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Sermon for the Third Sunday of Advent – December 14, 2025
Matthew 11:2-11
Dear friends, grace to you and peace from God our Father and our Lord Jesus Christ.
Jesus described John the Baptist as the greatest of all the prophets. It isn’t hard to see why. While still in his mother’s womb, John famously leapt with joy at the presence of the unborn Messiah as his pregnant Aunt Mary came to visit. Even then he was preparing the way! John was a spiritual superhero, living under vows of strict asceticism, depriving himself of worldly pleasures like comfy clothes and good food, utterly devoted to his calling as the forerunner for God’s promised savior. John was asked to baptize the Messiah, and in doing so he witnessed a manifestation of the Holy Trinity as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit each made themselves known as Jesus rose up from the water. There was no greater prophet that John the Baptist. Nobody else experienced some of the things he experienced. No one was as dedicated to the tasks of being a prophet as he was. And yet, there came a point in John’s life when he was confused about what God was up to in Jesus. There came a time when doubts and disappointments crept into his heart. There came a time when he wrestled with some questions. Questions like, “Is Jesus really the one?”
The John we meet in our gospel reading for today is a very different John than the one we met last week. Last week John was preaching boldly and bravely, pointing that blessed finger of his at both sin and the savior, calling people to repent, for the kingdom of heaven had come near. John lambasted Pharisees and Sadducees, calling them a brood of vipers. John was fearless and loud!
Later, John’s loud mouth and pointing finger would get him in trouble with Herod Antipas, the Jewish king who served as a puppet ruler for the Romans. Herod had his own personal sexual revolution going on which became a bit of a public scandal. Herod abandoned his first wife in order to marry his sister-in-law. Herod passed himself off as a pious Jew when it fit his purposes, but then he ignored God’s will for marriage in order to indulge his appetites. Well, John just couldn’t let that slide. He publicly rebuked Herod for his behavior, and he ended up in prison for it.
Perhaps John was expecting that his bold preaching on the sanctity of marriage and the sinfulness of adultery would earn him special protection from God. Perhaps, once he was imprisoned, he thought Jesus would put together a tactical squad to come orchestrate a jail break, or maybe that he would negotiate for a prisoner swap. After all, wasn’t the Messiah supposed to overthrow their oppressors and bring liberty to the captives?
John sat in his prison cell, waiting for something to happen. He had plenty of time to think. As weeks, and then months, went by, some troubling questions started to come into his mind. “Is Jesus the one? Was I wrong about him, because this is not at all how I expected things to go! Should I be waiting for someone else, some other Messiah, some other savior?”
John’s questions are not unfamiliar to us. They are not uncommon, even amongst the most devout and faithful Christians. We shouldn’t be surprised by this. If John the Baptist, whom Jesus called the greatest of all the prophets, experienced this season of confusion, if he asked these troubling questions, why should we expect to be spared from them?
And it seems to me that this confusion and these questions are especially common during the holidays. We are told over and over again that it’s the most wonderful time of the year, and then people get confused or troubled when things aren’t so wonderful. People watch hours and hours of Hallmark Christmas movies, where everything gets wrapped up neatly in a nice bow by the end, where every problem gets resolved by some last-minute Christmas miracle, and then people get confused and troubled when they don’t get a Christmas miracle of their own.
The truth is this is a hard time of year for many people. It is a season with so many expectations that it leaves many people disappointed and despairing. There are gifts that land flat and recipes that are a bust and plans that fall through. More seriously, there are those fault lines in family life that come under strain, threatening to break loose with conflict as emotions run high. There is the financial stress of trying to fill every wish and make everything special. There is the aching from the absence of loved ones – the spouse who is deployed, the family on the other side of the country, the kid who isn’t coming home this year. More seriously still, there are people who can’t enjoy Christmas cookies or egg nog because they are nauseous from chemo, and widows and widowers who are facing their first Christmas without their beloved.
First there is the confusion: It wasn’t supposed to be like this. And often this confusion leads to questions, questions like John’s: “Who is this Messiah again? Who is this savior? Because I don’t feel very saved right now. Where is he? Why isn’t he breaking me out of this awful situation? Is Jesus the one? Is he my savior, or should I be looking somewhere else?”
When John faced these questions, he sent for Jesus. He had a few of his friends go and ask Jesus precisely this question. And Jesus sent word back to him. Jesus responded by sending his friends back with a word of reassurance. Jesus didn’t scold John for asking the question. He didn’t say, “How dare you ask that?” Instead, through the witness of these friends Jesus pointed John back to the promises of scripture. The scriptures said that when the Messiah came, the blind would receive their sight, the lame would walk, the lepers would be cleansed, the deaf would hear, the dead would be raised, and the poor would have good news brought to them. This is what Jesus was doing! Jesus encouraged John to look beyond his circumstances to the promises of scripture. He told John to stop looking inwardly at his feelings, and instead to keep his eyes on him, even if he isn’t doing exactly what John expected. “Blessed is anyone who takes no offense at me,” Jesus told him. Jesus encouraged John to live by faith.
And then Jesus went on to say some wonderful things about John. In spite of his struggles, Jesus says he is strong. He is no reed shaken by the wind! Jesus calls him a prophet – and not only a prophet, but the greatest of all the prophets. In spite of his confusion, Jesus praises and blesses him.
John may have had some questions, maybe even some doubts, but John took those doubts to Jesus. He took those questions to Jesus when he reached out to him for help. This is faith, and Jesus proclaims John righteous on account of this faith.
Jesus has a proclamation and a promise for you here too. Jesus says that among those born of women no one has arisen greater than John the Baptist. And yet, Jesus says, the least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he! Jesus is talking about us here! He’s talking about all of us who have been made part of the kingdom of heaven through Christ’s death and resurrection. We may be the least, we may not hold a candle to John the Baptist in many ways, we may not have seen all the things John witnessed, but we have the benefit of living on the other side of Jesus’ death and resurrection. We have seen things John didn’t live to see. We have received a greater, fuller picture of Christ’s saving grace than John did during his lifetime. We have seen the vindication of Jesus as the Messiah of God and the savior of our souls. We have seen his ultimate victory over the worst captivity of all, our captivity to sin and death. We have been set free from those dark prison cells once and for all.
Some of you might still have questions. That’s okay. Some of you might not feel very saved as you face various troubles in your life. That’s okay too. If John the Baptist had those struggles, we shouldn’t expect to be spared from them.
Whatever your situation in life might be today, our Lord Jesus encourages all of us to look beyond our circumstances to the scriptures, to the promises of God we find there. Jesus encourages us to look beyond our feelings and to instead live by faith in him, putting our trust in what he has done for us. Jesus isn’t angered by those tough questions. He can take them. But he doesn’t want you to stay stuck in confusion. He doesn’t want you to stay stuck in doubt. He wants you to know the truth, the truth that he is your savior. He wants you to know the truth of his saving love, the truth that he has made you his own, the truth that he has made you part of the kingdom of heaven, bringing you into right relationship with God both today and forever.
It can still be the most wonderful time of the year, even when we are facing troubles and doubts, because when we send for Jesus, he sends word back to us that it is all true. The gospel, the good news, is true. Jesus sends his Word to reassure us that he is who he says he is. He was born to save us. He is coming again to make all things right once and for all. He has made us part of his kingdom even now, and so we are never alone, and never without hope.
Thanks be to God. Amen.
Rev. Jeffrey R. Spencer
Oak Harbor Lutheran Church