A Light to Walk By

What makes our path worth walking is who we're walking with.

You can’t beat Frederick Buechner’s thumbnail sketch of John the Baptist:

He lived in the wilderness around the Dead Sea. He subsisted on a starvation diet, and so did his disciples. He wore clothes that even the rummage-sale people wouldn't have handled. When he preached, it was fire and brimstone every time. (from Peculiar Treasures)

Photo by Julia Florczak on Unsplash

The Gospels give us brief excerpts from his sermons. On the face of it they all appear to have had one theme: “Shape up! God is coming.” And given his scolding tone, you might think that the Baptizer’s mission was to scare people into improving their behavior. It would be understandable if you thought of him as the morality police. And yet that wouldn’t be accurate.

John’s Gospel puts it this way. “He came as a witness to testify to the light, so that all might believe through him.” (John 1:7) In other words, John might have needed to do a little work on his tone, but the substance of his preaching was hope. The times are…