Maverick is the son of Chris and Becca Reeb.
On Sunday, December 10th, we welcomed Maverick Aiden Reeb into his new family at Rehoboth Presbyterian Church. Our lesson came from the beginning of the Gospel of Mark: John the Baptist announcing the coming of the Christ. This was also a perfect text for a baptism.
Sermon
Good morning. What a week this was in the life of Rehoboth
Church. Many of you were here yesterday as we said goodbye to Tom Smith. Today
we baptize Maverick Aiden Reeb. If I could have guessed the events of this
week, I would have called this sermon, “The Circle of Life.”
I sat down with Becca and Chris a couple months ago to pick
a date for Maverick’s baptism. Working around Chris’ schedule was a challenge. When
it became clear that we would celebrate the baptism during Advent, I asked them
which Sunday they wanted. I said we probably didn’t want to do it on the Sunday
of Peace, because, well, Maverick. And of course, I got the order of the Sundays
wrong, so here we are, celebrating Maverick’s baptism on the second Sunday of
Advent. On the other hand, that makes the sermon title really appropriate: “A
Voice Cries Out.” We’ll see if we have peace this morning.
Our Gospel lesson this morning offers us Mark’s take on
John the Baptist. He paints a scary picture of a man, “clothed with camel's
hair, with a leather belt around his waist, and he ate locusts and wild honey.”
That sounds almost like a homeless person on the street. John the Baptist comes
out of the wilderness; he’s not a civilized person; he offers a difficult
message: repent!
Aleksandr Ivanov, John the Baptist
This is a perfect message for Advent. As I said last
Sunday, we don’t want Advent, we want Christmas. We want a happy little baby,
tucked away in a manger. We want the carols on Christmas Eve and we want the
presents on Christmas morning. Maybe we can’t even wait for the morning, so we
exchange gifts on Christmas Eve.
But we don’t get that in the Gospel of Mark. We don’t get a
birth story. No, Mark’s Gospel starts with John the Baptist, a voice crying out
from the wilderness! A voice that tells the people to repent. As one of my
favorite biblical scholars says, there’s no easing into the Gospel of Mark.[1] There is simply a
proclamation and a call to follow. We want a happy message, with a baby in a
manger. We say that Advent is a time a watching and waiting, a time for looking
inward. We want that to be a happy meditation, but John the Baptist won’t let
us off the hook. We’re called to repent—even when we think we’re doing fine—no,
especially when we think we’re doing
fine.
But we’re not doing fine. We have problems, even here at
Rehoboth, and we need to change. That’s not a fun message.
There were a lot of people here yesterday for Tom Smith’s
funeral. But I have a feeling that there were people who didn’t know that he
had passed away. There are people who don’t read the newspaper and didn’t see
the obituary for Tom. We have a problem with communication in this
congregation. We also have a problem with service. Most of the people who do
the work in this congregation have been doing most of the work for years. We
need new people to serve on Session and Deacons; we need new people to serve on
committees. We need this service as much as we need your financial stewardship.
A voice cries out in the wilderness, and that voice belongs
to Maverick Aiden Reeb. It also belongs to Elizabeth Shannon King and Aubrey
Jean Couch and Lauren Nicole Fowler.
Beloved, I have officiated four funerals in my time at
Rehoboth Church. And today I’ll celebrate the fourth baptism in the fifteen
months that I’ve served as your interim pastor. The voices in the wilderness
belong to Maverick and Elizabeth, Aubrey and Lauren, and also Gavin and Gianna,
Aviana, Liam and Sydney, and so many other children in this congregation. They
cry out: We’re alive! Praise the Lord, this congregation is still alive! And
that means that we are charged with keeping
this congregation healthy so that they have a church home for many years to
come.
One of my tasks, when I write a sermon, is to find the
grace in the text. That is, I must find where God’s grace is expressed in the
text of the story. My job, here in the pulpit, is to proclaim that grace—to proclaim
God’s grace as it’s expressed in each week’s piece of Scripture, or text. The
grace is the message of repentance that was brought first by John the Baptist.
Of course, as we continue to travel through the Gospel of Mark, we will hear
Jesus proclaim this message, too.
I’m amazed that any people responded to the message of John
the Baptist. He’s kind of scary; his message isn’t fun. He doesn’t have any
power or prestige. John comes from the wilderness, the desert. The wilderness,
or the desert, is always an important location in the Bible:
We know, in theory, that
the desert is where divinity shows up. But we know even more, by experience,
that it’s a lonely place to be. We know, deeply, that it is also the place
where we will likely utter Jesus’ own words, “My God, my God, why have you
forsaken me?” We know, fearfully, that the wilderness is also the place where
abandonment takes root in our hearts and isolation takes over our souls. No
wonder we have to convince ourselves that, “Every valley shall be lifted up,
and every mountain and hill be made low; the uneven ground shall become level,
and the rough places a plain” (Isaiah 40:4) hopefully without our help.[2]
The fact that people
came and followed this crazy man who came out of the wilderness suggests that
the people were yearning for something. They knew their needs weren’t being
met. Something had to change. So, when John told them that they had to change, they listened, and they were baptized, but they
knew there was something more.
Here at Rehoboth, we are also yearning for something more.
We’re tired. We want change. We need to repent from the complacency that we
practice. This complacency can take many forms. Sometimes, it means that we
wait for other people to step into leadership positions. Or maybe someone says,
“call me if you need any help on the program committee.” That puts the burden
on the few people who are willing to serve—it gives the committee chairs one
more task.
Maverick Reeb is introduced to his church family.
The good news is, there are signs of new life! There are
new people who have volunteered to serve on the Deacons and the Session. And there
are still some spaces available to serve. This is how we prepare for the coming
of the Christ child; this is how we prepare for the incarnation, the Word made
flesh, God with us, Emanuel. Let us look within ourselves, find the new ways in
which we can serve, and repent of our complacency. Thanks be to God. Amen.
Benediction
Now, beloved, as you depart from this place, remember your
own baptisms. Remember that we are baptized into Christ’s death and
resurrection. Remember that, through baptism, we are dead to sin. And if we are
dead to sin, then we are alive in Christ, who calls us to be the Church, the
body of Christ in the world, the world today. So, go forth and be instruments
of God’s love and peace and reconciliation. Do not return evil for evil to any
person, but know that we are all loved by God, and that we are called to
reflect that love to everyone we meet. Go forth and be the salt of the earth
and the light of the world. In the name of Jesus Christ, our Lord, let all
God’s children say, Amen!
[1]
Karoline Lewis, “Wilderness Preaching,” retrieved from: http://www.workingpreacher.org/craft.aspx?post=5018
[2]
Lewis.
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