Sunday Sermon - "Wilderness"

A sermon from Luke 3:1-6. Our culture is well past Thanksgiving and fully immersed into Christmas. But on the Second Sunday in Advent, John the Baptist shows up, and he's got nothing Christmassy to say. Everything about John is surprising. He, and not the long list of important political and religious figures that open this gospel reading, is the one to whom the word of God comes. And if you want to hear this word, you have to leave town and temple, church and shopping mall, and go out into the wilderness where John is.