Homily for
the Fourth Sunday of Advent (For the ME Bible Study Group) (Cycle C)
TO PREACH AND TO BAPTIZE
(Under the
previous topic “Religion and Civil Society” - Part II)
As religious and social reformers,
what did John the Baptist and Jesus Christ came to do in the desert or
wilderness? It was to preach and to baptize (Mt. 3:1,11).
Both John the Baptist and Jesus
Christ preached repentance and the forgiveness of sins (Mt. 3:1-2; Mk. 1:4,15;
Acts 13:24, 38).
The gospel for the 3rd
Sunday of Advent taken from Lk.3:7-18, puts down clearly the call to repentance
and the subsequent forgiveness of sins. Various kinds of people came to John to
ask him what they should do to show repentance and to merit forgiveness: the
religious Jews (vv. 7-9), the rich
people (vv. 10-11), the tax collectors who were agents of the foreign
government (vv.12-13), and the Roman soldiers (v. 14). This call was the call
of the reformers in the wilderness or the desert.
To the religious Jews, John the
Baptist had this to say, “You brood of vipers, who warned you to fly from the
retribution that is coming? But if you are repentant, produce the appropriate
fruits, and do not think of telling yourselves, “We have Abraham for our
father”, because, I tell you, God can raise children for Abraham from these
stones. Yes, even now the axe is laid to the roots of the trees, so that any
tree which fails to produce good fruits will be cut down and thrown on the
fire” (Lk. 3:7-9).
These are very powerful words, as
you may guess, for these people who call themselves as religious in the sense
that they thought to have complied all their lives with even the smallest
requirements of the laws of their religion. But because they had been deceived
by the magnificent outward show of the richness of their religion, they did not
realize that the religion they had grown up with and had followed blindly is no
longer the true religion of God (which is Faith) but which was now merely a
religion of man (which is of natural religion, or paganism, a mere invention of
men).
(If
there is much time and the people are very interested to know the difference
between faith and natural religion, then briefly explain by use of a chart. If
not proceed as laid out here, and go to the next point).
Only
true faith in God, through Jesus Christ who is the mediator between God and
man, has the power to forgive all sins, past and present, great and small. This
is the first moment of salvation, the objective redemption of man by Jesus
Christ’s death on the cross (ref. Acts 2:21; Rom. 10:9-13; 1:16-17; Gal.
2:16-17; Ph. 3:9; Tt. 3:4-8; Ep. 2:8-9).
After
the person becomes a believer once he had already received the faith, he is now
ready to support his faith with good works, for “Faith without works is dead”
(Jas. 2:26). This is now the second and final moment of salvation, which is
salvation from the punishment of hellfire. This kind of salvation has not yet
occurred for as long as a person is physically alive. This salvation is
reserved after the final judgment (Lk. 21:28; Heb. 10:37-38; 9:27; 1 Thes.
4:13-18). These good works are the appropriate and good fruits that John the
Baptist was talking about: “I tell you even now the axe is laid to the roots of
the trees, so that any tree which fails to produce good fruits will be cut down
and thrown on the fire” (Lk. 3:9).
The
fruit then that faith produces, that a believer produces, which are the good
works, will save him for the second time from the punishment which is to come.
The religious Jews were filled
with consternation upon hearing such words of John the Baptist, because they
thought that all the good works they were performing in the context of religion
were justifying them before the eyes of God by presuming to have faith in God
since they were or descendant of Abraham who is the father of faith. But John
told them that “even from these stones God can raise children for Abraham” (Lk.
3:8). They thought of themselves, therefore, as God-fearing by reason of the
faith of Abraham, but they themselves were now worshipping a false god (Gal.
4:8-9).
To the rich people who came, John
the Baptist had these words to say: “If anyone has two tunics, he must share
with the man who has none, and the one with something to eat must do the same”
(vv. 10-11). For John, this is social justice, which is an important moral
doctrine of the desert or wilderness. Since the desert is an adverse and
hostile environment, the very nature of the place imposes upon te rich the
obligation to share to the others those things which he possesses in excess or
in abundance.
