Baptist jumps into our path each December on the way to the manger. We know he’s out there in the wilderness, an annual character in any serious Advent journey. But the startling appearance in his skimpy wardrobe with accompanying meager diet still seems so jarring amidst the Christmas lights, joyous angels, and sugar plum fairies. There’s a part of me that always asks: What’s this guy doing here anyway, ruining Christmas for us all?
Perhaps you have a manger scene at home, retrieved annually from the attic—Mary, Joseph, the baby; shepherds, a trio of wise men. We have manger and crèche scenes from all over the world in our house. My wife’s maiden name is Christmas (no kidding). She loves the season even though she married a Scrooge. We have multiple boxes of Bethlehem delights, hailing the wondrous birth. The holy family hangs out in our den all the way until Ash Wednesday.
But I’m wondering if you have a miniature facsimile of John the Baptist placed on the mantle alongside the other starring characters? Somebody gave us John a few years ago and he has a place in our library on the shelves. But he’s not been given permission to enter the holy of holies: the Christmas tree room. I may sneak him in this year and see if anyone notices.
There’s something about John the Baptist that takes us by surprise every year. He jumps out at us from the shadows like a Rottweiler who hasn’t eaten in awhile. He doesn’t have a machete, but he does carry an ax and I’ve no doubt the man means business. I know he’s coming, but he jumps out from behind centuries of bushes on our Advent trail and surprises me every year.
I find it interesting that all four Gospels begin (in the early chapters) with John the Baptist in the wilderness, calling God’s people to repentance and change. But only two of the Gospels bother to mention the birth of Jesus and the details we’ve come to know and love. John stands in a long line of prophets (some thought he was Elijah, back again) who confronted safe and comfortable faith. “There’s nothing safe about God,” John seems to say. “You see this ax lying here? God means to chop away all this stuff in your life that gets in the way of producing good fruit. The Coming One will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire” (Matt 3:11). The Greek word here for “fire” is interesting. It’s the word pur. We get our English word purify from this same root. Jesus means to come into our lives and burn away the chaff, purifying our lives with his love, grace, and yes, judgment.
This is not a popular image of Jesus, especially for Lutherans, and especially during Advent. The story seems too sweet to accommodate someone like John. We want to swaddle and coo over and protect little Jesus from mean old Herod. In doing so, it’s easy to forget why he came.
One of my earlier books is a slim volume on the topic of sanctification.5 It’s an important word that Lutherans tend to forget because we’ve been steeped in (and brought along by) the important phrase: “justification by grace through faith”—Luther’s great Reformation insight fueled by his close readings in the book of Romans and many other places in the Bible. Lutherans have forgotten much of the Bible, but we do know that a core teaching of the faith is the forgiveness of sins won by Christ on a cross.
A challenge among Lutherans is that we often think that’s the entire extent of Christianity. I’ve always loved the story of a Lebanese seminary student who came to the United States to study in a mainline Protestant seminary. In exasperation, he finally said in class one day: “All you Americans care about is justification! You love sinning and being forgiven, sinning and being forgiven, but no one seems to want off that hamster wheel. Have you ever heard of sanctification? Is anyone interested in learning to sin a little less?”6 It’s tough for Lutherans to talk about these things without feeling that we’re compromising our core conviction of grace. Jesus certainly came to this world—was born joyously into it—to forgive our sins. But even a cursory examination of his teachings reveals that he also came to show us a new way to live together. There was a post-communion prayer in one of our old worship books that we’ve now largely retired: “Almighty God, you gave your Son both as a sacrifice for sin and a model of the godly life.” It’s not one or the other. Jesus is interested in both.
And so John shows up every Advent to remind us. He shows up with ax and fire. Not so much to threaten infidels like me, but as a reminder that following Jesus, paying attention to his teachings, means that I’ll have to knock off and cease certain behaviors. That I’ll be open to the change that the Spirit is trying to effect in me. That I won’t be content with sweetness and sentiment when it comes to church life. “The ax is lying at the root of the trees.” Jesus means to forgive us, but he also means to change and convert us more and more into his likeness. Machete time with our Lord.
I won’t lie. This is hard and often uncomfortable work. And it may be that we’ve missed this about Jesus even though we’ve been a member of a church all our lives. “Do not presume to say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham as our ancestor’” (Matt 3:9). John is basically saying: “Don’t think that four generations of your relatives connected to a congregation gets you any special consideration in your stature before Christ.” Jesus is coming with fire and ax to burn and cut away all that separates us from God, regardless of one’s personal congregational pedigree. John is telling us the truth. And I think we long to hear the truth—long for national leaders who will speak honestly and straightforwardly with us. Who will not lie to us or lead us on. John spoke the truth in the wilderness and people flocked out there to hear him.
*
It might be wise each Advent to recall a scene from The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, the opening book in C. S. Lewis’s stories about Narnia. The kids—Edmund, Lucy, Peter, and Susan—step through the wardrobe into a new land and begin to sense the evil of the White Witch and the hopeful returning power of Aslan the Lion to the woods. (Aslan is the Christ figure in these stories.)
The children are befriended by the Beaver family and the conversation turns to the fears of Mr. and Mrs. Beaver, but also their hope in Aslan, the great Lion:
“Ooh!” said Susan, “I’d thought he was a man. Is he—quite safe? I shall feel rather nervous about meeting a lion.”
“That you will dearie, and make no mistake,” said Mrs. Beaver, “if there’s anyone who can appear before Aslan without their knees knocking, they’re either braver than most or
