Preparing the Way for Peace

Dec 5

Second Sunday in Advent, Luke 3:1-6

“The voice of one crying out in the wilderness: “Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight ….” –Luke 3:4b

In today’s gospel text, Luke introduces the ministry of John the Baptizer. John is introduced in a way similar to the way Hebrew testament books introduce Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Ezekiel. This is a literary clue that John is serving in the role of a prophet.[1]

Bible scholar Robert Tannehill, in his commentary on Luke, reminds us of the context surrounding Isaiah’s original vision upon which Luke has built. In days of old, the king’s visit to a city would prompt some repair and decoration along the way. Today, if the president’s motorcade is coming to town, a city might fill potholes, repaint the road stripes, put some decorative bunting and banners on the lamp posts. “In this case,” says Tannehill, “the prophet envisions a radical transformation of the landscape.” Luke retains Isaiah’s language, which seems better suited for constructing roads than religion, with its talk of valleys filled, mountains made low, crooked streets straightened out. Luke makes one small but significant interpretive twist. Whereas Isaiah talks about making “straight in the desert a highway for our God,” Luke writes, “Make his paths straight.” The lord that Luke has in mind, the One for whom preparations are made, is no longer simply Lord Yahweh, but rather Lord Jesus.[2]

Today, being the second Sunday in Advent, I’m naturally interested in making connections between the text and this day’s theme of peace. After reviewing 30 years of files, I retrieved an especially fitting story from my former colleague Lonnie Lee, originally told by John Morris.[3] The subject of the story is a highway in southern Vermont that made a steep descent down a mountain. The topography of the landscape had dictated that the road travel straight down before arriving at a sharp curve, a curve difficult to foresee and prepare for by drivers of rapidly descending vehicles. A family in a home near the curve kept a stock of blankets near the porch entrance for use when the inevitable crashes occurred. They knew that accident victims would need to be covered while waiting for paramedics.

At some point, the residents grew tired of serving as unwilling first responders, tired of putting blankets on people in pain, or covering those who obviously had not made it. They launched a movement, and created a petition asking the state to straighten the road. Together, they were envisioning a change that would prevent accidents and save lives in the future.

Morris comments, “John the Baptist seems to be saying something similar—the curves of injustice, immorality and inhumanity need to be changed into smooth paths so that everyone will see God’s salvation. That is God’s plan, and it is not wishful thinking to proclaim it. Who is going to do this work? It is God’s work, but at the same time, it is our responsibility to join that work.”

This week, as I took in the daily news, I found myself thinking more than usual about what Morris says is “our responsibility to join that work,” and many practical ways of preparing the way for peace, some of which you already are participating in or leading. The ideas kept coming to me like popcorn puffs, which made it difficult to decide which puffs to keep and which to discard. At one point, the text of this sermon was about 3,000 words, which is around 30 minutes. So, if you appreciate a sermon on the shorter side, then you’ll be happy to know I’ve decided to focus on just two news stories, and one practical idea that seems related to all the rest.

News Story #1:

This week, it was reported that the St. Louis County Council, by a vote of 5-2, decided NOT to confirm Dr. Faisal Khan as permanent director of the county health department. A major stated reason for the decision was an e-mail the Dr. Khan wrote in his role as interim director to the health department staff, thanking them for their work, then going on to call those who opposed it a “lunatic fringe” and “irrelevant fools.”[4] I wonder, when did it become okay to use a mass e-mail not just to disagree with a different viewpoint, but also to insult and demean the people who hold that viewpoint?

News Story #2:

This week, it was reported that prominent news correspondent Lara Logan, during a televised interview, compared Dr. Anthony Fauci to Josef Mengele, the Nazi doctor who conducted experiments on prisoners in concentration camps.[5] Again, I wonder, when did it become okay to use mass media not just to disagree with a different viewpoint, but also to insult and demean the people who hold it?

This kind of communication has become more commonly accepted than it used to be; there are so many bad examples that we may not even realize when we fall into a similar pattern ourselves.

Theologian Diana Butler Bass recently wrote an essay about the phenomenon. She reflected upon an evolution in her thinking from her days in graduate school, when a professor advised that “being nice” was not a Christian value. “Nice,” he said, “was a way of … avoiding arguments regarding difficult moral issues … a cop-out and a cover up. Jesus wasn’t nice (but) a troublemaker and got killed for it. ‘Nice’ had … turned Christian virtue into moral mush …”[6]

I remember a couple books by Professor Hauerwas, of whom she speaks. I remember the way, during the 1980s, even evangelical-conservative preachers began to shift toward bolder, more aggressive, sometimes even profanity-spiced forms of social and political criticism. Personally, I felt that if the language of prophetic preaching was something that I wouldn’t want my mother and her friends to hear, then there probably was something not quite right about it.

