Preparing the Way of the Lord

     Luke 3: 1-6

 

 

          “A voice cries: In the wilderness prepare the way of the Lord; make straight in the desert a highway for our Lord.” This is part of a passage from the 40^th chapter of Isaiah, where the great prophet begins his prediction of the future. Unlike most of the prophetic books of the Old Testament which tell of God’s message in their contemporary situation, the latter part of Isaiah focuses on the future. Isaiah looks down the long road to come. He sees God upholding his own cause with a world-transforming display of his glory. Isaiah aims his vision at such an event, the time when the way of the Lord will be revealed, when the King will come.

          John the Baptist is a lot like Isaiah. He looks like he came out of the woods. He is not a pretty sight. Isaiah wasn’t either. The Old Testament prophet once went naked for three years and pulled out his hair to make his point. The new one wears a garment made of camel’s hair, rough to the touch, and eats bugs for his nourishment. These are not your average seminary products. John is like Isaiah in more ways than one.  Like Isaiah, he is setting the table for another. Both are prophets, heralding the coming of the real thing.

          So in Luke 1, John the Baptist is the new prophet and he quotes Isaiah: “The voice of one crying in the wilderness; Prepare the way of the Lord.” Luke uses more references to people and kings in this passage than in any other place in his writings. He does so because he wants everyone to see the significance, to mark the date. Jesus is coming not just for the people of Israel, but for everyone. Luke is connecting the old with the new, but John’s prophecy is more than Isaiah’s. John is the herald, the announcer, not just the prophet. No matter who your king is, the real king is about to be introduced, and that is the job of John the Baptist. He would help smooth the way, prepare it for the Son of God. John’s call had worldwide significance, for the Savior was coming for all people.

          Luke tells us that the word of God came to John. The same words are used to describe God speaking to Samuel (1 Sam. 15: 10), to Jeremiah (1:4), to Ezekiel (1:3), to Jonah (1:1), Haggai (1:1), Zechariah (1:1), Malachi (1:1) and others. In each case, God was speaking to his servant, giving him both a vision and a task. The words introduce a special revelation, a revelation received to take to the people. In that same tradition, John the Baptist is sent as God’s prophet, and his proclamation is the “baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins.”

          How do you prepare the way of the Lord? Well, John seems to say that we need to level the field. John says make the path straight. Fill every valley. Lower the mountains and the hills. Straighten out the crooked. Make the rough places level.

          I think about that in practical terms. I like to ride a bicycle for exercise and for recreation, but I like it so much better when the terrain is smooth and fairly flat. I can go farther when the resistance is small. These days, there are bike paths designed for cyclists to move more easily with traffic. It’s as though the valleys have been filled and the mountains leveled. It makes the path straighter. I can see what John the Baptist was getting at. He wanted the path for the coming Savior to be clearly marked, easy to navigate. He wanted to prepare the way.

          When you want cyclists to be able to navigate safely with motorists, you create a bike path. You set aside a space where cyclists can ride. But what do you do when your objective is not just a safe place for a few, but a path for the Savior of mankind? It’s going to take a bigger path for that job. How do you prepare the way of the Lord?

          Prophets like John cry from the wilderness. That is, they are not the most visible, nor do they have the most credibility. They are prophets. If there is one thing that most of the prophets in the bible have in common, it is that they aren’t popular. They come talking about wrongdoing and they call for us to turn away from it, and we would just as soon they didn’t, for we are all too comfortable in our lives. This is not the way to win friends and influence people. The fact that they are right is just incidental information. If they don’t come preaching the message we want to hear, then we tune them out. They are marginalized from the start.

          In addition, John the Baptist is telling the people that the real king is coming. He says that “all flesh shall see the salvation of God.”   John does not promise salvation for all. Rather he heralds that it will be in sight for all to see. John points to the revelation of the Messiah, the physical manifestation of the Son of God. He goes on to say that the way must be prepared for him. The leveling to which he refers is nothing less than removal of the sin of the people.

The prophets talk in metaphors to tell us what needs to be done. How do you prepare the way of the Lord? Straighten the path, fill the low places, flatten the high places, straighten the crooked, make what is rough become level. It sounds like the prophets are in the grading business, and in a sense they are.

          That’s why John talks in terms of mountains and valleys. That’s why he uses such big terms to describe the grading project, because sin is everywhere. It’s as big as the mountains and as deep as the valleys and if we want God to be able to come to us, there is something we must do. We must be baptized in our repentance if our sins are to be forgiven. This is how we prepare the way of the Lord.

          What do we do to prepare for a royal visitor, a head of state? We make preparations of all kinds, from transportation to security to food and lodging and venues from which to speak and meet. We pull out all the stops to be sure we are ready to receive someone of so much importance in our midst. The ancients did the same for their kings and emperors. In the days of Isaiah, when a king proposed to tour a part of his empire, he sent a courier in advance to tell the people to prepare the roads. In Luke’s gospel, John acts as that courier. John knows he has been called to make way and that is exactly what he is trying to do. In his zest for the job, he thinks back to the visionary words of Isaiah and he attempts to remove the immoveable. Even though he knows that sin has pervaded our lives, he appeals to us to wipe ourselves clean, not only to ask forgiveness but to repent, to turn away. These are the hills to be leveled, the paths to be made straight, in our lives. The result of that repentance is salvation.

          How do you prepare the way of the Lord? Break down the walls. Tear down the fences. John the Baptist was called upon to tell the people, and through that testimony God calls upon us, to prepare our hearts, to prepare our lives. William Barclay says it this way: “The King is coming, Mend not your roads, but your lives.”

         John the Baptist tells us that “all flesh shall see the salvation of God.”  Of that, we can rest assured. But John does not promise us that all shall receive that salvation. Neither does God. For that, we must prepare the way.

          Are you prepared? You first have to ask forgiveness. You have to turn away from your selfishness and sin. That is how you prepare your way for the Lord. Make straight your path. The King is coming!