How many of you would like to have John the Baptist over for dinner?

Are your culinary skills up to cooking locusts?

And who else would you invite?

I mean, who else could you afford to invite who wouldn’t get offended at this rough, brash, tell-it-like-it-is prophet who had a gift for seeing inside a person and shedding light on all our hidden spaces?

I think your invitation to this dinner party would have to read, “Come Naked.”

Naked.

Most of us do not like to be naked. It is the stuff of anxiety dreams and sitcom pratfalls. In my bathroom at home there is a full length mirror that is, in my opinion, unfortunately placed such that when one exits the shower, you are greeted with the reflection of yourself naked.

Boom, first thing in the morning. An eye opener…. or eye shutter.

Most of us don’t like to be naked. And that is what John the Baptist asks of the crowds who come out to see him, the people who want to be baptized. He asks them to lay out their lives and their souls, to bare all.  In AA terms we might say to take a fearless inventory of the self.

And that is a difficult, oftentimes agonizing, or painful task. Being naked.

It asks us to confront who we are. Apart from the trappings of everyday life, when all that is stripped away, who are you?

Who are you, and who does God ask you to be, is what this fearsome, fierce half naked man in the desert asks us. In this advent season of preparation, what do we say?

John is out in the desert baptizing people. Our text says it is a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins.  We sometimes think of baptism as a solely Christian ritual or invention. But baptism had and still has a long history in the Jewish faith. People took part in baptism at important junctures in their lives, like before getting married or after having a child. There were rituals of baptism to become clean again if one had become ritually impure, like after touching a dead body. One could be baptized to repent for sins one committed. Baptism is a part of the faith tradition.

What is different is that John’s baptism is being done out in the wilderness, away from the Temple and religious leadership. And there are no entry requirements. John takes anyone who comes with a sincere heart. And the crowds come. Clearly there is a deep desire for what John is offering.

Which is why the Pharisees and Sadducees show up. What is going on out there? And when John sees them he blasts them with such harsh language:

"You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come? Bear fruit worthy of repentance. Do not presume to say to yourselves, 'We have Abraham as our ancestor'; for I tell you, God is able from these stones to raise up children to Abraham”

For these individuals come wearing their religious authority. They come as leaders. And they come bearing their heritage, “children of Abraham.” They are from the “right” family, the “right” descendents, the in group. They have the “right” to be there.

They have no intention of being naked.

Are we able to come to John naked? Are we able to leave those things that we cling to, those things that give us status and importance and “the right” behind?

John asks, who are you, and the Pharisees and Sadducees say “we are children of Abraham.” John says that is not enough; that is not what I meant.

“Children of Abraham” is what your lineage is, where you trace your inheritance, but that is not who you are. Even stones can be descended from Abraham.

There is a real tension in bible around this. This lectionary year, our three year cycle of scripture readings, starts in Advent. We just started Year A which mostly follows Matthew’s gospel. Matthew begins the story of who Jesus is not with the proclamations of John the Baptist, not with the birth story—that all comes later—but with the section I call the “begats.”

This is how Matthew starts. The book of the generation of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham.  Abraham begat Isaac; and Isaac begat Jacob; and Jacob begat Judas and his brethren;  And Judas begat Phares and Zara of Thamar; and Phares begat Esrom; and Esrom begat Aram;  And Aram begat Aminadab; and Aminadab begat Naasson; and Naasson begat Salmon;  And Salmon begat Booz of Rachab; and Booz begat Obed of Ruth; and Obed begat Jesse;  And Jesse begat David the king; and David the king begat Solomon…and on and on and on.

The entire first section of Matthew is filled with the begats-- all to prove that Joseph, and through him Jesus, was descended from David. Why does this matter? Even stones could be descended from David, according to John the Baptist. And, most interestingly, why does it matter what Joseph’s heritage is anyway? Jesus is not a blood descendent of David no matter what because Jesus doesn’t have Joseph’s blood. Jesus is born of the Holy Spirit. In modern parlance, Joseph is not the “bio dad.”

This tension lives in us as well. When people ask who we are we present them with credentials, titles, resumes, a CV, our job description, our family heritage, our nationality, our marital status.

But, John asks, who are you?

When go into the wilderness all of that stuff is stripped away.

Recently television talk show star Oprah went on a camping trip to Yellowstone with her friend Gayle. This wilderness adventure was broadcast as the regular show. So you saw Oprah first thing in the morning with bed head, and trying her best to ride a horse. It was a stripped down version of the glamorous star…. but hardly naked.

What happens when all the cameras, handlers, make up artists, etc etc, all comforts of home are gone?

What happens when all you lean on and clothe yourself with is gone and it is just you and an encounter with the holy, with John the slightly crazed prophet telling you to clean the inside of your life. This later becomes Jesus’ message, too. It is not what goes into the body that is unclean but what is inside the self and how relate to others. It is our acts of justice and injustice that determine who we are.

We go to the wilderness naked. And are asked who are you?

And, as we prepare in Advent, who will you become?

Who are you willing to be?

Can you re-center your life not on those other, external things, but on the coming of the messiah, the kingdom of God, the work that you alone are called to do and equipped for, the part of the kingdom you alone can bring about?

It is scary to be so naked. It makes us so vulnerable. To make matters worse, we then we hear John say, “I baptize you with water but he who is coming after me is mightier. His winnowing fork is in his hand and he will clear his threshing floor and gather his wheat into the granary but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire.”

If we understand this to mean Jesus is coming to separate out the worthy and unworthy and cast the unworthy into unquenchable fire, a clear version of hell, this can be terrifying. Which one of us, when truly standing naked before God, really believes we are completely worthy?

But I invite you to see this passage differently. I believe each of us is both wheat and chaff. We are good, we are dishonest. We are righteous, we are sinful. We are a mix of all that is pure and tarnished. If we dare to be naked in front of coming Christ, who indeed arrived naked as a babe himself, I believe Jesus can sort out the wheat and the chaff within us, separate it with is winnowing fork and burn the chaff. If we are willing to let it go and to come with a repentant heart.

Ultimately it is a gift, to lay down our mistakes, our sins, our stumbling pride, our striving and striving to prove our worth, to lay that all bare.  And to be baptized into a clean, clear future. To repent, which simply means to turn around. To receive an affirmation that you, your bare self, is beloved and valued by God. It is a gift.

The people knew that, which is why they flocked to the desert to see John.  Do we know this?

John asks: what do you need to deal with, repent, turn back to, for you to be able to stand naked before god, or welcome with a clean heart the naked Christ child? And then to act on the commandments of justice and righteous living that God asks of you?

This is the season of Advent. Prepare the way. Within yourself. To stand as your naked, beautiful self in front of the manger, to welcome the one who sees you with love all the way into the deepest part of you. And to go forth with the Christ living within you, through you, in the love you bring to others.

Amen.