We wait. We look to the future and we hope for a world of peace and mercy. We look to the church and hope that we may find reconciliation. We wait for the promises of God to be fulfilled in the world. We wait for something new to begin, to usurp the old repressive regime, so that we may truly begin again. We wait.

And sometimes when we wait in hope for the world, we can lose sight of who and what we are. Not as a church, or as a community, but as people, as individuals. We wait but can become so bogged down in trying to serve, in trying to pray for all those around us, that we can lose ourselves. We can forget why we are trying to serve others, why it was important to us in the first place. We can wait for a future full of hope and neglect who we are. We can forget why we are doing any of this.

It is easy enough to see in people around us. I have seen people try and save the world to the neglect of anything else, family, friends, their health (I possibly have done this myself). They were on a crusade, intent on following God’s will in their lives, trying to bear good fruit. But what they ended up bearing was the fruit of their own destruction as they burnt out and ceased to be effective to anyone, even to the ones that they were trying to save. They stood in readiness, they sought to serve, but became so immersed in what they were doing, they lost sight of all else.
What does it mean then to wait in service, to bear good fruit and not lose ourselves completely to the task? John calls us to examine just what that might mean. As he is baptizing the crowds who are coming to him, he notices the Pharisees and Sadducees who are also coming to partake. And instead of welcoming them, he rebukes them, he calls down wrath upon them and more then likely sends them packing. Why? Often Pharisees and Sadducees get a bad rap in modern day thinking. They stand in for all that is wrong in organized religion (ie. the hierarchy, the pious posturing, the self righteous aggrandizement). Or they represent human greed or the human inability to see God within our midst. They’ve had a hard time over the past two thousand years. The very words of Pharisees and Sadducees have almost become curse words. But perhaps that isn’t the fairest way to look at these men. They were certainly more multifaceted then we give them credited for. These were good men, wholesome men. These were men who were leaders in their community and often held that community together, both spiritually and physically. Why then did John go after them so vehemently?

John may have attacked them for the reasons listed above. Or perhaps there was another reason, one that we can relate to all too easily. Perhaps it had more to do with where their focus lay then on anything else. They must have recognized the vaunted position that they held in society. They recognized their importance and they lived their life accordingly. Perhaps they didn’t abuse that power. But they did something John felt was still absolutely reprehensible. They put themselves at the center. It was about them, their role, their power, their responsibility, their ability to repent and make things right with God. It was about the human desire to put self before all else, even if it was for an altruistic purpose. This shone brightly in these men. This was about them. And John knew that. He must have also known that many around him thought the same way. So he called out against the Pharisees and Sadducees and in so doing, effectively called out against those around him and humanity throughout the ages.

The fruit you bear needs to be good fruit. We strive for that and forget that it is not by our own merit that we achieve the production of such fruit. Does an apple tree produce apples on its own? No. It depends on the nutrients in the soil, the sun and rain in due season, the protection it receives from the harsh elements surrounding it. On its own, no matter how hard it would try to produce fruit, it would only shrivel up and die. And so do we. On our own, even if we strive for what is good and what is right, even if we walk in the path of saints, we would shrivel up and die. God must be central. And John recognizes this. He proclaims this as he calls those around him to repent. To repent means to turn back to God. It means to come to God not in a proud and confident way, promising to do better, but in all our brokenness, all our weakness, in all of our humanity, saying to our God “Change us. Help us. For we can do no better.” Only then do we find the center, that which gives us strength to bear the fruit that John is calling us to bear. And we cannot ignore the threat that he issues either. For the axe that he threatens us with is an axe of our own making. Forget God and you will vanish away, like a tree uprooted. You can not stand in this world alone. Only through God can you thrive.

In the repentance that John calls us to, we are stripped bear of our pride, our arrogance, our self-righteousness. Like chaff from the wheat, it is winnowed away and burnt, leaving only that part of us that recognizes God in our life, the one who is the source of our life. It leaves the part of us that will serve others and rely on God for the strength to do so, the part that puts God as the centre and draws life from that.

In our waiting, we are called to readiness. In our waiting, we are called to repentance. And in the Christ, in the one who baptizes us with Fire, with the Holy Spirit that burns away the dross from who we are, we find that promise fulfilled. We experience this in our baptism and in our daily dying and rising to new life in Christ. We wait for the Christ to come into our lives to strip away the dross and make us new once more. We turn to God and say, “We are broken. Help us in our broken-ness.”

We wait in readiness and repentance for the Christ child. In this renewal, we find the peace that awaits us this Christmas season. The peace of Christ in our lives, central and giving us life. We wait.

Amen