Corrective Steps
Malachi 3:1-4; Luke 1:68-79[1]
I’m told that when I was born, both of my feet were turned to the
right. In the early 60’s, the solution the doctors recommended was to have me
wear two left shoes. What they did not know is the effect that would have on my
body. All of my life, I’ve had problems with my right ankle and knee. Any
sports that involved running were a challenge for me. I must add that the
“corrective steps” the doctors applied to my feet must have done some good.
They did enable me to walk! I have had to take further “corrective steps” as an
adult. As a serious bicyclist, I found it helped to get fitted for custom
orthotics. These days, my practice of yoga has benefited me greatly. The
stances we do in yoga have probably helped the most in strengthening my right
leg.
At some point in our lives, most of us will be advised to take
corrective steps with some facet of our health. Some of those measures bring
relief. Others may be a nuisance, or even downright unpleasant. Many of us know
that some corrective steps doctors recommend can actually debilitate the
patient. The treatment for cancer can be like that. Chemotherapy and radiation
treatments are meant to kill the cancer, but they don’t have the ability to
discriminate between malignant and healthy cells. The treatment for some
diseases can be quite burdensome. Although the goal is to heal the body, the
steps taken can be quite painful.
Our Scripture lessons for today address “corrective steps” that
were needed among the people of Israel. In this respect, they don’t seem to fit
the season of Advent. More than that they seem to be in tension with each
another. Malachi speaks of one who will prepare the way for the Lord in fearful
tones, warning of judgment. The song of Zechariah in Luke’s Gospel joyfully
welcomes the birth of John the Baptizer as the one to go before the Lord. If
you find yourself puzzled, you’re probably not alone. A pastor friend of mine
mentioned to me this week that these were not her favorite texts to preach! How
does judgment go together with salvation?
The prophet Malachi addresses the people of Judah at a time of
disillusionment and complacency. It was some time after the exile in Babylon,
and they were weak, poor, and relatively disorganized. That their commitment to
God was failing can be seen from some of the practices that Malachi criticizes.
It would seem that they had placed all their hopes in God to intervene. And so
Malachi promised that God would indeed send a messenger to prepare for him to
come to the people.
Although this was the focus of their hope, they thought of the
Lord’s coming solely in terms of their deliverance. But Malachi speaks
pointedly about some things that needed to be corrected in order for that
deliverance to take place. He warns that God would come to judge those who were
faithless, those who broke the bonds of fidelity, those who distorted the
truth. He would come to judge “those who defraud laborers of their wages, who
oppress the widows and the fatherless, and deprive the foreigners among you of
justice” (Mal. 3:5). All of these practices directly contradicted specific
instructions God had given his people in the Torah. The fact that failed to obey these instructions
demonstrated, according to Malachi, that they did not truly honor the Lord with
their lives. And so Malachi speaks of the one who would come in ominous tones,
asking “who can endure the day of his coming, and who can stand when he
appears?” (Mal. 3:2).
This seems quite a contrast to the joyful song of Zechariah about
his son, John the Baptizer. Zechariah viewed his son as one who would prepare
the way for the Lord in that he would “give knowledge of salvation to his
people by the forgiveness of their sins” (Lk. 1:77). He saw the birth of John
as the dawn of the “tender mercy of our God” that would bring light to those in
darkness and guide the people to walk in “the way of peace” (Lk. 1:78-79). On
the surface of things, it seems difficult if not impossible to reconcile these
two visions of the one who would prepare the people for the Lord’s coming.
And yet, when you look at John’s ministry, you find that he sounds
more like the messenger of judgment Malachi describes than the bringer of
salvation and forgiveness. Luke’s Gospel tells us elsewhere that when John saw
the crowds coming to be baptized by him, he turned them away, calling them a
“brood of vipers” (Luke 3:7)! In order for them to experience the salvation of
the Lord they would have to “Bear fruits worthy of repentance” (Lk. 3:8) by
making some of the very same corrections that Malachi addressed in his day. How
could this message of judgment and the call for a radical change of life have
anything to do with salvation? In the words Luke quotes from the prophet
Isaiah, for the people to experience God’s salvation, first that which was
crooked must be made straight (Lk 3:5-6). The corrective steps that might sound
harsh were intended to lead the people to once again love the Lord their God
with all their hearts. Then they would know the salvation for which they had
hoped so long.
As we celebrate our
Lord’s coming to live among us on that first Christmas long ago, so we can also
look forward to his coming again to complete the work of salvation. But we must
remember that in order to experience God’s salvation, all of us will have to
undergo some kind of correction. That which is crooked within us must be
straightened out. The ways in which we live our lives that do not honor God
will have to be purged, and that may be painful. There are “corrective steps”
that we all need to take in order to truly love the Lord our God with all our
hearts and truly love our neighbors as ourselves. But the end result of these
corrective steps is that, on that final day, “all flesh will see the salvation
of God!”
[1] ©2018 Alan Brehm. A sermon delivered by Rev. Dr. Alan
Brehm on 12/9/2018 at Hickman Presbyterian Church, Hickman, NE.
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