by CCW | 27 June 2010 18:50
He catches our attention, though not necessarily our affection, unlike St. Francis, the Hippie Saint of the sixties. He catches our attention and, yet, we are even drawn to him, attracted by something strange and yet compelling. “What went ye out for to see?” Jesus asks, highlighting the strange and yet compelling character of John the Baptist whose nativity is celebrated on June 24th, and whose feast day marks the anniversary of the landing of John Cabot in Newfoundland in 1497. Thus he has become the patron saint of what has subsequently become Canada. His feast day also was the occasion for the baptism of Chief Membertou four hundred years ago in 1610, an event that marked the conversion of the Mi’kmaq to Christianity.
The figure of John the Baptist frames our summer sojourning; his nativity marks the beginning of summer, so close to the summer solstice; and his death, “The Beheading of John the Baptist,” coming at the end of August, marks the end of summer, being so close to the end of cottage season. We are talking about the Maritimes here!
Birth and death. Summer and winter. This birth points us to the winter’s birth of Christ, whose greater nativity signals all the summer of our lives in the grace of God towards us. In a way, that is the point of John the Baptist. He points not to himself but to Christ. The Nativity of John the Baptist signals the preparations which God makes for his coming into our midst as the Incarnate Lord in the Nativity of Jesus Christ. The summer solstice has just past; the long summer’s march to winter, yes, even to Christmas, dare I say, has begun!
But this summer’s feast signals something more. Beyond the reminder of God’s coming to us, there is the purpose of his coming in us – the motions of his grace taking shape in our lives. From that standpoint, the strange and compelling message of John the Baptist is constant and necessary; he points us to Christ, yes, but as well to Christ in us.
The Scripture readings for this feast highlight the strange and compelling character of John the Baptist but only so as to awaken us to the greater wonder of God’s being with us in Christ, in the greater wonder of Christ’s holy birth and death. Like the birth of Isaac to ancient Sarah and Abraham, there is a kind of miracle of nature in the conception and birth of John the Baptist to the elderly and skeptical Zechariah and Elizabeth. Indeed, Zechariah’s scoffing will be rebuked by his being silenced and unable to speak until the birth of John. His challenge to the angel, “how shall I know this?” contrasts with Mary’s question, “how shall this be?” There is a huge difference between a doubting that is a denial of possibilities and the intellectual inquiry that is open to their realization.
The birth and ministry of the John prepares us for the coming of Christ. But what is that preparation? Simply this. John the Baptist is the instrument of God’s grace sent to “prepare the way of the Lord” by “preaching a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins;” in other words, awakening us to our need for repentance and salvation. He is not the forgiveness of sins but the instrument of God preparing us for the coming one whom, he says, “is mightier than I, the thong of whose sandals,” he says, “I am not worthy to stoop down and unloose.”
It is, I fear, not quite what we always want to hear. We have an altogether too negative a view of repentance and forget that it belongs to the positive possibilities of transformation and renewal. In looking at John the Baptist, no doubt, we see a moral rigour and an ascetic demand that seems judgmental and restrictive, forgetting that he is pointing not to himself but to Christ. But repentance is about the hope of change for the better and about the triumph of truth over the lies of our lives.
Look at it this way. You don’t need to be stuck in a rut. You don’t need to be defined by the circumstances and happenstances of your lives, or even by sins and follies, both past and present. There is a grace that is given in the midst of things. John the Baptist would awaken us to the possibilities of change, a change of attitude, of mind, of the spirit within us. It simply makes all the difference. There is forgiveness. It is the meaning of Christ’s death and sacrifice and it is given to be realized in us, in our lives of service and sacrifice. Such things stand in a strange and compelling contrast to the easy indulgence and destructive narcissisms of our lives.
The changes are within. They recall us to the truth of our humanity against all that separates us from that truth in God. It doesn’t mean that we won’t grow old, for instance, but it suggests something about how we grow old. Graciously or complainingly?
In a way, there is a necessary unease about John the Baptist; after all, it is a birth that necessarily awakens us to death as well. That necessary unease is the meaning of his preaching about repentance for such is the dying to sin and self that leads to resurrection and life. That necessary unease is about the pattern of praise and worship. As always it seeks to awaken us to the something more of God’s grace and forgiveness signaled and realized in Christ so that it may be seen and realized in us.
Fr. David Curry
AMD Service of the Deaf
June 27th, 2010
Source URL: https://christchurchwindsor.ca/2010/06/27/sermon-for-the-fourth-sunday-after-trinity-200pm-service-for-the-atlantic-ministry-of-the-deaf/
Copyright ©2026 Christ Church unless otherwise noted.