Butler Bass also remembers her mother, and the prophetic preaching embodied in her mother’s behavior. Back when her mother was in high school, African-American students were admitted for the first time, and many of her mother’s friends boycotted classes. Her mother’s response was not a counterprotest or a fiery speech. She simply showed up on the sidewalk as the new students arrived, and greeted them warmly. For her, niceness was the path toward a better, more just world, the door into understanding another’s perspective, the embodiment of the Golden Rule.

I remember with great warmth someone like that, my mother’s friend Rita Langworthy, of whom I spoke shortly after her death in 2015. She was an elder in the congregation of First Presbyterian, Flint, a retired elementary-school principal, who, after her husband’s death, could have traveled and done all things that retirees like to do. Instead, she chose to buy a house in an impoverished area of Flint, where she could live among the children she had long cared for. She paid for that decision with her life when one night, as she was caring for several kids, a hail of gunfire ripped through the walls of the home, killing Rita and a one-year-old child. I’m not exaggerating when I say I consider her to be a Christian martyr.

Many years earlier, as my Sunday-school teacher, she had displayed a special blend of toughness, stubbornness, kindness, and love. She taught us a song that I’ve sung for you once before. It’s a song that made me bristle when she coached us to sing it. It’s a song with a message we should never take as an excuse for remaining silent about abuse or other evil actions. But it’s also a song for which I have a newfound appreciation.

If you can’t say something nice: Shh! Say Nothing.

Take a bit of good advice, Shh! Say nothing.

Think of friendly things to say, that's the path to follow.

If you can’t say something nice, close your lips and swallow (gulp).

Once you think it over twice, if you can't say something nice,

then don't say anything at all. Shh!

So here is my practical idea, my best tip this Advent season about preparing the way for peace: Be nice. When someone’s opinion about politics or social policy makes you crazy, focus on the issue, not the person. Shh! Be nice. Being nice may be more effective in promoting change than you think. Be nice!

Butler Bass says without a revival of niceness, she fears we are doomed. She makes a statement that resonates with me more now than ever. In our time, “Niceness seems positively counter-cultural and radical. What if … niceness is a first step … of showing up and recognizing that another person deserves respect and dignity …. Jesus might not have exactly said, ‘Be nice.’ But the Apostle Paul urged the first of Jesus’ followers toward a virtuous life grounded in the truest sort of niceness.” Kalyn read the text to us.

Keep on doing these things, Paul says, and the God of peace will be with you. Virtuous behavior tends to communicate the respect that is important for real dialogue, to express the compassion that helps de-escalate violence. It’s another way of saying what Morris said in relating the story about the highway curve that needed straightened out to save downhill drivers. “The curves … that lead to pain and suffering need to be changed into smooth paths so that everyone will see God’s salvation. Who is going to do this work? It is God’s work, but at the same time, it is our responsibility to join that work.”

What I’m saying may seem tedious. It probably would have seemed more so if I hadn’t shortened this sermon by half! But if you look at the troubles all around us, it is so potentially transformative. Be nice!

NOTES

[1] Fred Craddock, Luke, a volume in Interpretation: A Bible Commentary for Teaching and Preaching, Louisville: John Knox Press, 1990, p. 46.

[2] Robert C. Tannehill, Luke, a volume in Abingdon New Testament Commentaries, Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1996, p. 79.

[3] Lonnie H. Lee, “Preparing the Way,” a sermon delivered to Westminster Presbyterian Church, Springfield, IL, 10 Dec. 2000, originally from John C. Morris, “Smoothing the Path,” The Christian Century, 22 Nov. 2000, https://www.christiancentury.org/article/smoothing-path, accessed 1 Dec. 2021.

[4] https://www.stltoday.com/news/local/govt-and-politics/lunatic-fringe-st-louis-county-health-director-s-email-to-staff-enrages-critics/article_e857b896-aacd-55aa-b16a-64a3228d214b.html

[5] https://www.washingtonpost.com/media/2021/11/30/media-lara-logan-fox-fauci-mengele-comparison/

[6] Diana Butler Bass, “Be Nice: Kindness is now counter-cultural,” in her blog The Cottage, 30 Jul. 2021, https://dianabutlerbass.com/the-cottage/