The Lectionary and Scripture Interpretation for the Season of Advent
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Overview and Connections
Last Sunday focused on Christ’s future second coming. Today we shift to the past, when John the Baptist heralded Christ’s first coming. And this first coming is not limited to the nativity, as the season might suggest, but rather Christ’s ministry, passion, and death: the entirety of the Incarnation.
All three readings today give us stories of transformation:
- Baruch tells of a transformation of sorrow and mourning into exuberant joy
- In Philippians, Paul talks about the good work, the transformation begun in them which is even now bearing fruit
- And then John the Baptist in Luke’s gospel calls us to metanoia – a complete transformation of life
Baruch 5:1-9
Baruch was composed about 5 years after the destruction of Jerusalem. This is the only reading from this book in the Sunday liturgy, although it does have a place among one of the seven Old Testament readings at the Easter Vigil liturgy.
Chp 4 presents a metaphor of Jerusalem personified, as a mother whose children have been taken away into captivity. Jerusalem is a mother mourning her children, and because she has lost hope for them, she is wearing robes of mourning and misery. She is hopeless.
The temple has been utterly destroyed and the people deported to foreign lands. For a religion rooted in a particular place, God seems to have abandoned the Israelites and they mourn that. But the prophet in v1 is calling for transformation – change your clothes! The attire of city and people is to be completely altered so as to reflect a new state of being.
It helps to remember here that clothes in ancient cultures reflected one’s status in a way that they do not for us today. To change one’s clothes was to literally change one’s self.
V2 specifies the clothing given by God: a mantle of justice and a diadem, or crown, representing the glory of the Eternal One. Remember that glory in the Old Testament always means the presence of God. These new clothes indicate the presence of God. Dare we say, the real presence of God.
This is significant because the Temple, which was the center of Jewish worship and God’s presence, is gone. It’s no longer an option to worship that way. This is a promise of a renewed presence of God in some way that they can’t yet understand. Of course, if we interpret this through the lens of Advent, we know that renewed presence is none other than Jesus, God incarnate.
Jerusalem changes her clothes to reflect a new identity and then, in v4, there’s also a name change. Last week in Jeremiah 33, Jerusalem also received a new name: the LORD our justice. Today she is named: the peace of justice. Changing one’s name or having it changed was common in that culture to indicate a new identity. It was a highly symbolic and significant act.
In v5 the prophet tells Jerusalem to go stand on the high place and watch for her children, for the Israelites, to return from exile. V6 is this image of them being led away on foot as captives and now being returned in splendor – carried on royal thrones. This type of image of the reversal of fortunes is common throughout scripture.
V7 talks about the mountains, hills, and valleys encountered along the return journey. On this map, you can see the area in the modern day. Baghdad (near the top right) was the general area of captivity, and the people were returning to Jerusalem, on the far left.
They had quite a distance to go, and it was across a vast desert.
In this picture, you can get an idea of what that desert was like: tall sand dunes and mountains, and then these deep rifts where the sand has been blown out.
God is going to level the hills and fill in the valleys and make the path level. The very contours of the world will be transformed for the sake of the people of Israel, for them to return home.
V8 references the forests and tree overshadowing the people as they journey, a word which evokes the annunciation of Christ’s birth to Mary. This prophecy takes place at a time when they’ve lost everything – the Temple, their homes, and their homeland. Likely many family and friends had also been lost. But there’s this note of joy and hope about what God is going to do.
Spend some time in visio divina, meditating on the desert photo above. What does it feel like to imagine a promised land on the far side of those mountains? Does it feel impossible? How will you traverse the deep valleys? Will you go around the tall sand dunes or try to scale them? Now reread vv6-7. What feelings are evoked by imagining how God might carry you through this landscape, or even completely transform it to make it easy for you to journey through it?
The Advent season invites us, like Jerusalem, to be on the watch for the good things that God has promised. I think it also invites us to look on circumstances that might provoke sorrow as catalysts of transformations. A constant refrain in the writings of the saints is that we don’t grow (or at least not very much) in times of peace and serenity; growth generally happens when the going gets rough. How have you experienced this in your own faith journey? Think about some ways you might share your own experiences with someone to encourage them in their own journey.
Philippians 1:4-6, 8-11
The most relevant fact about this letter for the Advent season is that it is a prison epistle – Paul wrote it when he was in prison. Not the best of circumstances to inspire hope and joy! And yet, the key theme of this letter is joy. And this is not a facile joy in the absence of suffering and difficulty, but rather a deep joy than can spring forth out of a prison cell (1:7,13), the suffering church (1:29-30), and even the possibility of martyrdom. All those are situations that Paul addresses in this letter.
Paul begins in v3 saying he is confident that the fact he is in prison is not an evil thing, but rather a way to witness to the world, and a way for the Philippian Christians to witness as well. Again, Paul’s hope and joy are born in difficult circumstances that he chooses to interpret in a different light.
A word in v5 is translated in this version as partnership. It is the Greek word, koinónia – better translated participation. This word implies financial support, but more than that, it implies the possibility of giving one’s life for the gospel. Paul saw the Philippians as a community that fully participated in the mission of Christ. They supported him financially for sure, but they also gave of their lives to witness to the gospel. Paul commends them for that and holds them up as an example for others to imitate.
