By Jared Warner
Willow Creek Friends Church
January 12, 2025
Click here to join our Meeting for Worship
Luke 3:15–17, 21–22 (ESV)
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 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.”
21 Now when all the people were baptized, and when Jesus also had been baptized and was praying, the heavens were opened, 22 and the Holy Spirit descended on him in bodily form, like a dove; and a voice came from heaven, “You are my beloved Son; with you I am well pleased.”
Today we are moving away from the season of Christmas and into the third period of the church calendar, epiphany. Advent was the season of expectation or holy anxiety. Christmas is also a season of holy anxiety but an anxiety of hopefulness. Epiphany is a season of revelation.
“As the people were in expectation.” It was not long ago when I discussed this passage. I spoke briefly about the holy anxiety and longing within the words. The word used in the original language has two senses the first is to await anxiously. This is often the sense I tend to fixate on. The second sense is to expect or to regard something as probable or likely.
During the season of advent we tend to focus on the first sense. We have this longing for something or someone. There is a tension building within us as we wait. This tension can have two forms one of fear and one of hope.
I find it interesting that there is often a duality in our longings. We want one thing, we long for it, we hope for it, it is something we want so badly we can hardly sit still. And as we wait there is also a fear. What will happen if what I long for actually happens. How will this change things? Will I be up for the challenge? This is what our emotions are for. They are signs that point us to something deeper.
We need these emotions they should guide us, but they should not control us. We know the expectation that these people are feeling. There are students that have tried out for a sports team and they eagerly wait to see the final roster, or a student that has auditioned for a part in the school play. You worked hard, you put your heart and soul into your try out or audition. Will I be good enough? What will I do if I actually got in? We get this feeling when we apply to Universities, or put our neck out for a promotion at work, we are hopeful for the opportunity, yet we are also terrified.
The people were out in the wilderness listening to John speak on the banks of the Jordan river, and they were longing, they were in expectation. They were in a state of anxiety but they were also prepared for what would come. They were expecting something to likely happen, they just did not know exactly how it would manifest itself.
In scriptures this word is not uncommon, but where it is used most often in the works of Luke, both in the gospel and in the Acts of the Apostles. And when Luke uses this word he uses it with both senses in thought. As we read through we can sense the movement. We feel it. We get the emotions, and we also have that almost intellectual longing, where we know this is supposed to happen and we are just eagerly waiting for it to actually occur. Then we move once again to the emotional side of things. There are waves, peaks and valleys, rises and falls. We want it and we don’t.
But want are we expecting?
“And all were questioning in their hearts.”
This term of questioning also has a few senses. The first is to actually discuss. The second is to debate internally, and the third is to think and ponder. The root of this word is where we get the term dialog from, and what we see here is an internal dialog.
The people out in that wilderness have spent their entire life longing for their Messiah. They have many ideas as to what that might look like. One view is a radical leader that would ignite a fire of nationalistic pride. They want to be their own nation, under their own king, living according to their own law. Or they wanted freedom to worship and a purely restored faith. They longed for God to once again reveal himself to them and lead them as in the days of Moses. They wanted a king, a priest and a prophet.
Their teachers have lists of scripture that they have gleaned from the various texts of Law and prophets that point to the return of the king, the anointed one from the house of David. They believe and long for that day of independence and freedom to live as Israel. But how will they get to that place? How will God move them in that direction. This word we translate as expectation when used in the Greek translation of the Old Testament and other religious writings largely point to God’s actions. They hope for God to do something miraculous, and but it is mostly found in the pages of that translation that we often regard as the inter-testamental or The Apocrypha books. These books are not usually found in our Bibles for a number of reasons, mainly because they were not found in the Hebrew manuscripts, but they were in the Greek translation of the Old Testament.
I mention this not because I am advocating for their use, but I want us to see where this longing comes from. These books were not found in the Hebrew scriptures, but were in the Greek translations. The Greek translations were for those people of Israel that lived outside the holy land. They were still living in exile throughout the empire, and these writings were sent to the people in exile to inform them of the hope that had returned to their homeland. They talk of how God preserved the oil in the lamps through the struggle against the Hellenistic battles, and they speak of grace and mercy that can be found when we seek God’s holy wisdom.
Luke is writing to those people who had known those Greek writings of the Old Testament, and he is wanting them to remember what was shown in those stories and how that was a mere shadow of the reality to come. The people were in expectation, and they were having an internal dialog concerning John.
