vipers

For four centuries there hadn’t been a prophet in Israel. It was as if God had fallen silent, and the people of Israel wondered if they’d been abandoned. Then the son of Zechariah and Elizabeth showed up in the desert, eating bugs and wearing animal hair. He looked and acted like a prophet. But listen to what he said.

Luke 3:7-8 John said to the crowds coming out to be baptized by him, “You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the coming wrath? Produce fruit in keeping with repentance.”

I learned while preparing a sermon that John was being especially mean here. Vipers were considered some of the nastiest creatures around – it was believed that they ate their way out of their mothers. Being called vipers was insulting.

And just in case they missed the point, John asked them who warned them to flee – this could be a reference to the preferred method of getting vipers out of a field, which was to burn it. The vipers then would flee the field, seeking someplace safe from the flames.

This was a harsh call to repentance. He basically said, “You guys are so nasty you’d hurt your own mother if it helped you. The only just end for you is to be burned out.” 

John’s call was to produce fruit in keeping with repentance, so that the coming savior wouldn’t destroy them. As I wait during this Advent period, I find myself asking if I produce that kind of fruit. Does the outcome of my actions show repentance? Where is my fruit, what does it look like?

That’s my challenge to myself this Advent, to turn my nasty viperish self into someone who bears the fruit of repentance. It seems like if I can do that until Christmas, it might be the start of a new way of thinking.

That’s only a couple of weeks. Watch and wait.