Advance Man

The scriptures referred to are Luke 3:1-6.

One thing that bugs me about beginning an e-book is it often jumps right to the first chapter. I like reading the preface and introduction and table of contents first. They give you an idea of the reason the book was written and what it intends to do. Yes, you can usually discern this from simply reading the book but I like a bit of background and context going in. It is much easier to judge a book properly if you know what gave rise to it. I also read reviews before buying books and an intelligent reviewer can also tell you what the book is actually about. It's the same way with a movie. If you are interested in a nuclear confrontation during the cold war you wouldn't want to watch Dr. Strangelove with the same expectations that you had for Fail Safe. Though they came out in the same year, and dealt with the very same subject—a rogue US bomber headed to Russia with the intent of dropping a nuclear bomb—they are wildly different in their approach and tone. Fortunately a good trailer should tip you off to that in advance.

In the same way, most shows with a live audience—talk shows, sitcoms, etc—have a comedian who comes on stage before the taping to tell jokes, interact with the audience, and get everyone in the mood to have a good time. Watching at home you don't know this. You might think the enthusiastic crowd that applauds and whistles and laughs uproariously at the monologue or the dialog is just a really good audience. But someone has prepared them for what is to come.

In the same way, no celebrity or politician shows up to speak at a venue spontaneously. Before an important person makes an appearance, an employee visits the location first and handles publicity and security and sets up what the speaker is expected to do. He's called an advance man. And you could call John the Baptist Advent's advance man.

And we find that even John's coming was foretold in Isaiah. His job is to prepare the audience for Jesus. The audience is looking for a Messiah. But what kind?

For a lot of people, a warrior-king would suffice. “Just push the Romans out of our land and set up a kingdom like David's,” they would say. That would be enough for them. And while a holy warrior may have been preferred, in the end they probably would have accepted any freedom fighter who accomplished what they wanted. People will forgive their leaders for a lot of stuff if they show themselves to be effective.

But God wasn't interested in a political revolution. The kingdoms of Israel and Judah did not ultimately yield a more just and loving people. God is going both bigger and deeper this time. He wants a spiritual revolution. And that's what John is to prepare them for.

And that's why John was “proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins.” That was revolutionary.

Baptism didn't originate with John. But it was primarily used on Gentile converts. They had to get circumcised of course but they also had to go through a ritual purification that involved being immersed in water. And what's revolutionary is that Jews responded to John's call to be baptized as if they were Gentiles starting out as God's people. They must have felt that things were so bad that they needed a new beginning with God.

Water is often used as a symbol of the Holy Spirit. In Isaiah God says, “For I will pour water on the parched ground and cause streams to flow. I will pour my spirit on your offspring and my blessing on your children.” (Isaiah 44:3) This was never intended as merely an external action. In Ezekiel God says, “I will sprinkle you with pure water and you will be clean from your impurities. I will purify you from all your idols. I will give you a new heart, and I will put a new spirit within you. I will remove your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. I will put my Spirit within you; I will take the initiative and you will obey my statutes and carefully observe my regulations.” (Ezekiel 36:25-27) The cleansing by water outside was to be accompanied by a cleansing by the Spirit inside. The Greek word baptizo means “to dip, to sink, to immerse or submerge.” It can also mean “to overwhelm.” It comes from a word that means “to make fully wet.” The important part of baptism is not so much being dipped in water but being fully immersed in and saturated by God's Spirit.

So this wasn't a magical rite that worked regardless of a person's spiritual state. It was a “baptism of repentance.” We associate repentance with someone making a big show of remorse, like Jimmy Swaggart did on TV after being caught with a prostitute. But that dramatic bout of crying on TV didn't mean anything. He did it again and this time he said to his church, “The Lord told me it's flat none of your business.” He didn't change.

The Greek word for repentance, metanoia, literally means a “change of mind.” Which leads to other changes. If you were originally going to do something and change your mind about it, you don't do it. Or you do something else. To repent is to rethink what you are doing or thinking of doing. Real repentance, a real change of mind, changes your behavior. My father-in-law had a heart attack at 65 but wouldn't change his lifestyle. Then he had another heart attack, a massive one that resulted in him getting a quintuple bypass. And that's when he changed his diet and changed his mind about doing the exercises his doctor ordered. He lived another 24 years, making it to age 91.

