Preaching text: Malachi 3:1-4
For he is like a refiner’s fire and like fullers’ soap; he will sit as a refiner and purifier of silver, and he will purify the descendants of Levi and refine them like gold and silver...
Imagine for a moment that you are a hunk of metal ore. You are a rock that some miner has dug out of the ground and has taken to a smith. That smith has then placed you into a furnace, into intense heat. The fire is burning and melting you and the parts of you that are impure and unwanted are being melted away, leaving behind only the pure metal the smith desires: the iron, the gold, the silver; what he wants is kept, what he does not need is discarded.
It’s a violent process, when you think about it. If rocks could feel, one could almost say it was painful or unpleasant as this ore is taken and transformed from one form into another. Rocks, of course, cannot feel, but people can and that’s a big part of what makes this metaphor from Malachi so powerful. As God transforms his people through the work and word of his prophets, they are going to find things a little hot, a little uncomfortable, maybe even a bit painful.
Certainly, that was the experience of our person-of-the-day and those who encountered him. Today is the Nativity of John the Baptist, placed here because we are precisely six months from Christmas Eve and Evangelist Luke tells us that the Baptizer was born six months prior to the Christ. Luke also tells us they were cousins, and we can guess that they knew each other, perhaps even grew up together. And through them, of course, God set out to change the world, but in very different ways with each man.
Isaiah’s prophecy of the “voice crying out in the wilderness” is the one associated with John and his work. As an adult, he is a controversial figure, wandering around the desert dressed like some crazy barbarian, claiming that God is doing a new thing, and that the people should repent and make ready for it. Prepare ye the way of the Lord. And how does one do this? By changing the way you live your life. Moving from selfishness to selflessness, from greed to generosity, from apathy to compassion. He does not pull his punches with those who benefit from the status quo, calling out the religious and political authorities of his time: You brood of vipers! He is blunt and bold, harsh but truthful. He is not a man most of us would like. He’s a firebrand, a troublemaker, a meddler. And God is using him to burn away the injustice and immorality of his people.
But the people, as we know from the story, are not interested in having their injustice and immorality burned away and, in the end, it is John who pays the price for their lack of vision. Jesus comes along with a much gentler approach later, but essentially calling for the same thing, a new world of justice, peace, and mercy, and they kill him too. Change is the most dangerous thing to ask of people and yet it also always one of the most necessary.
If we fast forward to today, we see this same dynamic at play. So much of what defines our life and times is the change of our world and the ways in which we humans are fighting tooth and nail against it. Take the Middle East for instance. Why do groups such as ISIS and Al Qaeda exist?
Because the Muslim world is changing. It’s encounter with the more advanced more affluent secular West is transforming it. And many are seeing their livelihoods threatened by economic forces outside their control (globalization, mechanization, etc.) They’re seeing their traditional social privileges challenged as women gain more rights and privileges. They see Western powers, such as the United States, as taking away everything they hold dear and so they feel compelled to fight back. But the truth that they don’t want to admit is that change is coming to their world and they are not going to be able to stop it.
That should sound familiar, because it’s also happening here. We here in the West are also experiencing rapid change. People are seeing their livelihoods threatened by economic forces outside their control (globalization, mechanization, etc.) They’re seeing their traditional social privileges challenged as women, people of color, LGBT folk, and those of other religions gain more rights and privileges. Many of them blame the forces of liberalism as taking away everything they hold dear and so they feel compelled to fight back. Mind you, while we have seen violence as a result of this (Many mass shootings, Charlottesville), it’s nowhere near the level of terrorism ISIS inflicts on its fellow Muslims (yet), but the dynamic is very much the same. The truth that we don’t want to admit is that change is coming to our world and we are not going to be able to stop it.
One of the most fundamental and often-unspoken teachings of our faith is simply that God knows best. We have spent the millennia of human existence pretending otherwise. When God sends a prophet to remind us of what we’ve been taught, we resent them, often silence or discredit them, and, if need be, we kill them. We don’t want to change from our sinful and evil ways. We like being evil and with good reason. It feels good to hate; there’s an adrenaline rush that goes with it. It gives us power. It feels good to have money and get stuff, even if we take it by dishonest means; it lets us lie to ourselves about how successful and important we are. It gives us power. And we like feeling powerful. It’s our first sin. Eat this and you will be like God. You will be powerful and the world will be yours. And ever since, we have been trying to prove that lie true in whatever way we can.
But God’s way really is better. Love instead of hate. Generosity instead of greed. Compassion and mercy instead of cruelty and apathy. A world where people of all color, creed, language, tribal origin, gender, sexuality, age, and everything else that we so often use to divide ourselves one from another can come together as brothers and sisters. United as children of the same Creator, united as brothers and sisters of the same Redeemer, united as recipients of the same Spirit. That is God’s vision of the world, God’s dream, God’s desire. And he keeps calling us back to it again and again and again. Who is it this time who brings this word to us? Is it Isaiah or Elijah? Is it John the Baptizer? Is it MLK Jr? Is it Malala Yousafzai? The names change as the generations pass but their purpose, even if they don’t fully understand it, is the same. To bring this world closer to what God envisions.
What about us? My friends, this world is for us. Christ came and died and rose again to ensure we would be a part of this new world. I know there are many in the Church who do not like what is happening in our world. I know there are many in the Church who are afraid of change, who find the refiners fire too painful. But the simple truth of your existence has not changed. You are beloved, you are precious, and you would not be left behind in a world of God’s true justice. Your excess may be burned away, but the person you are meant to be in the world that means to create will remain. Do not fear it. Trust that God does indeed know best. Amen.
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