Sleeping Baby Jesus

John said to the crowds coming out to be baptized by him, “You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the coming wrath?  Produce fruit in keeping with repentance. And do not begin to say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham as our father.’ For I tell you that out of these stones God can raise up children for Abraham. The ax is already at the root of the trees, and every tree that does not produce good fruit will be cut down and thrown into the fire.”

“What should we do then?” the crowd asked.

John answered, “Anyone who has two shirts should share with the one who has none, and anyone who has food should do the same.”

Even tax collectors came to be baptized. “Teacher,” they asked, “what should we do?”

“Don’t collect any more than you are required to,” he told them.

Then some soldiers asked him, “And what should we do?”

He replied, “Don’t extort money and don’t accuse people falsely—be content with your pay.”

The people were waiting expectantly and were all wondering in their hearts if John might possibly be the Messiah. John answered them all, “I baptize you with water. But one who is more powerful than I will come, the straps of whose sandals I am not worthy to untie. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire. His winnowing fork is in his hand to clear his threshing floor and to gather the wheat into his barn, but he will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire.” And with many other words John exhorted the people and proclaimed the good news to them.

―The Gospel of Luke

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Dear Kate,

Do we know Jesus?

I guess we know enough about him to know we don't need or want to know more.  Not the kind of feeling one has with an easy lover after causal sex; more like we feel we know how to drive a car and in god's name have been driving enough of it to be told anything different about our drivenness.

If a most definitive Word has been spoken by God we must have heard enough of it by now, somehow found a way to incorporate it into our charmed way of life, we say, but still, it sounds kinda vague, kinda compromised, kinda...you know what I mean, too obscured for our practical  purposes.  "What is truth?" Pilate spoke for us all.

"[Jesus] will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire. His winnowing fork is in his hand to clear his threshing floor and to gather the wheat into his barn, but he will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire."  What do you think John the Baptist meant by that?  Read the sentence after this, and we will hear Luke seems to suggest John meant to give people the Good News.

From where we stand we would say Jesus wants us to be a socialist, or at least a better philanthropist, maybe at worst for the month of December, to chop up a few more turkeys for the poor or clean out our excesses, put them in big black garbage bags labelled for curbside pickup.  Maybe more political actions, progressive thoughts, environmental engagements.  For heaven's sake, Jesus, just point us to where our fingers should point and we shall out-point you for missing the point about the obvious matters we must deal with in our modern age!

What do I know?  I know I will need to go to work now.  Let sleeping dogs lie, and baby in manger too.

Yours, Alex