December 7, 2025 at Saint Peter and Saint William Parishes in Naples, FL
Isaiah 11: 1-10 + Psalm 72 + Romans 15: 4-9 + Matthew 3: 1-12
“Repent” say John. He said it “In those days” and he says it in these days. The whole idea of repentance, at least among church people and a lot of preachers is connected with guilt. People would repent to absolve themselves of guilt that comes from sins they know they have committed. There is probably no changing that mentality, at least today, but John’s idea of repentance has nothing to do with guilt. For John, repentance is an action. To repent is not to feel bad, but to think differently and then act differently.
For the first and only time in the Gospel the Pharisees and Sadducees are together. They are not easy company. On every religious or political issue, they took opposite sides. They represent different classes and different intellectual and theological traditions. This dramatic confrontation with the Pharisees and Sadducees should make it clear to us that the Kingdom of Heaven is going to be a threat to everyone and every earthly kingdom. Anyone who thinks that religion or faith should not confront or conflict with earthly Kingdoms has missed the point here. What John predicts here is not a reform movement but a revolution. Suddenly Herod’s slaughter of infants makes sense. and this new age should bother everyone.
The conflict that John addresses is not with one party or another, but with everyone and everything that resists God’s heavenly kingdom for the sake of the little kingdoms we create to preserve our privileges or keep things as they are because we think we know it all and know what is best.
John goes after the false idea that being a descendent of Abraham may protect or guarantee safety or salvation. One’s allegiance to someone or some earthly institution will not protect or guarantee their safety or salvation. Refusing to find a new identity in the Kingdom of God will result in the experience of that “unquenchable fire.” What it takes, what John insists upon is a new way of thinking and with it, a new way of acting.
Yet, all of us are so busy running down our enemies these days that we, like the Sadducees and Pharisees, have become comrades in hostility to God’s Kingdom. We like to think that our enemies are God’s enemies never realizing that we and those we oppose may be equally distant from God’s Kingdom. We get so committed to the victory of our own party or ideology that we totally forget about the Kingdom of God. My observation is that both sides are always claiming God’s favor and find motivation from the assumption that what they will is God’s will.
As John sees it, God’s wrath did not come from one against another, but will be felt by both for a shared opposition to God’s reign and the stubborn refusal to change the way we think. The only appropriate response is real repentance. From that will come great fruit, life, joy, and peace.