Sermon for December 9th, 2012

Luke 3:1-6

1In the fifteenth year of the reign of Emperor Tiberius, when Pontius Pilate was governor of Judea, and Herod was ruler of Galilee, and his brother Philip ruler of the region of Ituraea and Trachonitis, and Lysanias ruler of Abilene, 2during the high priesthood of Annas and Caiaphas, the word of God came to John son of Zechariah in the wilderness. 3He went into all the region around the Jordan, proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins, 4as it is written in the book of the words of the prophet Isaiah, "The voice of one crying out in the wilderness: 'Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight. 5Every valley shall be filled, and every mountain and hill shall be made low, and the crooked shall be made straight, and the rough ways made smooth; 6and all flesh shall see the salvation of God.'"

Prepare the Way: Looking Back

Once upon a time. Isn't that how every good story begins? Those famous words are actually a very intentional storytelling device, to accomplish a very specific purpose, although they do it so subtly that most of us don't realize what they are doing, or think too much about it. Once upon a time. With those four words, any connection a story might have to a specific time, a specific history, is obliterated. Once upon some vague time, somewhere in the past... it could be thirty years ago, it could be three thousand years ago. Once upon a time. George Lucas accomplishes the same thing in the preface to each of his Star Wars films: When do they take place? Oh, a long, long time ago. Not really sure exactly when. Where do they take place? Oh, in a galaxy far, far away. Somewhere you've probably never heard of... Once upon a time.

Today's story--the story of John the Baptist, the one who "prepares the way" for the coming of the Messiah--today's story has an altogether different sort of beginning: "In the fifteenth year of the reign of Emperor Tiberius, when Pontius Pilate was governor of Judea, and Herod was ruler of Galillee, and his brother Philip ruler of the region of Ituraea and Trachonitis, and Lysanias ruler of Abilene, during the high preisthood of Annas and Caiaphas, the word of God came to John son of Zechariah in the wilderness." How's that for specific? Time, place, cultural context, political context, religious context, and even family context are all minutely present and recorded in the beginning of this story. And I think there are some very good reasons for this.

The Gospel of Luke tells the story of the life and teachings of Jesus Christ. All four Gospels do this, but each has its own authorial style, it's own agenda and emphases, and it's own intended audience. Matthew, for example, is written by a Jewish author to a local Jewish audience (probably in Jerusalem). Both Mark and John seem as thought they were intentionally written to specific congregations-- one in Rome and the other in Ephesus. But Luke alone seems written for a broader audience, one that encompassed all the known Mediterranean civilizations of the time. The author of Luke seems particularly concerned with the broad arc of history, and how his story fits within that history.

You can almost imagine, as Luke begins his story, a wide-angle camera shot of the Mediterranean that slowly zooms in on its subject, so that anyone from any part of the world could place the story in the proper context: In the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius... that's the Roman Emperor, the ruler of most of the known world... when Pontius Pilate was governor of Judea, and Herod was ruler of Galilee... now we're zooming in to specific regions in the Roman Empire... during the high preisthood of Annas and Caiaphas... now we're in a specific part of Judea: Jerusalem, where the temple and the high priests would reside... the word of God came to John son of Zechariah in the wilderness... Now the camera pans slightly over, to the wilderness outside Jerusalem, and comes to rest at last, focused clearly on one lone person: John.

But Luke is concerned with more than just geography. He's also giving you history, and dates. During the

Luke points to the past

John points to the past

Advent points to the past