Second Thursday in Advent

You can find the "Following the Star" Advent devotionals here.

What I see in today's devotional is that Luke lists all these important people, a whole list of people in power. People who have power in government, people who have power in religion--but the "word of God" comes to John, a guy hanging out in the wilderness.

The wilderness is about as far away as you can get from power. In the wilderness you have no roads, no infrastructure, no connection with organized faith systems. It doesn't matter how much money you have, because in the wilderness, there is nothing to buy. It's just you and your wits, and maybe what you have prepared in advance to take into the wilderness with you. But it's here that the "word of God" finds John, and he takes the message of that word not to the people in power, but to the people on the edges of that power.

It's a little bit like saying: In the sixth year of the presidency of George Bush, when the world was focused on terrorism, and Viacom and AOLTimeWarner were posturing for even bigger market shares, and James Dobson and Jerry Falwell were commiserating about the fall of the Republican Party, the word of God came to _________. Fill in the blank. Maybe with your name. Maybe especially with your name. Maybe especially if you are a person with no power, and no position, and you feel like your life is lived pretty much in the wilderness.

Because back in the fifteenth year of the Emperor Tiberius, the most momentous thing that was going on was that the word of God came to John. A guy with no credentials was getting his backwater neighborhood ready for the greatest event of all. And when the people in power finally started paying attention, John wouldn't be ushered to the front of the temple to share his wisdom. He wouldn't be ushered into the board room or into the Oval Office. No. He'd be ushered straight to jail.

We who name Christ as our Lord should understand by now that position and power don't really have anything to do with the orchestrations of God, but we forget that a lot. This passage of scripture reminds us.

Lord, may the Word of God come to us today, in whatever wilderness we may find ourselves in. And then may we share that Word with our backwater neighbors, and help them get ready for the greatest Event of all.