Luke 3:1-6
Every year, the second week in Advent, we are reminded to repent. This is a critical process in preparing ourselves for the birth of the Christ child.
But John the Baptist is not asking us:
• to beat our breasts,
• to lower our heads, and say,
“Woe is me, for I’m a man of unclean lips, living amongst a people of unclean lips, and my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts.”
Now, this may or may not be true, but that is not how we repent in the Christian life.
We repent not by feeling sorry, but by submitting:
• submitting to the sacraments of the faith,
• submitting to prayer,
• submitting to worship.
These are the ways that God purifies us. That’s what the verses following John’s call to repent describe—the straightening out of the crooked ways of life so that all may see the salvation of God.
Metanoia is the word that marks the power of baptism to change us. We don’t change by our will but by the power of God. It doesn’t happen through our force of will, in which we say, “I’m going to do better tomorrow.” It happens through immersion. In baptism, it’s a metaphor for totally encompassing yourself with the numinous presence of God.
For the rest of the proclamation of God’s Word, the choir will offer us a gift: the path by which we can all repent—that is, be transformed. This will come through Benjamin Britten’s Ceremony of Carols. These carols focus on praising the Christ child for the simplicity and lowliness of his birth, for the animals of creation that pay Him homage, for His perseverance, and for His great sacrifice that heals the sin of humankind.
Come before the Lord. Repent and submit by using these carols to let the God of all creation straighten our sometimes-crooked hearts, to smooth out the pieces of ourselves made rough by the hard knocks in life, so that all of us may see the salvation of God. Amen.
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