JOHN’S MESSAGE

III SUNDAY OF ADVENT - Luke 3:10-18

This Sunday’s gospel presents the teaching of John the Baptist. In the desert, his life was hard and difficult. Anyway, it is always difficult to survive in the desert, even though people like the Bedouin live a nomadic life in the desert. The people of Israel had made that experience and the life in the desert always remained as a kind of ideal: a life in which people entrust themselves to the Lord and allow him to be the shepherd that guides and protects them. In spite of appearing like a crazy person, people recognised in John a person touched by God and moved by his Spirit and they went to him to hear his message and to accept his advice. When people are weighed down by a life full of hardships, they are ready to go anywhere looking for relief. When they feel lost, they look for the meaning and purpose of their lives and they are ready to make sacrifices in order to find it. And so they crossed the desert and went down to the Jordan River so that they could receive guidance from John.

Luke presents three groups of people going to John: the people in general, the tax collectors and the soldiers; and all of them asked the same question: "What should we do?" That is the same question that people go on asking: What should we do to get out of this mess which we are in? The question implies that we are responsible for our own lives and that the outcome depends on what we do.  If we dream of a different world and want it to be a world of justice and peace, then we must ask: What should we do? However, the question is only meaningful if we are ready to do what needs to be done. In his answer to the question, John gave an indication of what is essential, presenting three attitudes that we must put into practice: 

1. Share what we have with the neediest. We must put an end to our selfishness, accepting that we are responsible for the fate of the others. We must pay attention to the most vulnerable so that they do not feel abandoned and ignored in their suffering.
2. Practice justice in the demands we make on others. We must put an end to the exploitation of others so that we enrich ourselves and consider us superior to all the others. The world belongs to all and is not my private property.
3. Practice non-violence, never using authority to oppress others, but putting ourselves at the service of peace. We must put an end to oppression on the ones who depend on us and we must stop behaving as if we are the lords who must always be obeyed.

John's advice is simple and workable. Although it must be enacted by each individual, this adice has a communitarian and social dimension. And if we want to build a fair and peaceful society, we must act upon this advice and change it into policies in our society. 

John did not work any miracles that might attract the crowds, but they were ready to endure the hardships of the desert just to listen to his word - a simple, sincere and direct word, full of truth, which touched the hearts of people. John’s word is a word that confronts and judges us, leading us to face our actions and our motives for those actions. 

John was an honourable, sincere and honest man, who was well aware of his mission and of the limits of that mission. And so he plainly spoke the truth about himself:

“I baptise you with water, but someone is coming, someone who is more powerful than I am, and I am not fit to undo the strap of his sandals; he will baptise you with the Holy Spirit and fire”. This Someone - the Christ- will baptise us with the Holy Spirit, thus making us children of God.