I love v6! In the midst of the suffering and persecution, Paul speaks of his confidence in God’s faithfulness. Imagine yourself in a prison cell with no sure hope of release. You are there as one falsely and unjustly accused. You have done nothing wrong, and yet, here you sit. Can you pray v6 with Paul? If you cannot feel that level of confidence, can you ask God for the grace to have it?
In v7-8 Paul talks about how much he loves this community because they’ve been partners with him, again, participating in the gospel. The passage closes with a prayer. Philippi was a place where the majority of citizens were retired Roman soldiers, so you can imagine a pretty rough lot of people. This was on the edge of the empire – people who chose to retire here were generally of very low social status. But Paul prays that their love, knowledge, and discernment will keep increasing. God has already transformed a community of rough individuals into one that can love each other, and Paul prays that transformation will continue to happen in them.
Think of someone in particular for whom God might be asking you to pray this prayer.
Luke 3:1-6
Today’s passage starts off with a laundry list of places and people. I love Luke! He is all about the details and putting us in a particular and very specific context. Which is all the more reason to study and understand that context.
He begins at the top, rooting us in the Roman Empire, which encompassed the known world of the time. At this point, Tiberius Caesar had ruled the empire for 15 years, which dates this at about 29AD.
Tiberius was the ruler of all the empire, to which the Jewish lands belonged. Herod the Great was a Jew (nominally at least) and a puppet king of Rome who ruled the Jewish lands at Rome’s pleasure. Herod died in 4BC. After his death, the Jewish lands were divided among his three sons.
One son misbehaved to the point where the Roman emperor replaced him with a Roman governor – Pontius Pilate. Herod and Philip were also sons and were tetrarchs, or local rulers of other Jewish provinces. No one is really sure who Lysanias was, but Abilene was west of Damascus (not to be confused with Abilene TX which is west of Dallas). He was possibly a minor ruler in an area of special interest to Luke.
Putting this reading here in Advent roots us in the realities of human life. Ours is not a faith that shuns the world nor was Jesus outside the realm of humanity. Rather the world and the human condition are exactly where we find God. This will become a more and more prominent theme as we move through Advent: the extraordinary events of the Incarnation are accomplished smack dab in the middle of ordinary life.
Luke has situated us in the overall world of the Roman empire (which as the world of the time), as well as the particulars of the Jewish world. Now in v2 he situates us in what was most important to the Jewish people: the religious structure. Luke tells us that what he’s going to talk about now happened during the high priesthood of Annas and Caiphas.
Strict Judaism says there is only one high priest at a time. And some commentaries will criticize Luke for making the mistake of thinking there were two high priests. But here’s a little detail that tells us that Luke did, in fact, do his homework: Annas was high priest from AD6-15, and he was deposed by the Roman authorities. Nevertheless, he retained his title in Jewish circles and five of the succeeding high priests were his sons – all appointed by Rome. Many Jews still saw Annas as the high priest. Annas’ son-in-law Caiaphas was elevated to this role by Rome in AD18. The Romans viewed the priests as rulers. Jewish writers of the time (such as Josephus) used the title high priest to extend to leading members of the aristocratic families in general. It wasn’t that Luke didn’t understand the Jewish system of the priesthood. Quite the opposite: Luke understood very well the political context in which his story happened.
Luke situates us in the political world of the ruling elite, both secular and religious. But then he makes a start shift and starts talking about this nobody out in the middle of nowhere: John in the desert.
In v3 we see John out in the desert preaching a message of metanoia. This is special and key theme of this gospel, and is usually translated as either repentance or conversion. It comes from the Greek meta which means (among other things) to change, and noia which means thoughts. Literally, to change your mind. The New Testament usage of this word use always implies an about-face, changing the way one lives. I think a lot of times repentance for us is more focused on the past – sorrow for what one did wrong. Metanoia, though, is more about the future – doing things differently. Metanoia is about transformation.
V4 tells us John’s message. By quoting from Isaiah, Luke is establishing John in a long and revered line of great prophets. He quotes Isaiah 40:3 and the Old Testament rendering of the verse reads like this:
In the desert, prepare the way of the Lord
This is how the Hebrew cantillation marks, used for chanting the text in the synagogue, render it. The liturgical use of this passage in the synagogue hearkens back to the exiles, with the people making their way through the desert, returning home. But for Luke’s gospel, John himself is in the desert, so this becomes a voice crying out in the desert about the Messiah.
A voice of one crying out in the desert: ‘Prepare the way of the Lord…
V5 then echoes the Baruch reading. Matthew and Mark also use this Isaiah quote but only Luke extends it to encompass v6 of Isaiah which references “all peoples.” For Isaiah, salvation was a return from exile. For Luke, salvation is the Christ event.
Context was important to Luke. His audience depended on knowing the political landscape in order to understand the story. Perhaps it seems less important to us today, and yet, maybe not. How often do we make assumptions about a neighbor by the political signs in their yards? Think about your context – the historical factors that are important to who you are. What kinds of things might Luke list about your world and what difference do they make to your story?
Advent is actually a penitential season. That emphasis tends to get lost in a cultural focus on Christmas. Today John in the desert is calling us to transformation. Perhaps imagine yourself out there in a wilderness landscape, listening to John preach. What areas of your life are ready for Christ’s transformative power?
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© 2024 Kelly Sollinger