The tax collectors were Jews who
subcontracted to the foreign government the work of tax collection. Usually,
they pay in advance the Roman government the taxes supposed to be paid yet by
or collected from one province, district, village, town or city, and later on
collect from the people their tax dues. The tax collectors make large profits
for themselves by raising the tariffs on land, goods, services and properties
from the populace, which tariffs could be lower if the foreigners themselves
collected directly from the people. That was the reason why during those times,
tax collectors were considered by the Jews as sinners in line with the pagans
and the Samaritans.
For these tax collectors, the word
of advice from John the Baptist as, “Exact no more than you should rate” (vv.
12-13).
Even the Roman soldiers came up to
John for some word of advice. These soldiers were the only Roman officials who
were conspicuous enough to the people as they went about their duties as
maintainers of Roman power and presence in the Palestinian province. They were
encountered by the people in almost all their daily transactions.
John the Baptist’s word for these
soldiers, therefore, was as follows: “No intimidation! No extortion! Be content
with your pay” (v. 14).
All these precise and sharp
answers of John the Baptist to various kinds of people, especially the ones
already mentioned in the gospel story because they were the powerful people of
John and Jesus’ society, showed to us the kind of moral demands which these
social and religious reformers exacted in the desert or wilderness where they
preached repentance.
It is no longer mentioned in the
gospel story whether these people were willing or not to subject themselves to
such standards, but that point is no longer important to us. Our immediate
concern is to show how important these moral standards were, vis-à-vis the
kinds of society to which these moral standards were applied by the reformers.
Remember that these reforms were being launched from the desert. This desert
morality was an important part in the reformers’ (John and Jesus) preaching,
hence these moral doctrines from the desert spelled out very clearly the kind
of social and religious reform they were into. The seriousness and timeliness
of the preaching and the teachings of both John and Jesus showed how serious
the corruption, ineptitude and anomaly of their society and religion in those
times.
That was why, people were seeking
reform by escaping and seeking refuge in the desert away from normal social
life (Acts 7:23-30). Thus, the reformers of the caliber of John the Baptist and
Jesus Christ were given to them. These reformers were successful enough in
shaking and shocking their society and their religion to the very foundations,
which retaliated by killing the reformers just like all the rest of the
prophets that God sent to Israel before them.
Because of his success, John the
Baptist was being looked up to by the people as the promised Christ (Messiah)
that was to come. But John frankly and openly told the people, “I baptize you
with water, but someone is coming, someone who is more powerful than I am, and
I am not fir to undo the strap of his sandals; he will baptize you with the
Holy Spirit and fire. His winnowing fan is in his hand to clear his threshing floor
and to gather the wheat into his barn; but the chaff he will burn in a fire
that will never go out” (Lk. 3:15-18; Acts 13:23-25).
Let us now go to the second part
of the reformers’ work, which was to baptize.
The gospel for this Fourth Sunday
of Advent is about the annunciation story. The story of the annunciation of the
angel to the Virgin Mary is likewise an important step in Christian baptism.
The birth of the Christ (Messiah)
was announced by an angel to Mary. This announcement is the same as the announcement
made by an evangelist (or catechist evangelist) to a person regarding the
message or the good news of salvation, which is the very first step towards
baptism, and which process was enunciated by Jesus Christ himself when he said,
“All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go, therefore, make
disciples of all the nations, baptize them in the name of the Father and of the
Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teach them to observe all the commands I gave
you…” (Mt. 28:19-20).
How should the apostle carry out
the work of making disciples of all the nations? The gospel of Mark will tell
us, “Go out to the whole world: proclaim the good news to all creation…” (Mk.
16:16).
And, hence, part and parcel of the
religious reformer’s work was also to baptize in accordance with these
injunction of Jesus Christ.
John baptized with the water of
repentance (Mt. 3:11; Acts 13:24), while Jesus Christ baptized with the Holy
Spirit and with fire (Mt. 3:11; Jh. 1:33; 4:1). Both baptism with water and the
Holy Spirit which John the Baptist and Jesus performed was necessary for
salvation (Jh. 3:5). That is why, Christian baptism is both a baptism with
water and the Holy Spirit (Mt. 10:38-39; Acts 2:38; 2:34; 8:38; 10:44-47;
19:2,6; Titus 3:5; 1 Jh. 5:6-8).
Hence, the Christian practice to
baptize with water and Holy Spirit, therefore, had originated in the preaching
practice of these two religious reformers, John and Jesus, in the desert.
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