Prepare the Way: Joy
God Gives Us Joy
Matthew 11:2-11
Rev. Tim Callow
Preached Sun. Dec. 14th, 2025
If your goal is to win friends and influence people, being a prophet is not the best career path. John was a prophet’s prophet, a serious man full of vigor and the word of the Lord. He burned with such fire that people came from miles around to watch him burn with the vengeance of God. Even Herod Antipas, the King of Galilee, was interested in the guy. Surely not because he was convicted, but because he liked to hear the things John said. Like he was some actor, or some stage artist. But one day John went “too far.” He targeted his barbed words at Herod and said it was unlawful for him to marry his brother’s wife. This went too far because now John was getting involved in politics. So Herodias, the wife of Herod (formally of his brother Philip) urged that John be put away. And he was. He was put in prison.
While John is in prison he begins to doubt. Perhaps, he thought, this is not how things are supposed to go. Or, perhaps, he was confounded by the reports he heard about Jesus. Recall John claimed the one who was to come after him would baptize the world in fire. But Jesus was dining with the very people John called a brood of vipers. Where John ate only locusts and wild honey, word got around that Jesus never stopped eating and drinking. Where John never left the wilderness until his arrest, Jesus could be found in the towns among the well to do as well as the outcast. It is possible, this is only speculation, that he was wondering whether Jesus really was the messiah because he was not doing the things John though the messiah should be doing. Where is the judgment? Where is the terrible recompense? Where is the vengeance of God? If messiah has come, why is John in chains?
So John sends some of his disciples to Jesus looking for an explanation. They ask, “Are you the one who is to come, or are we to wait for another?” Are you the one who is to deliver Israel from occupation? Are you the one who is going to fulfill all the promises of God? Are you the one who will end the last remnants of our exile? Or are you just another rabbi, just another teacher?
Jesus answers not with a “yes” or a “no” but by telling John’s disciples what has taken place. “Go and tell John what you hear and see: the blind receive their sight, the lame walk, those with a skin disease are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the poor have good news brought to them. And blessed is anyone who takes no offense at me.” You may have noticed that in responding to John Jesus is making use of our old testament reading from Isaiah this morning. “Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf shall be opened; then the lame shall leap like a deer, and the tongue of the speechless sing for joy. For waters shall break forth in the wilderness and streams in the desert; the burning sand shall become a pool and the thirsty ground springs of water; the haunt of jackals shall become a swamp; the grass shall become reeds and rushes.”
Jesus must be the messiah because he is doing the things Isaiah says messiah will do. He is the agent of God’s healing. He is the agent of God’s love for the poor. He brings the good news of the Kingdom of God. And those who are not offended by his works know the blessing of God.
In other words, Jesus is the messiah because the presence of Jesus is the presence of healing and joy. Where the Kingdom of God is present, how can it be otherwise?
I realize the past two weeks may have come across as a little dour. All this talk about repentance, judgment, sin, the end of the world, not being lulled to sleep by our ordinary lives, what am I doing? Isn’t the sanctuary all dressed up in green? Haven’t we covered this space in candles and lights? Isn’t this the “most wonderful time of the year?” Why, Linus has recited Luke 2 far before I have.
But this scripture reminds us of what is truly coming, and yet already here. It reminds us of what we are waiting for, and what we can know now. Jesus comes bringing healing, reconciliation, and good news. Those who know him know joy. True joy. Not some manufactured feeling of happiness. Not some nostalgia or sentimentality. But the ecstatic happiness that is called out of us by the presence of God and his blessings.
Today we lit the candle of joy on the advent wreath. That is to remind us what we are waiting for, and what God gives us. That the holiness God calls us to is nothing more than our own happiness. And that the happiness of God can break through even in the midst of our own drudgery, our ordinary lives, or our sleepiness. It can break through even when we are tired. It can break through even when we are afraid. Because it is not our own concoction, but the presence of the Holy Spirit among us.
The joy we feel is confirmation of that presence. Confirmation that he who has come is still coming. That God is at hand. That our redemption is near.