Repentance doesn't have to be accompanied by tears. Zacchaeus simply told Jesus and the crowd he was going to give half his money to the poor and give those he cheated 4 times what he took. (Luke 19:1-10) People who decide to change their life and get help with their drinking or drug use often do so after a sobering period of reappraisal. They may or may not cry. What's vital is they decide to change the direction of their life.

That's what John was preaching. He was saying, “The reason you are a spiritual mess is that you keep doing the same harmful things over and over. You need to change your mind and change your behavior.”

By being baptized, by publicly showing they were doing just that, they received forgiveness of sins. The Greek word for forgiveness, aphesis, literally means “a sending away, a dismissal.” John wasn't forgiving their sins; God was. If someone receives a presidential pardon, the president doesn't come and put a piece of paper in their hand. It comes from the Office of the Pardon Attorney. But the pardon attorney is not the one with the power to pardon people. That power resides in the president. The pardon attorney is just conveying it. John was the messenger. He was doing what priests and pastors do: simply conveying the good news of God's forgiveness to repentant people.

What's interesting is that the Supreme Court has ruled that a pardon “carries an imputation of guilt; acceptance a confession of it.” Forgiveness doesn't mean you did nothing wrong; it means you did but you accept responsibility and receive the mercy offered. And, believe it or not, people have refused presidential pardons because they don't want to admit guilt. People refuse God's forgiveness for the same reason. They refuse to be released from their sins because they don't think they did anything wrong. That's why C.S. Lewis called pride, or what we call arrogance, the complete anti-God state of mind. A person who can never admit they were wrong can never be forgiven because they won't accept God's mercy and grace. That's what's makes a sin unforgivable: an inability to admit your sin and accept God's forgiveness. As Lewis said, the gates of hell are locked from the inside.

While we are analyzing the original wording, let's take a look at sin. The Greek word is hamartia. It means “missing the mark,” and was used by archers who didn't hit their target. So sin is a moral failure. Perhaps the image of the arrow not making it to the target was in Paul's mind when he said, “For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.” (Romans 3:23) Only the arrogant think they have not come up short of what God asks of us: to be as loving and just as he is. And our falling short isn't because we are not all-powerful like God. We fail to live up to his standards even when it is fully within our power to meet them. In a situation where we can simply tell the truth, we choose to lie. In a situation where we can choose not pass on harmful gossip, we do anyway. In a situation where we can avoid letting someone get hurt, we choose not to do anything to stop it. We sin by committing acts we should not and by not doing things we should. Only rarely do we find ourselves in a true moral dilemma where one ethical value seems at odds with another and it looks like our only choice is to pick the lesser of 2 evils.

Of course forgiving a sin does not undo the damage sin does, anymore than forgiving someone who stabbed you makes the wound magically disappear. Forgiveness is just the start. But again that's John's role: to get things started. To get people thinking about their sins and the nature of repentance and forgiveness. To prepare them for someone who can do more than simply dismiss sins.

Evil destroys things. It destroys the things which God created and pronounced good. It destroys our relationship with God, our relationships with others, even our relationship with ourselves. Evil destroys things either by ending their existence, or by corrupting them to the point that they cease to be what they were intended to be. Nor does sin have to kill someone to end his or her life. It can cut off their potential to be more than they were. It can twist them into a cruel parody of what they were. For some, hell is not a far off fate but something they are living in now. We don't just need forgiving; we need healing and restoration to whom God created us to be.

John preaches and baptizes. That's all. But he is the advance man for one greater than he: one who heals and reverses the damage evil wreaks on people. He has the power of life. And he will pit it against evil and the power of destruction, disease, decay and death. He will let the sins and evil of this world do their worst to him. And just when it looks like evil has won, he will reverse the power of death itself and triumph over it.

John is letting people know where the true danger lies. It is not in Rome. John is letting people know that the real danger lies in what we do against God and others and ourselves. John is letting them know that what must change is not who rules an earthly government but who rules in our hearts. And who is that? That's the essential question. And to find the answer we need to go to Jesus.