A ram horn sounds. Then a strong solitary voice sings: “Pre-ee-ee-pare ye the Way of the Lord! Pre-ee-ee-pare ye the Way of the Lord!
The sound is stark, solid, unsettling in its isolation. There is a brief pause. Then the call fills theater, church, or kitchen with the phrase repeated again and again with more and more voices.
That is how the musical Godspell begins.
I think of it every time I read the beginning of the Gospel of Mark. In Mark there is no listing of the lineage of Jesus to authenticate his claim to be the Messiah. Nor are there infant narratives to let people know that from his beginning, Jesus was someone special and important.
The Gospel of Mark is the gospel of the kerygma–the Good News of Jesus Christ! He wants us to know that God sent His Son Jesus to bring us into eternal union with Him. We are sinners. It is not our human nature to love and obey as God wants us to do. But, we can do what we can as people, to turn toward God, to see and experience Jesus, and then to accept the gift of His sacrifice on the cross so that we may rise with him to build the Kingdom of God.
It was likely the first Gospel written. It is bare bones. And the bare bones are a call to the people of Jesus’ day and our day to believe in Jesus, the Christ, and follow Him.
Mark begins with a one-line reference to Isaiah and then names John as the messenger. Part of Jewish culture at the time of Jesus was that it was TIME for the Messiah to come. The setting was right. It was a time of peace—Roman peace—which meant people were safe from other foreign invaders, but oppressed by a pagan ruler. It was time for righteousness among the people to let God know “We have done our part. We have purified ourselves. We are ready for You, YHWH, to come and deliver us.”
Then John appears. “Repent!” he preaches. “Repent to prepare the way of the Lord!” The people come to hear John, to be sparked with hope and conversion.
With this scene Mother Church turns our attention from the Second Coming of Christ at the end of time to the days just before Jesus began his ministry. As Mother Church shifts, it is a good time for us to pause and think about “Prepare ye the way of the Lord.” How are we to do it?
Isaiah 40:1-5, 9-11
Today’s first reading includes the first verses of Deutero-Isaiah, also known as Second Isaiah. The first author of Isaiah ended his predictions of coming terror in Isaiah 39. Chapters 40-55 were written during the Babylonian exile and have a very different message. The message is HOPE. God is saying to His People: your time of exile is coming to an end—and the future will be wonderfully bright.
Read this selection out loud slowly. Pause at the many images of comfort and hope. Which ones especially speak to you today? “Make straight in the wasteland a highway for our God,” “the glory of the Lord shall be revealed,” “all people shall see it together” are the words that call to me.
Yes, for me, especially “all people shall see it together” attracts me. That joins with the images of the passage: mountains and valleys being smoothed. I can see a desert turning green and large numbers of sheep grazing and resting while Jesus, the Good Shepherd, guards and guides them.
From those images my prayer goes out from my heart, “Come, Lord Jesus, come again, come now, shepherd us, lead us, guide us, protect us.”
Fr. Eugene, homilist and director of the oblate retreat I am attending this weekend, says “BE BOLD in prayer.” Say what’s on your mind to God. Do not be afraid to let God know what is in your heart.” I know that—from experience, from guidance through the years. But I hesitate. What if what I want isn’t what God wants? Shouldn’t I just say “Thy will be done?” Probably not, if that’s not really where my heart is. Better to say, “Lord, I want…, but life events seem to indicate you want…..” and then BE OPEN to listen to how God answers. Might I change God’s mind? Might God change my mind? Might what God seeks for me be something different from either of those positions as I am thinking of them?
Just as salvation comes in stark boldness in Mark, Jesus might be coming in stark boldness to me (or to you) today. I may need to let go to what I have figured out in my I-think-I-understand-it-all mind in order to follow the ram’s horn and truly “pre-ee-ee-pare ye the way of the Lord.”
II Peter 3:8-14
The second reading asks such a “letting go” prayer of Christians who were seeing Jesus’ return as a hinge point of their lives. Like some of Paul’s epistles we have been reading these last few weeks, it seeks to comfort and stabilize the faith of Christians who expected Jesus’ Second Coming to be any day now. They grew impatient and restless, especially since persecution of Christians was getting more common.
Those of us who live where it is safe to be Christian probably can’t fully appreciate their distress. What if your faith was tentative, but you might have to die because of it? On the other hand, what if you denied your faith to save self or family, but then Jesus came and found you wanting? Apostasy was a real temptation, but, at that time, it was pretty much considered an unforgivable sin.
Some readers may be facing such dilemmas today. Martyrdom is far more common today than in the first century. Such threats are a stark reality that those of us who are comfortable need to face. Sometimes we don’t quite stand up for our faith when faced with common taunts of polarity in our culture. The final words of this reading can speak to us all:
Therefore, beloved, since you await these things,
be eager to be found without spot or blemish before him, at peace.
Mark 1:1-8
Back to John the Baptist at the Jordan. Pre-ee-ee-pare ye the way of the Lord!
Jesus comes now to us. He comes in God’s Word. He comes in the Eucharist. He comes in the Church. He comes in the hungry, thirsty, stranger, imprisoned, and sick.
As we heard on Friday, when Mary said yes to the angel and gave God human flesh, God came in a new way to earth. When 100% human/100% divine Jesus ascended to heaven, the human world forever joined the world of God. Then, when the Holy Spirit came on Pentecost, God was present on earth forever. Jesus in his flesh unified the human and the divine. He IS EMMANUEL, God with us–even today.
God who is present comes to me, to you. How can I pre-ee-ee-pare the way of the Lord for him in my life? How can you pre-ee-ee-pare the way of the Lord in yours? How can we lay the groundwork for Jesus to come in that bold, solitary call of Godspell’s ram’s horn?
Prayer
As I pray with the scene of John the Baptist at the Jordan, lead me, Lord, to consider that my words or actions this Advent can prepare hearts to receive Jesus–or to dismiss Jesus–this Christmas. Lead me, guide me, to prepare the Way of the Lord in myself, in my family, and in even strangers that I meet. Help me heed the ram’s horn.
