Creating a straight path – Mark 1:1-8

Rev. Bruce Kemp

There is a passage in the Old Testament that begins with these words: “Comfort, comfort my people, speak tenderly to Jerusalem, and cry to her that her warfare is ended.”  These words were given by God to the prophet Isaiah and were intended to herald the end of their exile.  Some 80 years before this time, the kingdom of Judah had fallen into the hands of foreign nations and the people had suffered the loss of their homeland and their dignity.  While in exile, they struggled to figure out where God was in the midst of it all.  They had to learn again how to worship God, for the centre of their faith – the Temple in Jerusalem – was no longer available to them.  They had to learn how to survive as a foreign people and learn different ways.  It is believed that the exile is what gave birth to the synagogues that we read of in the New Testament.  The synagogues became the places where the faithful would gather to hear words of their history and faith and learn how to worship God without the trappings of the Temple.

No doubt this was a challenging time to be a believer.  One of the most famous stories of this time is recorded in the book of Daniel where the prophet is thrown into a lions’ den.  His survival is seen as a sign of God’s presence with the people even in a foreign land and serves as a reminder to the people that while God traditionally was worshipped in the Temple, God was not bound by geography and was to be found active wherever the people might go.  And while this was good news, the people still looked for that day when they could return to the land of their ancestors.

The prophet comes with a message from God in which he declares to the people that their time of exile is over and that they have paid dearly for their sins.  But now the people are to prepare a way in the wilderness, a highway for God in the desert – and a straight one at that.  I have never been in a desert, but I can imagine how difficult it would be to make a highway in one.  Shifting sands and winds would play havoc with any attempts and so the image of a straight path in the desert would be one of great hope for the people.  After all, their ancestors took 40 years to traverse the wilderness of Sinai. A straight path home through the wilderness would be wonderful.  That is the promise of God from Isaiah. A straight level path will be provided to the people to guide them home.  The return of the people to their homeland would not bring with it the same glory as in the past but they would be back in familiar territory.  They would no longer be the controllers of their destiny in a political sense, but they could return to their way of life and be able to worship and live for their God in the land that God had desired them to be.  God would provide the path; the people needed to take the walk.

This Sunday in Advent is traditionally a celebration of John the Baptist.  This is why our reading from the gospel of Mark is the story of John and his ministry.  John picks up the theme of Isaiah and uses it as the rallying cry for the coming of God in Jesus Christ.  John knows that the people have been feeling exiled from God spiritually.  The close connection between God and the people has been muddied by many things. John knows that God is planning something marvellous; but the people need to be ready.  It is interesting how when we lose control in our lives and find our physical movements limited, we often feel that we are losing control over other parts of our life and of ourselves. The physical limitations that the people of Israel felt under the rule of the Romans was affecting their spiritual life. They had lost the sense that God was still there for them. They struggled to feel his presence. Many of them were going through the motions, but felt no hope, no escape, and no real future.

Then John appears with a message from God.  His message breaks through the drudgery of life and touches the hearts of many.  They hear the ancient words of Isaiah and are reminded of that time when the exile ended, and their ancestors were allowed to return home.  They knew that God had brought that day about and that He had provided the path.

Now in their time the words of the prophet were heralded again.  But what was this path?  In the time of the Exodus, the path was from Egypt to Judah; in the time of the Exile, the path was from Babylon to Judea; but they were in the land of their ancestors, where were they to go?

The path of the Lord was being created and that path would be revealed in due time. For now it was necessary for the people to be baptized as a sign of their readiness for God’s coming.  When a person chose to be baptized, they were publicly declaring their desire to not only be forgiven of their sins but to turn their life in a new direction.  When we bring our children for baptism, we are making the commitment to direct the lives of our children that they may find the path of God as they grow.  And so baptism is not a simple rite of passage nor is it holy insurance.  Baptism is a sign to God that we have made a change in our life and that we have decided to live this life for him and with him.

This baptism by water, the baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins was the first step in the journey that John was inviting the people to take.  The second step would be when they received the baptism in the Holy Spirit: the promise of God to not only visit the people but to dwell with the people.  The water washed them physically and was an outward sign that they were preparing themselves to receive the new message from God. The Spirit would wash them spiritually and be an inward sign that not only had they received the new message from God but that they could and would dwell in the presence of their God forever.

Not everyone came for baptism.  Not everyone stayed for the baptism of the Spirit.  But for those who truly repented, who sought to change the direction of their lives, the coming of God in Christ brought hope and peace.

Today as we celebrate the Lord’s Supper, we remember two significant moments.  We remember the gift of a new life, a new start in the symbolic action of baptism and we remember the gift of an eternal life with God in the symbolic action of breaking the bread and drinking the wine.  But they will only be symbols without real meaning unless we make the conscious decision to live the truth that lies within them and reveal through our words and actions that we have accepted God’s gracious gift given in love!

AMEN