Locusts and Honey

Second Sunday of Advent

December 7, 2014

Mark 1:6

Locusts and Honey

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In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.

Amen.

I.

In order for Jesus to be the Savior as promised, God needed to send a messenger into the world. His message was to prepare the way for the Lord. John was this promised messenger for the promised Savior Jesus. And John's preparation for Jesus was locusts and honey.

Locusts are a type of grasshopper. In the days of the Old Testament, while many insects and animals were not to be eaten by devout Jews, locusts were listed as acceptable for eating. And they were cheap, so typically the poor would eat locusts. Out in the wilderness John, who didn't have much money, if any, ate locusts.

But locusts represented judgment. When the Lord God sent Moses to deliver the Jews from Egypt, the eighth plague was billions of locust swarming into the land and eating all plant life and making the humans and animals miserable.

So Moses stretched out his staff over Egypt, and the Lord made an east wind blow across the land all that day and all that night. By morning the wind had brought the locusts; they invaded all Egypt and settled down in every area of the country in great numbers. Never before had there been such a plague of locusts, nor will there ever be again. They covered all the ground until it was black. They devoured all that was left after the hail—everything growing in the fields and the fruit on the trees. Nothing green remained on tree or plant in all the land of Egypt. (Exodus 10:13-15)

This plague of locusts was the last and worst of the animal plagues. The only plagues left were the plague of darkness and the plague of the dead firstborn. Locusts represented judgment.

So the first part of John's message was the judgment of the Law.

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. And do not begin to say to yourselves, 'We have Abraham as our father.' For I tell you that out of these stones God can raise up children for Abraham. The ax is already at the root of the trees, and every tree that does not produce good fruit will be cut down and thrown into the fire." (Luke 3:7-9)

John called on the crowd to confess. In the original language confess comes from the idea of admitting to the truth about yourself. So John called on the individual souls in the crowd to be honest about who they were: bad trees that produced bad fruit. Just as the Devil came as a viper to Adam and Eve in a garden full of trees, John preached that we are snakes, bad trees, dead rocks, sinners who think far much too much of ourselves and far too little of the true God. In a word, we are sinners who deserve punishment, just as that old Egyptian pharaoh brought locusts on himself.

II.

But John's preparation wasn't only locusts. His message was honey, too. To point out the obvious, honey is sweet. Even today someone who takes a spoonful of honey might wonder why they don't enjoy honey more often. It's sweet and delicious nectar.

And just as locusts were never more awful than in Egypt, honey was never so sweet as in Egypt. When describing the promised land to the Hebrews slaves in Egypt, the common phrase used is that it was a land flowing with milk and honey (first mentioned in Exodus 3:8).

III.

My beloved fellow Jews—Jews by faith, not by blood—today we are in Egypt. And we are waiting to go into the promised land. We are waiting for the Great Deliverer to come to us, to advent, and take us into the land flowing with milk and honey. In this land of honey the bitter judgment of locusts will be a distant memory.

Until He comes, heed the locusts and honey of John and prepare the way of the Lord. Prepare yourselves just as the crowds who came to John prepared: they listened to God's preacher and were baptized and repented. They confessed their sin and trusted in Jesus to wash all sin away.

Earlier I mentioned the plagues of Egypt. The final plague was the plague of the dead firstborn. This event also has another name: the Passover. The Jews as they were taught put lamb's blood on their doors and the angel of death passed over their houses.

This blood in Egypt symbolized the coming blood of the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. This holy blood of Christ takes sin away because He became our sin and allowed Himself to be devoured by the locusts of judgment. He died. And His death is the sweet honey of the Gospel. It is the forgiveness that He gives us to eat that prepares His way for us.

Every day eat locusts and honey. Receive the Law and the Gospel. Confess this trustworthy saying:

Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners—of whom I am the worst. (1 Timothy 1:15)

Alleluia! Amen.