I want us to really consider what that implies about the people at that time. They wanted to God to work. They wanted God to act within their lives. They wanted God to move among them. They were looking for him, longing for him. They were doing everything they could to make the world in which they lived open to God. This is why those Apocrypha books are important, they speak of the work that happened during that time of history between the testaments. Israel returned from their exile in Babylon and Persia. They remained under the rule of Persia until Persia were conquered by Alexander the Great as he marched toward the east. When Alexander died they fought a battle against those Hellenistic rulers, because that leader decided to sacrifice a pig on the alter of God in the Temple. This abomination desecrated the temple, made it unclean in the eyes of God.
The temple was rededicated, but there were still struggles within Israel. What had led to such a thing? This is why there was internal debates. This is why there were different factions within the people of God. The Pharisees, the Sadducees, the Herodians, and the Zealots. Each of these groups and others were attempting to make sense of how to live their faith in the changing world. Should they embrace the Hellenistic worldview, should they focus on proper rituals within the temple, should they live a life of righteousness? Should they use force to drive out the opposition? We think we are in the middle of a culture war today, and we are but the things we are facing have similarities to what they faced in the first century.
They were all in expectation and all were questioning in their hearts. How should we live? What should we believe? Is he the chosen one or should we keep looking? They were studying, they were looking, they were seeking and longing. Their feelings are similar to ours, maybe we could learn something from them.
They questioned in their hearts, and John answered them. This implies that someone did some external questioning also. What do we find in that answer?
“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.”
Consider the debates among the people. Some wanted to get the rituals correct in the temple, believing that in the ritualized life they would find favor in the eyes of God. Some wanted the people to live the law, that every law within scripture should be followed and that would give us favor in God’s eyes. Some wanted to fight, and others withdraw from society at large. But what is John telling us. “I baptize you with water, but he who is mightier than I is coming.”
As a Quaker pastor, I read this section a bit differently than pastors or people that come from other Christian faith traditions. We do not practice the ritualized expression of water baptism. Some might say that we do not believe in baptism. They are not necessarily wrong, we do not put an emphasis in rituals. We believe that a ritual is empty without the reality of faith, and if we have the faith the ritual is not needed because the reality is already present. When I read the words of John, I see confirmation of my faith.
He said that he baptized with water, but there is a mightier one coming that makes the ritual he is performing worthless. Because John is not worthy to untie his shoes. There were people that wanted Israel to focus on the ritual. The Sadducees were focused on the rituals. They controlled the temple, and once the temple was destroyed they no longer had a place to perform these rituals, their faith died. This leaves the Pharisees. They also put a great deal of stock in ritual but their ritual was a bit different. They ritualized life. Proper diet, proper clothing, proper prayers, proper work, everything in their life was dedicated to adhering to the letter of the law. John was not considered a Pharisee, but much of his lifestyle resembled theirs. He lived a righteous life. Yet he said I am not worthy to untie the sandals of the one to come. “He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire.”
They had expectations, they had internal and external debates and dialog concerning John, and he answers them. He tells them if you are putting your stock in what I am doing, you need to look elsewhere.
The ritual is empty if you are not living the life. The life is empty if you do not have true faith. Faith is empty if it is place in the wrong place, and the place is empty if it is not the one who is the truth.
John continues by saying, “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.” As someone that grew up on a farm if understand this intimately.
Those that plant a crop are after one thing, the grain. It is the grain that has the value. You can have the most beautiful stand of wheat in the field, it can be tall, it can have wonderful color, it can be picture perfect. If it does not have grain it is a failure. We could debate this to some degree because there is value for other portions of the plant. Some people grow wheat to feed cattle, in that case the value is not the grain but the leaves and the stock. But in those cases you are not growing wheat for the value, wheat is only one of the resources you use to get to the thing that is valuable, which in that case the livestock. The point remains, what is of value? The livestock and the grain. Everything we do should be invested in that.
Farmers and researchers have spent countless years selecting and breeding wheat to get the most grain as possible. They have selected varieties that will grow and produce in specific areas. The grain grown in Kansas is similar but not exactly the same as the grain grown in Texas, or in Canada. We grow what is best for this area, and we breed it in a way to maximize the yield in that area. They have even bred a variety of wheat specifically for use in space. You might not fully understand why, but each of these varieties have the same goal, to put as much energy as possible for the most important part, the grain. If the plant is too tall, it wastes energy on foliage that detracts from the part that holds true value, the grain.
