Turn

 Luke 3:7-18

Repent! I get a thousand images and remember things I would rather forget from just this one word. Yet repentance comes from a Greek word: metanoia which actually means to reverse a decision, or at its root to think differently. Once a preacher likened it to turning from one direction into a new direction. At its best repentance asks us to turn inward, to look within ourselves, and to see what we need to grow on or through. It does not ask us to feel guilty or to see what have been the sins in our life we label. It instead asks us to examen ourselves.

Now this is not examine in taking a fine tooth comb and seeing what of the 10 commandments we haven't lived up to, or what others label as sinful and wrong. Examen is an exercise which takes us on a tour of what we've done throughout a day or a year. To look at this with eyes not evaluating, but to see where we have felt within as spiritually free or unfree.

To label the spiritually free is to be in a state of freedom. The emotions which don't weigh us down or cause us to feel bound inside. Joy, love, happiness, kindness, gentleness, patience are all places where we are spiritually free. We dwell in the moment grace because we can freely give and receive.

To be spiritually unfree are the times we can't think straight. These emotions are anger, fear, frustration, loss of patience, unkind, harsh and they lead us to act in a narrow way because we don't see other options open to us. So we lose our temper and say something we shouldn't, or we cut off someone because they have cut us off, and the list goes on. 

The Ignatian way of examen asks us to look at these instances and see where we have to ask for forgiveness during these times of being spiritually unfree. It is a way to train our eyes on not condemnation but of repenting. Because there is no guilt in the bringing up, only a road to forgiveness and how we might act differently the next time. What is it tomorrow that you will do if another time like this comes up, how might you respond differently.

This is the point of John's repentance preached in Luke today. When you encounter certain people: an official from Rome whom you'd rather spit at, the people whom you are oppressing and resent because you are far from home and they hate you respond differently than in hitting them. Make a difference and act with spiritual freedom. You don't have to be hateful just because the other person is. This is mostly a fear response, a response to make someone else less than human and to put us in positions of being us and them. You know they are other because of ... or they are bad because of ... fill in the blanks. 

Now the thing which helps us with these ways is expectation. This week expectation is one of the words we were prompted to write about in our poetry group. I have thought about expectation deeply. Why are children so excited about Christmas? Expectation of Christmas, the hope for this or that they have asked Santa for. As we age it is in the gathering of family or traditions kept. Every year my son sends me pictures of the Christmas bread I always made, it fills my heart with joy to see he is carrying on a tradition we did. The memory brings expectation of a season filled with joy and love. 

In repentance expectation helps us to react differently. We are filled with the hope of something new beginning with us. We can make the difference in how we react to something: whether fearful, angry, or frustrated. We can turn this around by being open, having patience, and listening better to what someone is saying. This is the place where I have found people astounded as they share, this is a person who I think I can talk to and I never thought I would be able to understand a (again fill in the blank) Trump supporter, Biden supporter, ant vaxer, a vaccinated person wherever the fault lines are. 

This is exactly what John is speaking to in Luke's gospel. We need to repent of the ways we make our enemy evil. We need to repent of making them less than human. Then we need to operate in the ways of expectation, the hope born of a Savior is within us all. God within us to give and receive freely. To listen more openly instead of have our position already laid out. To release the fear, anger and pettiness which divides us and instead bring us together as God would see this world. 

Love came down at Christmas, love all lovely, love divine. Love was born at Christmas star and angels gave the sign, Christina Rosetti wrote this ages ago, and it still rings true today. If we operate in the ways of repentance we will see the hopeful expectation in the star and angels a joy to the world.