Text: Matthew 11:2-15 

Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.  Amen.  As I began to work on this sermon, I realized that this particular passage has an awful lot of points to discuss and questions to answer.  Just a few came to mind like why does John the Baptist actually question Jesus about his Messiahship, why does Jesus say that John is more than a prophet, why does he also say that while John is the greatest among men born of women, he is still least in the kingdom of heaven, and what does it mean when Jesus says that the kingdom of heaven suffers violence and the violent take it by force?

In many ways this passage only seems to yield more questions than it does answers.  And being faced with the reality of having to preach on this text, I began to wonder how exactly I should best handle this passage.  So, after much consideration and wrestling, it seemed best to focus on John and his role as a prophet.  And I hope that in the midst of this reflection on John the Baptist at least some of the questions that the text raises will have answers.

Now Jesus is very emphatic about John and his role as a prophet sent by the Lord.  After all he does say that John is a prophet and in fact that he is, “more than a prophet.”  Now it’s pretty easy for us to understand that John is a prophet.  We only need to draw to mind the Lukan narrative about Zecharias and Elizabeth, or perhaps the narrative about John the Baptist preaching a baptism of repentance for preparation of God’s coming kingdom.  These things testify to John’s person and role as a prophet.  But identifying what Jesus means when he says that John is more than a prophet is not quite as easy.

And I think that several things are meant by Jesus’ statement.  On the one hand, when we think of prophets, we normally think of a person who proclaims something about God’s threats and promises.  This is especially true when we think about God’s prophets proclaiming the future Messiah who will redeem God’s people.  But something that we don’t normally associate with prophets is a prophesy about the prophet.  In other words, God has sent prophets from time to time in order to call his people back to him, but he doesn’t normally give a prophecy about a coming prophet.  And yet for John, this is the case.  When Jesus quotes Malachi 3:1, “Behold, I send My messenger before Your face, Who will prepare Your way before You,” he is in essence telling the people that John is the one who God promised to send before the coming of his Messiah—John is a prophet who has been prophesied about.  And in this way, John is more than a prophet.

Along this same line of thought, John is more than a prophet because of his great actions which also testify to the coming Messiah.  While some of the prophets in the Old Testament did pretty amazing things, like Elijah, John really brings his message of the coming kingdom together with his wild repentant lifestyle and his ability to draw thousands of people unto a baptism of repentance.  John’s action is so influential that his preparation of the coming kingdom has a great affect on much of Israel.  In fact, John is so much of a man of action that his deeds of preaching repentance for the coming kingdom actually help to get him thrown in jail.  And perhaps it for these two reasons, (1) that he is a prophet prophesied about and (2) that he is a man of such great godly action, that Jesus says he is the greatest of all people born to women.

Now the idea of greatness is something that probably resonates with all of us.  We all live in a culture that says we ought to be great at everything we do.  The success of our lives is in many ways determined by how great we become by our works.  And our culture only seems to be interested in the size of our bank accounts, the cars that we drive, the homes that we live in, and the fame we enjoy.  It probably doesn’t take any effort for us at all to think of someone great in our time, and I am pretty sure we will judge them by the same standards that our society judges us.  And because of our enculturation toward greatness, I think we probably admire John the Baptist for his greatness.  In our eyes he probably looks like someone who deserves many pearls and crowns of glory in heaven.  And I bet if we want to be like someone great in the bible, John the Baptist is probably one of our heroes.  We might not want to eat wild locust and honey, but we certainly wouldn’t mind being called the greatest among men born of women.  Such a title would make us feel great, and we would all love to draw such fame unto ourselves.

But interestingly, Jesus also has other words for us about John the Baptist.  While he is in the mind of Jesus the greatest of all people up to that time, he is still considered by God least in the kingdom of heaven.  Now this doesn’t seem to make sense to us at all.  How is it that someone can be the greatest among men and have the lowest seat of honor in the kingdom of heaven?  Shouldn’t it be the other way around?  Shouldn’t John the Baptist have the highest seat of honor since he is the greatest?  And what does this mean for us?  If we are considered the greatest in our own time, does that mean that we will be least in heaven like John?

Jesus does offer us answers for all of these questions but they may not be the ones that we really want to hear.  And in the text for this morning, I think that the answer to these questions probably comes in Jesus statement that “the kingdom of heaven suffers violence and the violent take it by force.”  The English translation from the Greek does not exactly portray the probable meaning of the text as well as it could.  The real idea is most likely that the kingdom of heaven is rushed upon by all those who are desperate and lost, and they seize upon the kingdom of God with great avidity.  In other words, Jesus has opened the kingdom of heaven, but the gates are not opened for those who are considered the greatest before men.  Instead they are opened for those who are considered the least—those of us who are actually despised in the eyes of the world, who are lost and condemned persons without any hope in themselves.  And it’s for this reason that Jesus tells us that John the Baptist is least in heaven, because his works, however great they may appear in the eyes of men, are not but filth and rags before the Almighty.

And while at first this may be confusing for us that God would rather choose the weak and weary over the mighty and strong, it is actually a great blessing.  And it’s a great blessing because as the weakest among men we don’t have to do anything at all to be considered the greatest in the eyes of God.  Imagine not having to do anything in this life to become rich or have that house that you have always wanted, or that car that drives as fast as you would like—I think we would like this very much.  And while the world doesn’t work that way, the kingdom of heaven does.  The gifts that God bestows on us, gifts we don’t deserve, are far greater than anything we could ever have on this earth.  In Christ, he freely gives to us forgiveness, life, and salvation which we could never earn on our own—no matter how great we may appear in this life.  And the truth is that we are actually desperate for what he has to give us because without his gifts we would have no hope at all, only the promise of a fiery furnace.  And so God freely gives to us his greatest gifts through Word and Sacrament.  He says to us, “the kingdom of heaven is yours, I have purchased it with the blood of my Son, and now I freely give it to you.”  There is no greater gift we could possibly be given than new life, eternal life in Christ.  This is far greater than any earthly gift we might receive for it makes us greater than the greatest men of action on this earth.  And so this advent season as you prepare gifts for one another, remember that whatever you get or give to others, there will be no disappointment for you this year—for the greatest gift is already yours.  You may not be considered the greatest among men on earth, but in Christ Jesus you are the greatest in heaven and you have the promise of a glorious seat there.

In Jesus Name.

Amen.

Vicar Mark Taylor