Our readings this week remind me of a story I once heard which involved a Pope who had not driven a car since his youth and wanted to enjoy that experience once more. So, one evening during a mission trip abroad, the Pontiff summoned his driver and said that he would like to go for a ride. Being a dutiful servant, his aide brought the car around and it was only then that the Pope confided in the driver of his wish to drive. So, the driver climbed into the back of the vehicle and off they went.
It wasn’t long however before they had caught the attention of a local police officer who was confused and a little frightened as to what she saw. The officer wasn’t at all sure what to do about it so she called to her supervisor for advice. “A late model limo just passed me and although it’s not doing anything wrong, there is something very suspicious about it”. Her supervisor told her to pull the vehicle over and check it out, but she said that she didn’t think that she had the authority. “You see, I can only imagine who is in the back since it’s the Pope who is driving”.
The Gospel tells us about the great misunderstanding and confusion at the beginning of the Lord’s mission on earth as John the Baptist brings the forbearing message of the Messiah who is to come. John’s divinely inspired teachings are both of the warning of severe judgement for the misdeeds and infidelities to God and man, and of the consolation of Divine Mercy through reconciliation. So forceful and convincing is the truth of his words that many around him suspect that John himself is the long awaited Messiah. And yet, nowhere in Sacred Scripture does the difference between John and Jesus stand out more clearly. “I am baptizing you with water, but one mightier than I is coming. I am not worthy to loosen the thongs of his sandals. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire."
Now at first, this is taken as good news by the Jews, as they are sure that in God’s mercy, they possessed favored status as His chosen people. They held the belief that a man was safe from judgment simply by virtue of the fact that he was a Jew. But John, a Jew himself, immediately squelches this idea, “Do not begin to say among yourselves, we have Abraham as our father, (Lk 3:8)” in that there will be no privilege of one above another, rather that one’s life example (lived by faith) was God’s ultimate standard of judgment.
The tax collectors are not sure what to make of this and what their fate will be so they ask John what they should do. John tells them that being baptized has no relief for them if they simply go back to taking advantage of the people. They were used to collecting more than the prescribed tax so that they could live very well themselves while paying a nice amount to the temple in order to rationalize their thievery.
The soldiers were also in a quandary. They were the biggest and strongest, the best athletes of that time and trained killers at that. There was no one they couldn’t intimidate or extort for whatever they desired. And the message from John was the same for them, that they must discontinue their sinful ways and perform their jobs with dignity and honor.
But the thing that we must not miss here is the fact that these people of all walks of life, many of whom were the least of which you might expect to follow the Word of the Lord, were coming to believe. In the previous versus to our Gospel reading, John even refers to them as “vipers”, the worst of society. In the desert where John had lived, it was very dry and if a fire started, it would spread quickly among the weeds and brush and the vipers (the snakes), would scurry out of their holes and rocks in fear. “You spawn of vipers, who put it into your heads to flee from the coming wrath? Produce fruits to match repentance. (Lk 3: 7) "
Perhaps their hearts heard for the first time, that mankind should share and support one another rather than living by the rule of survival of the fittest. They were suddenly able to hear that God would not absolve one who is content to have too much while others have too little. It was a message of doing one’s job in the way that it should properly be done as it was John’s conviction that man praises and honors God well by the honest and serving nature of his work. And it is a measure of the message of Our Lord that we too live the time, talent and treasure of our lives to the benefit of others.
-Deacon Joe Whiston