Good evening Church, 
 
I have spent much of my working career as a painter. One of the things you learn as a painter is the importance of prep work. You cannot simply show up to a house and start painting. It must be cleaned, and you need to scrape the loose paint. Often before you begin, you need to spend a lot of time masking and protecting surfaces you do not want to paint. It is often said your paint job is only good as the prep you did. 
 
This last week we saw the importance of John preparing the way for Jesus. Zechariah said,
“And you, child, will be called the prophet of the Most High; for you will go before the Lord to prepare his ways,” (Luke 1:76). This role that John the Baptist played, like the prep work for painting, is crucial. 
 
On Sunday, we looked at two ways that John ‘prepped’ the people for the coming of Jesus.
 
John first prepared the way for Jesus by calling people to repentance. 
John showed the people of Israel that they were sinners and that their most urgent need was the forgiveness of their sin. This is so important because people don’t naturally think of sin as an urgent matter. We tend to downplay it and excuse it. We believe our problems are caused by outward circumstances. John’s words declare the truth that our biggest problem is within ourselves and the bad things we are doing and have done. If left untreated, we will end up under the wrath of God eternally. This is not a popular message. It was not popular in John’s time either (he ended in prison for his hard stance on sin) and it is still unpopular today. We, as modern Christians, are tempted to gloss over it because it is seen as too harsh or judgemental. We just want to hear the good parts about forgiveness and hope. The problem is that without preaching repentance, we become like painters who just want to paint the house without any prep work. At first it might seem to work, but soon the paint will fail because of the lack of prep and the house will look even worse than it did before. We need the prep of having our sin exposed and being called to repent of it before we can experience the healing and hope of the gospel in Christ. 
 
The second way John prepared the way was by declaring Jesus to be the Savior of sinners. His messages began by condemning sin and calling for righteousness, but they conclude by pointing to someone greater than himself, namely Jesus Christ. People who were convicted by John’s message and saw themselves to be sinners, were hungry to be righteous and were ready to receive Jesus Christ as “the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world”. This simple message of sin, repentance and faith in Christ are still what we preach today. Our message has not changed. This is the same message that we have been looking at in Galatians.
 
As Christians, it is important that we don’t gloss over sin. As we enter this Christmas season, we must heed the call of John to repent and put off the practices of sin. Are there actions or attitudes you need to turn from and repent this Christmas season? The promise is that when, and only when, we do turn and repent, seasons of refreshing will come, and we will receive the full comfort of Jesus who has come to save sinners.
 
May God make us a people who are ‘prepped’ and ready this Christmas season as we remember his incarnation and look forward to the second coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.
 
Taylor Ewert
Pastor, Friendship Baptist Church
taylorewert@friendship-bc.com
604.970.8506