The Pinch of Salt

Isaiah 12: 2-6
Luke 3:7-18

Did you know to make a dessert sweeter, a pinch of salt is often added? If you want to bring out the full flavor of fruit, a squeeze of lemon works wonders. Did you know the quilts the Amish painstakingly make always have a flaw in them? Today we read the rest of Luke 3 and John the Baptist’s revelations about the Messiah. In it, we receive the pinch of salt, the squeeze of lemon, the flaw in the quilt that reminds us that good news often needs a dose of reality to make it truly good.

John the Baptist is one of my favorite people in the bible because he does not mess around. He cuts straight to the point, gets to the reality of the situation quicker than any prophet does previously. Even Jesus will often skate around the point he’s trying to lead the people to by offering them questions and parables. Jesus does this because it is more beneficial for a person to discover the truth with their own minds than to be told the truth. But John, well he is all about cutting to the heart of the matter and telling everyone exactly the way it will be. I can appreciate that because I have a similar philosophy.

John the Baptist is out in the wilderness preaching the coming of the Messiah. He is preaching the good news! He is giving every Jew the news that for thousands of years they have been anticipating. The news spread like wildfire. Everyone was coming out to see the crazy Baptist man in the wilderness who was yelling about the coming Messiah. People were shouting for joy, preparing their children, praying to God, offering sacrifices in the temple.

Have any of you watched or been to Times Square on New Year’s Eve? I have a cousin who went and when she came back she told me the energy in the air is electric. She said the anticipation and party atmosphere soaks into your bones and you find yourself unable to feel the cold because you’re warm from the inside out. You smile because others are smiling, you laugh at jokes that aren’t normally that funny. She said if she could go every year she would because the feel good camaraderie makes the rest of the year seem more hopeful and happy.

This is how I imagine the crowds felt as they listened to John speak. People were smiling, clapping, laughing. They were bringing their friends and neighbors and children out into the wilderness to hear this news that made them warm from the inside out. But all of a sudden, John shouts, “You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the coming wrath? Produce fruit in keeping with repentance.”

It had to have felt like a bucket of cold water dropped on all of their heads. The instant silence, the awkward glances exchanged among the crowd of people as they listen to him go from glowing terms of the Messiah’s coming to their own wickedness. The shifting of feet, the almost silent muttering as people listened to him and realized their own sinfulness. The joy became shame as they realized they are not ready for the Messiah to come. John the Baptist was serious when he said the people needed to prepare the way for the Lord.

They needed to prepare the way for the Lord to enter their hearts by accepting their utter unworthiness to receive him. This is the dose of reality that keeps the Gospel from being a fairytale. Yes, Jesus is coming to save the world. Yes, Jesus will love all people. Yes, Jesus will forgive you for the wrongs you have committed. Yes, you will be given eternal salvation and go to heaven. BUT. First, before any of that can happen, we must clear our hearts and minds of wickedness. We must ask God to forgive us for the pain we have caused in the world. We must ask God to help us become better people. We must ask God to send his Spirit deep into our hearts and reveal to us our own sinfulness so we can let go of that darkness to embrace the light of Jesus Christ.

If we do not, John the Baptist tells us what will happen. “and every tree that does not produce good fruit will be cut down and thrown into the fire.” You’d think some people would be turned off by this harsh speaking, this utter honesty coming from John’s lips. However, the people’s response, from young to old, from innocent babe to hardened soldier was, “What can we do then?”

We need both the Good News and the consequences of what happens when we ignore the Good News. We need that little dose of bitterness to make the rest of it sweeter. In the movie, “A Walk to Remember” Mandy Moore says to her bitter boyfriend, “Suffering makes the world a more compassionate place.” At the time he responds, “tell that to those who suffer” and he doesn’t find out until the end of the movie that Mandy is one of the people that is suffering. However, she knew that the truth depth of meaning and feeling is found when we experience both sides of the coin. We need both pain and happiness to be able to truly understand both emotions.

We need to know that we are sinful, and we need to know how deeply our sins have invaded into our core selves so that we can truly appreciate the joy of being forgiven. John the Baptist understood humanity better than many of us do. He understood that humanity needs the pain of rejection we could experience to understand the happiness in complete acceptance that Jesus offers us. We need to know the pain we have caused so we can make amends equal to the hurt we inflicted.

Think about it this way. When do we appreciate life the most? Isn’t it right after experiencing loss or the fear of losing a loved one or our own life? Advent is the time we take to sweep away the darkness in our souls so that when that little baby Jesus, our Lord and Savior, comes into our lives, we can appreciate and understand the true meaning of Christmas. Jesus makes us good. Jesus makes us better. Jesus makes us whole.

And the only way to truly grasp what it means to be made whole is when we look at the fragmented mess our souls are in without Jesus to hold us together.

Amen.