Navitity of John the Baptist

Are you he, or should we look for another?

The birth of St. John the Baptist set against the birth of Jesus, though not quite as remarkable as a virgin birth, is nonetheless miraculous.  John's father, Zacharias, is from the priestly class and is well-known for his piety.  He has been stuck with muteness during John's gestation because of his inability to accept the likelihood of his wife, Elizabeth, giving birth at such an advanced age.  All of the biblical markers for the birth of someone great.


John's ministry focused on repentance and the use of the Jewish mikvah or ritual cleansing before worship. John's messianic message was that the Messianic age arrives in response to the change of heart; conversion and repentance bring salvation, not the other way around.  It was, in its own way, very much a set including especially the drama before his birth as God working to bring life from the barrenness of Elizabeth's womb. Ironically, John does not take up his father's priestly line of work but instead goes into the literal barrenness of the desert to announce the imminent arrival of the Messiah.


Many flocked to John's side during his ministry, and it is likely that Jesus, John's cousin, was one of his early disciples. Jesus "graduates" from John's group, it seems, shortly after being baptized, and then began his public ministry apart from John. The contrast between John's expectation for Jesus and what Jesus does is highlighted in John's message from jail asking Jesus to make an account of his ministry; John has heard that Jesus' ministry involves inviting the "unclean" into the Kingdom. In frustration, John writes (rather sarcastically): “... Are you the one to come, or should we look for another?" (Matthew 11).art of Jesus' message of repentance, of metanoia, or turning around 180 degrees to enter the Kingdom.  John's kingdom, though, was not Jesus' Kingdom.  John envisioned the radical moral reform of the Jewish people and Jesus as the warrior King of Isaiah, not the Suffering Servant of Isaiah; thus, the confusion and disappointment.


We find in John, too, a brother in our disappointment when we set up Jesus as the head of a church that defines the limits of God's love and compassion, and tries to reduce God's supreme revelation to "hidden knowledge" for a few "insiders"---the rest of humanity burning in an eternal lake of fires for their sins.  What John heralds in his birth is a savior that is the one who comes to suffer for people, who invites the outcast into communion and heals. The change of heart of Jesus' disciples comes not only from his preaching but also in many profound instances from his healing.  Unlike John, Jesus was an intensely social person who came "eating and drinking" not only among the Jewish people but among those despised for their "outsider" status and non-believers and the Jewish unclean, such as lepers.  John longed for all his heart for the coming of the Messiah, convinced Jesus was the prime candidate, but also bitterly disappointed that Jesus wasn't acting in a way that was very messianic, according to John's understanding.


The celebration of John's nativity, some six months before Christmas and the celebration of Jesus' birth, is a good time to take stock in what we expect of Jesus, and through association, of ourselves--what we long for, and what has arrived.