Removing the Barriers - Advent Gospels - Day 8
December 05, 2021
SolLuna, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons
Removing Impediments
12/5
Every valley shall be filled, and every mountain and hill shall be brought low; and the crooked shall be made straight, and the rough ways shall be made smooth; And all flesh shall see the salvation of God. – Luke 3:5-6
God called John to be a smoother and a “straightener”. In many ways, John’s role was nothing more than to clear away the obstacles that might impede the message of the one who would come after him.
He was a voice.
He was a voice in the wilderness.
And he cried out with passion and conviction removing excuses and uncovering facades.
He was the one to come before Jesus who could really move some mountains and clear some paths. John was a co laborer with God as we are called to be and His mission was simple:
To be an agent through whom all flesh might see the salvation of God.
God has no desire to hide His salvation. He wants all to see it. He wants all to receive it.
We have the task of removing the impediments.
What kind of impediments are there? Sometimes mountains are too high, valleys are too low, and roads are too crooked and rough. We can cooperate with God to change that.
One impediment to people seeing God’s salvation is our tendency to speak religious jargon that no one understands. We mask the grace of God in a jungle of theological language and church talk.
Another is our insistence on traditions that have lost their meaning. Or it may be our own negativity or the contradictions of our lives – the dichotomy between what we profess and what we practice.
We have to remove the obstacles that keep people from coming to Christ or even hearing the Word of God. The problem is not so much that people don’t want to hear as much as they sometimes cannot hear over the irrelevant chatter. Remove the impediments and let everyone see the salvation of God.