Sermon for 2nd Sunday of Advent – 6th December 202: Isaiah 40, 1-11; Mark 1, 1-8

Revd. Canon Leonard Doolan – St Paul’s Athens

 

A voice says, “Cry out!” And I said, “What shall I cry?” All people are grass, their constancy is like the flower of the field. The grass withers, the flower fades, when the breath of the Lord blows upon it; surely the people are grass. The grass withers, the flower fades; but the word of our God will stand forever. (Isaiah 40, 6-8)

As a boy chorister in my local church I recall an anthem that was in the choir repertoire. It was partly based on these words from the prophet Isaiah, and composed by Samuel Wesley in 1833. Jokingly the choirboys used to call him ‘steamship Wesley’ because his initials were ‘S.S.’

After a very beautiful and serene homophonic introduction, ‘Blessed be the God and Father, of our Lord Jesus Christ’ the anthem then moved on to a beautiful soprano solo, ‘Love one another with a pure heart fervently’ followed by a slow and sombre section for the grizzly basses to sing which ended, ‘the grass withereth, and the flower thereof, falleth away.’ Then a single thundering chord from the organ, and off we went in full polyphony ‘But the word of the Lord, endureth for ever’ sung a breakneck speed for which each choir member, soprano, altos, tenors and basses each needed a good pair of lungs and their own set of teeth, before the whole piece ended with the great Hebrew ‘so be it’, Amen, Amen.

800 years after Isaiah wrote his words which Wesley incorporated into his anthem, along comes John, son of Zachariah, and of Elizabeth. We know him better as John the Baptist. As Isaiah was the great prophet of the first covenant, so John, maintaining the prophetic DNA, is the great prophet of the second covenant. The gospel writers know this, and Mark is quick to connect the two men. He quotes the prophet as he refers to John as the messenger, the forerunner, the voice. His message is repentance; he is before so as to make people ready; he is the voice who declares ‘prepare the way; make the path straight.

John the Baptist is one of the great figures of the gospel narratives. We are told almost as much about him as any other character other than Christ himself – and yet we are told so little. He is so significant, both in announcing Jesus as the Christ, but also as part of the backdrop of religious zeal in Galilee during much of the ministry of Jesus. We are left with that yearning to know more. In fact we will return to John next Sunday also.

Today, however, we are taking note of the importance of John, yet we are also noting that there is no altruism in this man. As the ‘go-before’ he seeks no praise for himself. His focus is on the one who is to come; the one promised by God even since those far off days of Isaiah; the one whose sandals he is not fit to untie.

Some of you may know the painting by Grunewald, referred to as the Isenheim Altar piece. It is a triptych in a chapel in a mediaeval leper hospice. When the doors of the triptych are closed we see Christ crucified, pock-marked – showing every inch of his body in agony. On one side of the cross is Mary swooning backwards into the arms of Mary of Magdala, and on the other is our friend for today, John the Baptist. He hold sin one hand the open pages of a book – this is of course artistic license – but with the other hand a knobbly finger is outstretched pointing to the crucified Messiah.  Barely legible now because of the ravages of age, are written the words in Latin,  ‘He must increase; I must decrease.’

 

This is the central attitude and action of John – to point the way, to direct people to the straight road that leads ultimately to the cross and the empty tomb, to deflect from himself; even though he is significant he seeks no glory. Though his voice will fade, and his words will pass, just as the grass withers and the flower thereof falleth away, ‘the word of the Lord endureth for ever’.

There isn’t much time to wait between the messenger, and the arrival of the message in St. Mark’s narrative. No sooner does John introduce the one who is to come, and he comes. It is Jesus. Mark goes straight from the good news of the ‘coming one’ to the arrival of the good news – Jesus himself who comes to this significant person John to be baptized; but this baptism is transfigured into a theophany – a revelation of the divine, the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.

This moment is a moment of new creation for the waters of baptism are broken open, and also the heavens are broken open. This event is an earth shattering event, and a heaven shattering event. Jesus the message – Jesus the good news is anointed by the favour of God the Father.

In his ministry, which begins at this moment of baptism, Jesus tells many good stories, and says many good things. There are many people now who are attracted to how he vividly opens up the events in everyday life in his parables; there are many people attracted to the ‘wisdom style’ and moral teaching of Jesus, and the wise compassion that he both talks about and illustrates in his own actions. This is all good and well.

However we have to remind ourselves again and again that Jesus is infinitely more than the words he used to share wisdom with others, and in our own day we need to be reminded that this Jesus is infinitely more than words that we cherish in the pages of our holy scriptures. He is the Word beyond words, the good news beyond the gospels, the message beyond all messengers, to whom messengers past and present can simply and only point.

We must rehearse again and again the faith that proclaims Jesus as ‘The Word made flesh and dwelling among us’ (John 1, 14). Of course the eternally true words of our scriptures must be honoured, but it is the Word-made-flesh who is our Saviour; it is Jesus the Christ to whom we give the glory, full of grace and truth.

Isaiah was so right, and he was truly prophetic. He too was a messenger, and a forerunner, and a civil engineer working away on the road beset by bends to transform it into a super high-way of the Lord. He, and John; John, and all the prophets of the first Testament had a clear vision that contrasted the things that are transitory, fleeting, unimportant, insignificant, with that which endures for ever.

So thank you, ‘Steamship’ Wesley for that exhilarating setting of the text, but even more, ‘Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ…the grass withereth and the flower thereof falleth away… But the word of the Lord endureth for ever.’  Amen.