Nobodies [Advent 2C]
The Rev. Jeremiah
Williamson
Luke 3:1-6
Nobodies
There are some
important people mentioned in today’s Gospel.
There is Tiberius – the most important.
He was Emperor of the Roman Empire.
He ruled an Empire that covered more than 2 million square miles; as
much as a quarter of the world’s population lived within its borders.[1] He was powerful. He was feared. He was a brutal man. He so despised Jewish people that he deported
all Jews who were living in the capital city of Rome. Whether they liked him or not, to those living
in the Empire, he was the most important person in the world.
John the Baptist was a
nobody.
Pontius Pilate was the
prefect of the Roman province of Judea.
According to Jewish sources, he was “’inflexible, a blend of self-will
and relentlessness,’ [a ruler] whose administration was marked with briberies,
insults, robberies…, frequent executions without trial, and endless savage
ferocity.”[2] His territory was a backwater filled with
occupied people who refused to worship the gods of the Empire. And he ruled them as a tyrant. Whether they liked him or not, the residents
of Judea, knew he was an important person.
John the Baptist was a
nobody.
Herod ruled the Judean
territory of Galilee. He was known for
building his capital city on a burial ground and offending the Jewish residents
by placing images in the public buildings of the territory – something that is,
of course, forbidden in the Torah. Also
he is remembered now, by Christians, for executing John the Baptist and for his
role in the crucifixion of Jesus. But
that was not how he was known in the early first century. Then he was a ruler and he was
important. So was his brother Philip,
who ruled a nearby Gentile region of the Empire. And so was Lysanias. They were all important.
John the Baptist was a
nobody.
Unlike the first five
in the list, Annas and Caiaphas were not political leaders; they were religious
leaders. By the time John was off in the
desert and Jesus was feeding the multitudes, Annas was no longer the high
priest but his influence was still felt.
Caiaphas was his son-in-law and between the two Annas’ sons were in
charge. The family controlled the Temple
for decades and were therefore the most important members of the Jewish
community. Not a powerful or large
community, but in that tight circle, they were very important people.
John the Baptist was a
nobody.
It is into this world
that we are told the word of God came.
And it could have come to any of the important people. There were plenty of important people around
– people with wealth and influence, with power and platform. But the word of God came to John, the oddball
son of a village clergyman – a man who was eating bugs in the desolation of the
wilderness. He wasn’t an emperor, a
ruler, a king; he was an obscure prophet, a nobody. The word of God came to a nobody in the
middle of nowhere.
One of my favorite
scenes in the most recent Star Wars film, The
Last Jedi¸is a conversation between Kylo Ren and Rey. We are introduced to Rey as a junk trader in
a harsh desert wilderness – living alone, squatting in a wrecked ship, abandoned
by her parents. And yet somehow, despite
her barren surroundings and meager existence, the Force is unexpectedly strong
with her. And because it is we wonder
about her heritage. There must be more
to her story than the nobody she appears to be.
I mean Luke Skywalker and Princess Leia, their parents are Darth Vader
and a Queen; Kylo Ren, his parents are Han Solo and Princess Leia. So which
important persons parented Rey – the most recent hero in a line of great Star
Wars heroes? It’s a juicy mystery – one
that we eager watch Rey try to untangle.
And finally everything
becomes clear. Kylo Ren says to Rey, “Do you want to know the truth about your
parents, or have you always known? You've just hidden it away. You know the
truth. Say it. Say it.” With tears
streaming down her face Rey admits what she seemingly knew deep down but never
wanted to believe, “They were nobody.” Ren
confirms her confession: “They were filthy junk traders, who sold you off for
drinking money. They're dead in a pauper's grave in the…desert. You have no
place in this story; You come from nothing. You're nothing…”
John the Baptist had no place in the story. The story that mattered was the story of
Emperors and rulers, the rich and powerful, the urban elites, the descendants
of aristocrats. And he was a nobody in the
middle of nowhere. The historians of his
day did not write his name in the annals of the kings of Rome. The news of his violent death did not reach
the Emperor’s palace. No one outside of
Galilee knew that he lost his head. I
mean, bodies piled up around the Empire – just object lessons for those who
might intend to stir up trouble. In that
world, in that time, John was simply a reminder not to criticize your local
official.
And it is not just him.
Public execution ran in the family.
His cousin would be killed not long after John was. Jesus: he had no place in the story
either. Think about it. He was the son of a teenage girl (who was, by
the way, pregnant before she was married) and a local laborer. And maybe they did have family ties to the
great Davidic dynasty but no one in Rome cared about that. Imperial forces rarely care about the tribal
histories of the people they conquer. Jesus
came from nothing. He was born into a
poor family at the edge of a vast Empire.
He was a Jewish baby born under the rule of an Emperor who would not
even allow Jews to live in the same city in which he lived. Jesus was crucified between bandits and
mocked by passersby. He was buried in a
borrowed tomb.
Thousands of people, besides John and Jesus, were executed in
the Roman Empire in the first century.
You don’t know their stories. As
far as history is concerned, as far as the powerful rulers in Rome were
concerned, they were nobodies. They had
no place in the story.
John and Jesus were born into a desperate community – a
community that was beat down and on the verge of hopelessness. A community that was an afterthought in the
most powerful Empire in the world. You
hear it in their songs, the songs that open this Gospel according to Luke. Zechariah, John the Baptist’s father, cries
out to God for a savior who will “save us from our enemies, from the hands of
all who hate us.” He cries out to God
for a savior who will set them “free from the hands of our enemies” because
they were not free. Mary, Jesus’ mother,
cries out for God to bring down the powerful from their thrones and lift up the
lowly because she was counted among the lowly.
John the Baptist had no place in the story. Jesus had no place in the story. Mary had no place in the story. They had no place in the grand narrative of
the Empire. They do not include peasants
in the stories of princes. They had no
place in that story. And so they wrote a
new story – a story that gave hope to the hopeless – the salvation story of a
God who always seems to work through nobodies.
You see Advent tells us that if the story you are reading is
set in ivory palaces you are reading the wrong story. Advent tells us that the word of God comes to
the nobodies in the middle of nowhere.
The Word of God is hidden in the darkness of a teenage womb. The Word of God is wrapped up in swaddling
clothes and lying in a manger. The Word
of God is in the blood-stained palms of an occupied peasant. The Word of God is hanging on a cross between
bandits. The word of God comes to those
who are desperate enough to listen to some hope.
Where God happens is where God is least expected. This is the story that God is writing – a
story written in the desolate wilderness and in barren wombs and in sealed tombs. And it is really the only story that
matters. It is a story about some
nobodies who you and I still know about.
Kings and kingdoms pass away, but the salvation story is still being
told.
The word of God doesn’t come to the powerful on their
thrones; the word of God comes to those who are willing to hear it, who are
desperate enough to need it, who gotta have some hope. You might think of yourself as a nobody, but
I am telling you that God speaks to nobodies; God works through nobodies. You have a part in this story and it is the
most important story ever told.
Love the sermon. The analogy is both powerful and encouraging. We "nobodies" can sometimes make a difference for the better. Lessons are gained about societies and values throughout the ages. Simplifying the biblical language helps me.
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