The farmer in John’s story has the winnowing fork in his hand, he is clearing the threshing floor. The idea here is that all the sheaves of wheat are brought into the threshing floor, and the draft animals are walking around trampling the wheat to remove the grain from the stocks. Then the laborers take the fork and the toss the stocks up into the air, and they allow the wind and gravity to separate the things of value from that which lacks value. They do this multiple times, they remove the empty stocks and make a pile. They keep tossing what remains into the air and the chaff, which does not have weight gets caught in the wind and it eventually will blow away and fall in a different pile, until all that remains is the grain. The farmer then gathers the stuff of value into his barn, and the piles of trash are disposed of in the only way available to them at that time, they burn it.
John is not telling us we need the rituals, he is telling us we need the stuff of value. Everything that is done in our lives that do not contribute to the things of value are worthless trash to be burned. Which should lead us to ask what is of value to God? And what can we participate in to ensure the production of that valuable resource?
I want us to really consider this as we move into the season of Epiphany, the season of revelation. Luke concludes this section by saying, “Now when all the people were baptized, and when Jesus also had been baptized and was praying, the heavens were opened, and the Holy Spirit descended on him in bodily form, like a dove; and a voice came from heaven, ‘You are my beloved Son; with you I am well pleased.’”
What does God value? Luke tells us. God values Jesus. His beloved son. But this is more than just a relationship between a father and a son, or in this case the relationship within the triune God. It is the relationship between who and what the son represents. Jesus is God with us, Emmanuel. Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life. He is redemption, and through him all of creation is reconciled to God. This does not only mean we get a ticket to enter heaven, it means that all of creation is redeemed, the process of restoration has begun. What was lost is found. What was hopeless has hope. What was dead has renewed life. Eden is being restored, and humanity can once again walk with God.
That is of value. God created humanity, male and female, in his image. We bear that image in this world that he created. This is poetry. It is a literary message of the purpose of our existence. The story of Eden is more than a story of creation it is a story of relationship and worship. God created the world and all that was in it including our first parents. And then he created Eden and placed them in it. Eden was the temple created by God and according to the poetry of the ancients humanity was the representation of God to all that came to the temple to praise their creator. When we fell in the garden we marred that image. And all of creation groans. We became distracted from God turned away, and instead of reflecting the light we cast shadows. We were created to reflect hope, to give life, to praise the beauty of our creator. Instead we exploit, we oppress, we go to war and destroy. We have become instruments of wrath, greed, jealousy, hate. We seek pleasure and wealth, power and domination. We were created to bring all of creation to God, and to be fruitful and multiply. Instead we drive creation into death and destruction.
Jesus came to show us true humanity, and a true life with God. He made it his custom to worship, he withdrew often to pray, and he ministered to the needs within the community. Jesus shows us the life and lifestyle God wanted to have with humanity. And that is what has value to God, that is what pleases God. It is not the ritual but the person. It is not obedience to a law, but the implementation of God’s wisdom as we interact with others. It is not heaven but earth.
Jesus prayed, “Our Father in Heaven, holy is your name, your kingdom come your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us today our daily bread and forgive us our sins as we forgive those who sin against us.” He taught us to pray, and in that prayers he shows us what God values. A kingdom is people, it is each of us together, gathered in His name. And for this to happen we need strength and energy so we ask that he provides for us, through our jobs and work. And then to bring people into that kingdom we need grace and mercy in our lives, and we must extend that mercy to others.
The people were in expectation and all were questioning. They were seeking, and thinking deeply about who and what God wanted. And John said, “I baptize you with water, but he who is mightier than I is coming, the straps of whose sandals I am not worthy to untie. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire.”
We are here not for ourselves, but for each other. We are not great in ourselves, not one of us. I am only a pastor because of God and each of you. The richest man in the world is only rich because we value what they offer and gave them the money for mutual profit. The president is only president because we voted not because they are the chosen one of God. It is we, us. A collective of humanity and God that has value, everything else is chaff and trash fit only to burn.
As we go out this week I want us to consider what is truly valuable. And examine our lives to see how our actions are contributing to or detracting from that value. And let us all draw closer to Christ, the Beloved Son through whom all creation is reconciled with God and is pleasing in his eyes.
To Donate to Willow Creek Friends Church Click here:
To donate directly to Pastor Warner click here:
Discover more from Jwquaker's Blog
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
Discussion
No comments yet.