Advent 3 Matthew 11:2-15

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This past Friday, the Schlueter family woke up like it was any other Friday, another day, another full list of things to do, especially during this time of year. But then we looked out the window, the kids got up and looked out the window and during the night some snow had decided to fall.
Snow fall does imaginative things to children. while most of us big people will get up and look out that snow covered window and see shoveling and delays and slippery roads and stress, a child will look out and see sleds and snow forts and snowball fights and snow angels and fun. What you see out your window has much to do with your perspective, doesn't it? I can recall the days when I looked out my window to see hope and anticipation, these days the view can seem much more cloudy, the sky can seem more dim, less bright, how does the view look from your window?
How do you suppose the view looked from John the Baptist's window? There was a day for John when that view was unobstructed. From the house of freedom he looked out and saw a world ripe for the coming Christ, a world that needed to be warned of the impending Kingdom that would come with fire and judgment and wrath and doom. John spoke the words of a prophet, the words of warning, yet warning spoken in love.
But the view from his window changed. His window changed. At the time contemporaneous with the telling of our text, John's window had bars on it. The prophet had been free to speak God's Word of coming judgment. He had seen the Christ approaching and that judgment getting near. Suddenly that picture was o scurried by injustice. Prison bars for the innocent and the good. John's view out his window had become quite different.
John had come to preach judgment. There is safety and security in judgment. Judgment reminds us that while There is evil, evil has hell to pay. When there is judgment, Things are as they should be. The judgments keep us safe, remind us that there is someone watching.
what happens when it seems that the one who is supposed to be watching seems not to be noticing? what happens when the evil seems to get off scott free so that the evil goes on unencumbered? What happens when the good seems to be paying for the deeds of those who are evil? What happens to those feelings of safety and security? What happens when the view out your window is obscured by prison bars, as was that of John? We start to wonder, don't we? We wait for judgment. We expect judgment. I am willing to guess that John the Baptist was the same.
Some of the earlier interpreters of this text didn't want to believe that John didn't understand when he sent his disciples to ask the question. "Are you the Christ or should we wait for another?" After all, shouldn't John have known? Didn't John see the dove? Hear the voice? Didn't he even leap in his mother's womb when the incarnate Christ approached in the womb of Mary? John must have known better than to ask. But put yourself in John's shoes. Picture yourself with John's view out John's window. Imagine looking out through bars of steel to see the one who was to come with fire and wrath looking past the sins of Herod and instead welcoming sinners and eating with them. Instead of fire from heaven there is bread. Instead of fierce words of judgment there are kindly spoken words of mercy. Might cause you to question too. Perhaps the view from your window today causes you to question.
So what do you see when you look out your window? What do you expect to see? Chances are it's isn't the naive innocence of childhood. Perhaps your view is obscured by your situation. By the economy. By work or family struggles. We look out at the world hoping for some deliverance, but expecting it not to come.
Or perhaps, instead of looking out the window we look up... to heaven... Perhaps we pray for deliverance. fervently and feverishly. hoping against hope that God will save us. But, perhaps we, like John are afraid those prayers are falling on deaf ears.
Jesus tells us that the one not offended by him, the one not scandalized by him shall be blessed. Perhaps this is the scandal that he means. Mercy instead of judgment. Love instead of vengeance. Forgiveness instead of justice.
John was scandalized, offended by Jesus. And so he sent his disciples to ask. Jesus sent back a response. "Go tell John what you are seeing and hearing. The blind are seeing, the lame are walking, the lepers are clean, the deaf are hearing, the dead are raised and the poor have the Gospel preached to them."
While it is true that the Lord is a god of justice and judgment and retribution and vengeance, it is also true that he is a god of love and mercy and forgiveness. Let's not loose sight of the Old Testament text, after all. The weak made strong, the feeble made firm, the anxious given hope, springs in the desert, pools in the wilderness, God making all things new. But at the same time bringing vengeance.
I wonder if sometimes our trouble isn't that we want vengeance, just not against us. Take vengeance on those who have wronged me, but let my vengeance slide by. Show all those other sinners just how wrong they have been, but show mercy to me. God is merciful. God is merciful to us. But he is also merciful to our enemies. God loves you and me, but he also loves our enemies. God forgives my sin, and he also forgives the sins of the ones who sin against me.
And so it was with John. Jesus was merciful and good to John, but he was also merciful to Herod. Jesus was merciful to tax collectors and sinners, but he was also merciful to Pharisees and Saducees, and in our own day, Jesus is merciful to us, but he is also merciful to our enemies. Because mercy is what he does.
That's hard for us to get a hold of some times. We can't understand it and we can't imagine doing it. After all, the world needs order, it needs structure, it needs rules and morals and consequences. You start handing out mercy and forgiveness willy nilly and the whole world will go to pot.
But that's what Jesus does. Recklessly and dare we say it, carelessly he hands out forgiveness. Even to the bad people, even to the people who don't deserve it, even to those really bad people who would horde God's mercy but begrudge the same gift when its given to the people we don't prefer.
And then, with all of this mercy and forgiveness going around, with no one being held to the standard or made to give account, with no one being made an example of, well, you and I could have predicted what would happen next. Jesus, the fool, was arrested and killed, murdered. So then what? Now look what has happened to all he had worked for, everything he had accomplished, all the disciples he had accumulated and followers he had gathered. They all came to nothing.
Or did they? Hardly. Far from it. In fact, the world's biggest scandal became the worlds greatest victory. Jesus came from behind, came from death itself to defeat not just the enemy, the devil, he came to emasculate and completely disarm his enemy. With one fell swoop Jesus over took death and hell and sin and punishment and he did away with them once and for all. Jesus was killed, but on the third day he rose again from the dead, ascended into heaven and will come again to judge the living and the dead.
In our text, Jesus made the comment, "From the days of John the Baptist until now the kingdom of heaven has suffered violence, and the violent take it by force." As he said those words, the violence was only just beginning; for John, but especially for Jesus. John was beheaded. Jesus was crucified. Jesus' words about the kingdom of heaven being taken by force came to their fruition. Kind of makes you wonder, though, what kind of a kingdom is it if it can be taken by force? If it's taken, doesn't that mean its no longer a kingdom?
Yes but you see, Jesus' kingdom is not of this world. It is of the next. Jesus reign in this world by hiding his power in simple places out of the sight of most people. But it's there. In the Word, the Sacraments, in the hearts and lives of believers. So, since the kingdom is not one with borders and soldiers and taxes and rules, it is a kingdom of flesh and blood or water and word. It can be attacked, but it cannot be defeated. It can be taken but it cannot be overcome. It can be killed, but it cannot be exterminated. Because it is God's kingdom. And it is heaven's kingdom. And the day is coming when the mask will be pulled back and we will see this kingdom in all its glory, not just with our hearts but even with our eyes.
Today our eyes look through the glass of clouded windows. We see clouds and snow and dreary times, but occasionally, like a ray of sun breaking through the clouds we see that future hope of eternal glory. That day is coming. don't loose heart.
Amen.