Sunday, December 8, 2019. Rev. Annamarie Groenenboom, preaching.Scripture Readings: Isaiah 11:1-10; Matthew 3:1-12

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SERMON TEXT

When

I was in college, I had the opportunity to study abroad in Israel. While I

spent some time in the classroom, I spent most of my time exploring the amazing

culture, sites, and history of Israel in Jerusalem, the West Bank, and Galilee.

 One morning, my fellow students and I

piled onto our large bus and drove several hours East of Jerusalem.  When the bus finally stopped and we all

unloaded, we were all so confused. We were standing in the middle of literally

nowhere. There was nothing but sand and some cliffs in the far distance. There

was no water, no plants, and no animals.  We were the only living creatures for miles.

With no announcement or goodbye, the bus took off and left us there.  It was then that my professor said while looking into our shocked faces, “we are in the Judean Wilderness and our bus will meet us in Jericho. We will be spending all of today, walking through the wilderness.”

Anyone who has gone hiking with me or gone on the Summer Mission Project with me can testify to the fact that I am not an outdoorsy type person.  I feel super out of my element.  So, as I saw the means of my safety and preservation drive into the distance, I actually pondered chasing after the bus.  Maybe it would see me and I wouldn’t be stuck in the middle of this deserted place.

But as we walked all morning and all afternoon towards civilization, I actually felt closer to God and my peers.  I realized that just because there was nothing growing in the wilderness, it didn’t mean that God wasn’t there.  My walk in the wilderness was truly one of the most formative moments of my spiritual life.  It was just me, my peers, and God and a whole lot of history.  For a short time, we were completely separate from society and the city.  Our walk through the wilderness was a transformative experience for all of the students.  So much so that many of them went to get tattoos with the Hebrew word for wilderness, midbar, on their wrists.

The wilderness can be a scary place.  I certainly was terrified when we were left by the bus.  I did some simple word association with our Wednesday Bible Study group and when asked what came to mind when I said “wilderness” some of the responses were: barren land, wild beasts, separate from anything human, and vulnerability.

The wilderness is exactly these things, but much more especially in the Bible.  The wilderness is a very significant place in the story of the Israelites.  It represents a place of safety, a place where God delivered them from the Egyptians.  It is a place of relationship building and covenant making when God gave the Israelites the 10 Commandments.  But it is also a place of pain and sorrow after the Israelites rejected and disobeyed God.

The wilderness was an important place in Jesus’ story too.  It was a place for him to get away from the crowds; a place of formation and comfort.  It was a place of contemplation and the place where Jesus went for 40 days and 40 nights and was tempted.

The wilderness is important in our lives today.  It represents places where we feel uncomfortable.  Places where we feel alone.  But also places where we can spiritually grow. These can be physical places like the wilderness I walked through or they could be feelings or places in our spirit.

Now, you may be wondering, what does the wilderness have to do with Advent? Well, during Advent, we are welcomed into the Wilderness to wait for our coming Messiah by John the Baptist.  In our Gospel story today, John, the voice crying out in the wilderness, “prepare the way of the Lord, make his path’s straight,” becomes our Advent guide.

John the Baptist is quite the character. He lives in the wilderness wearing clothes made from camel hair and has a special diet of ho