Are you the one? by the Rev. Don Hamer
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Trinity Episcopal Church – Hartford, CT
Year A – Advent 3
December 15, 2013
Matthew 11:2-11
The Season of Advent is in many ways a season of contrasts, a time when the tension between what is and what might be is almost palpable. Theologically, this season reminds us that we live in an “in-between” time – after the first coming of Jesus Christ at Bethlehem and the second coming of Christ in glory at the end of the world. Practically speaking, that brings us to reflect on all the ways that God’s human stewards of the world God created have caused it to fall so far short of the Dream of God. That is part of the “work” of Advent: We take stock of those aspects of our corporate and individual lives that tend to separate us from the Dream of God, resolve how to minimize those, and reflect on ways that we can make more space for God – more space for the work of this Child whose birth we are awaiting.
But what are we waiting for? What does that look like? That’s the question John poses today.
John is the really the last in the long line of Hebrew prophets. Remember that earlier in the Gospel of Matthew (ch. 3) John has already told his disciples that Jesus is the Messiah. Like them, he identified the characteristics of the Messiah without meeting him. Unlike them, he actually did finally get to meet the one whose coming he foretold, and, against his own wishes, gave in to Jesus’ request and baptized him. The prophecies to the people of Israel were fulfilled before John’s very eyes.
And yet here John is asking the question, “Are you really the guy?” What’s happened in the interim?
Well, for one thing, prison has happened. He has been arrested and jailed as a political enemy of King Herod. It’s funny, isn’t it, how easy faith can be when the sun is out and all is right between us and the world. But let the heavy doors of prison, family problems, poverty or other adversity slam shut, and doubt and despair can quickly fill the darkness. It’s then that we ask, “Jesus, are you for real? Are you really the one?” And so John asks, “Are you the one?”
As Jesus so often does, he answers not directly, but with a challenge: You go and tell John what YOU see: the blind receive sight; the lame walk; lepers are cleansed; the deaf hear; the dead arise; the poor have good news proclaimed to them. Then let John come to his own conclusions.
Jesus’ answer is the same when we ask the question, in whatever way we ask it.
What are some of the ways that we ask the question, “Are you the one?”
How does Jesus answer us today?
What evidence do we see in the New Testament or in Christian history that Jesus is the one?
What evidence do we see in modern history that Jesus is the one?
What evidence have we had in our own lives that Jesus is the one? Said another way, what personal experiences have we ourselves had that showed Christ is present and active in us?
What do all of these experiences tell us about the role of the prophet in pointing us to the Kingdom? The role of the disciple?