Good news

Mark 1:1-8

Imagine someone coming out to the Black River and saying this. "Come on out, repent, for something new is coming. There is someone who will do and be something more. Come and get ready." We would probably think some crackpot was down at the river. We might go to see because we are curious, but we certainly aren't going to welcome change, are we?

Yet this is what John is calling for. The good news is not proclaimed first in the temple, among all the religious folks. It is proclaimed out in the wilderness, away from a building. The good news is there is something new, away from the temple and it will involve being baptized from the Spirit, not from water. The good news is something is changing.

Now I don't think we would welcome this with open arms. We are stuck to tradition just as they are, we are stuck with our building just as they are. So having someone proclaim there is something new coming which doesn't embrace any of this would be disturbing to us and it was to them. It would be ignored by some, just as it was then. So we wouldn't be the first ones out there welcoming this good news, and this calls us to ask more questions of ourselves then.

We are faithful followers, right, so why do announcements of change, or following the Spirit frighten us so? We do shut these conversations down. Everything is how it has been and always has been. We don't want to look at the facts of what is happening all around us. Dwight Zschelle author of  "The Agile Church" says we are stuck in one of the stages of grief, we are too busy being in depression, denial, and anger to move forward in positive ways. What we want and what we picture is the church as it has always been. We're here and people are supposed to flock to us. This is not the reality anymore. Just because we make changes within doesn't mean the people will flock to us.

We are afraid to confront a different and new reality. We don't want to talk about it or face it. Yet if we are to go on we must. We must dare to try new things and fail. We must learn and try again. We must proclaim something new is stirring and see where it takes us, because reality faces us just down our own street. Do we dare to say out loud that our neighbors are closing. First Presbyterian won't be here anymore. It is happening all over this country.

So when we say prepare the way for something different we should feel safe in our tradition of this. We are a people of bringing out new things. We have stood at the crossroads and from a few people, twelve, something new came into being and spread. So there is much reason to hope, much reason not to be afraid, yet we have to go forward with the hard conversations. We must stop living in fear, anger and denial. We must be willing to listen to the Spirit and see where it will move us.

We are not orphans, we have been adopted as God's people and God's people faced hard times. They faced evolving challenges of who they were and how they could still be who they are. This is the gift of Isaiah from a captive people separated from their house of worship. Make straight, prepare the way, listen for the voice of one crying out in the wilderness. In the dry and deserted places, in the places which aren't often sought out. Because it is in these places where we flourish. Becoming fully what God has called us to be. Don't be afraid.

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