Who Do
You See?
Keith
McFarren
December
14, 2025
Matthew
11:2-11
    A guy went to his barber for his monthly
haircut and while he was there he told the barber about his upcoming trip to
Rome.  I don’t know if the barber was in
a bad mood that day or if he had a negative outlook on life…but he found fault
with the airline the guy was going to use to fly to Rome.  He had negative comments about the hotel the
guy was going to stay at in Rome.  And he
even had negative comments about the guy’s hope of having an audience with the
Pope while he was in Rome.
    A month later the guy went back for a
haircut and told the barber what a great time he had.  The flight was perfect and the hotel couldn’t
have been any better.  But the best part
was…he got to meet the Pope.
   The barber, with his surly attitude
replied, “Yeah, what did the Pope say to you?”
    “Well,” the guy said, “He placed his hand
on my head and said, ‘My son, where did you get such a lousy haircut?’”
    The barber didn’t take the joke very
well.  In fact, he brooded over it for
months but he eventually got over it.
    For some of us, it’s easy to find things
to get upset about.  For some of us, it
seems like we’re always mad about something.
Nothing seems to go our way; it’s like the world is always against
us.  Over my lifetime I’ve had things that
bothered me for a long, long time, only to find that once I got it all
straightened out or all figured out, most of the time it really wasn’t even
worth getting mad over.  
    It’s the same with worrying.  Most of the thing I’ve worried about didn’t
even happen or if they did, it wasn’t nearly as bad as I thought it would be.
    But then again, some of my worries were
worth worrying about.  The things that I
worried about did actually happen just like I thought they might.  But there wasn’t a whole lot I could do about
the outcome.  I just had to roll with the
punches, go with the flow or as some people say suck it up and get over it.
    That’s why we have Jesus, isn’t it.  In times when things don’t go our way and we
find ourselves rolling with the punches or going with the flow, we always have
Jesus to turn to.  That’s because Jesus
is sympathetic.  Jesus is good at
comforting us.  It’s as though he always
has that “come to me” invitation available to us.
    But not always.  Sometimes, instead of offering us compassion
and a shoulder to cry on, Jesus seems to have this “get over it” attitude.
    Remember the storm?  The one that happened at sea.  The one where Jesus was sleeping and the
waves kept getting higher and higher and the wind kept getting stronger and
stronger and the disciples were screaming louder and louder because they were
afraid they were going to drown.  “Don’t
you care that we’re going to die?” they screamed at him.  
    Meanwhile, Jesus had been sleeping in the
boat.  All the screaming and yelling
finally woke him up and Jesus opened his eyes and got up…told the storm to calm
down…and said what to his disciples?
“Where is your faith?”  
    After being scared to death because of the
intensity of the storm and having death looking them in the eye, Jesus said nothing
more to his friends than “Where is your faith?”
That was it.  It was over with and
done.  Forget about it and get on with
your life.  But if you stop and think
about it, what more needs to be said.  If
you have Jesus in the boat with you when you are facing a storm, that’s all you
need.  
   It might sound kind of harsh coming from
Jesus, but it’s a message that we all need to hear every now and then…especially
on the quiet, peaceful side of a storm that could very easily be waiting for us
just over the horizon.
    So what does all this have to do with the
3rd Sunday of Advent?  The
third Sunday of Advent is meant to be a time to shift our seasonal mood a
little bit.  We lit our third Advent
candle this morning and if you have noticed, there are three different colors
of candles.  
    There is the big white one, the Christ
Candle, that we light on Christmas Eve that symbolizes the presence of Christ
among us.  The ring of candles around it
will normally have three purple or blue candles and one pink one.  The pink one is for today, the third Sunday
of Advent.  For what is called Gaudete (Gow
day tay) Sunday with Gaudete being Latin for Joy.  
    The first two Sundays in Advent are meant
to focus on our repentance and our preparation for the coming of Christ.  The third Sunday, Gaudete (Gow day tay) Sunday
is meant to slow us down a bit and to get to think about rejoicing.  Rejoicing not only in the nearness of the
coming of Christ but also rejoicing in the Old Testament prophets who have been
telling us to keep our eyes and ears open and to continually be alert for the
coming of Christ.  
    We need to be reminded of the joy that
should be filling our hearts…despite all that is going on in our lives.  As we look at the calendar and realize that
Christmas is just a couple of weeks away and we aren’t ready yet, we need to be
reminded of the joy that should be felt within us.
    That’s what today is all about.  The third Sunday of Advent with the pink
candle that symbolizes joy, is meant to remind us to be joyful in the coming of
Christ.  It’s about Jesus telling us to
“Pay attention.”   It’s about the
fulfillment of the promises of the coming of Christ made by the prophet Isaiah
who cried out:
    “Even the wilderness and desert will be
glad in those days.  The wasteland will
rejoice and blossom with spring crocuses.
Yes, there will be an abundance of flowers and singing and joy!

    The deserts will become as green as
the mountains of Lebanon, as lovely as Mount Carmel or the plain of Sharon.  There the Lord will display his
glory, the splendor of our God.  
With this news, strengthen
those who have tired hands, and encourage those who have weak knees.  Say to those with fearful hearts, ‘Be strong,
and do not fear, for your God is coming to destroy your enemies.  He is coming to save you.’  
    And when he comes, he will open the eyes
of the blind and unplug the ears of the deaf.
The lame will leap like a deer, and those who cannot speak will sing for
joy!  Springs will gush forth in the
wilderness, and streams will water the wasteland” (Isaiah 35:1-6 NLT).
    That’s what this is all about.  That’s what we’re waiting for.  That is the promise we can wrap our hopes
around.  Christ is coming!  Someday what is wrong will be right.  Someday, all that is scattered will be
gathered up again.  
   We live in a society of abundance…but we
still lack a lot.  We live with our basic
needs satisfied…but we still lack a lot.
We may not be as physically dry as those out in the desert who were
hearing Isaiah’s proclamation of what the world would someday be like…but our
souls are running on empty and our souls are spiritually parched.  And we all understand what it’s like to be
vulnerable and to have weak hands and feeble knees at some point in our lives.
    We understand what it’s like to not feel
safe in the world in which we live.  We
don’t feel safe on the roads that we drive on.
We understand what it’s like to desperately need a safe place to go and
feel protected and comfortable.  And we
all understand the need for someplace to go, perhaps all by ourselves, to scream
out with the pain and anger and frustration that sometimes dwells deep down
within us.  
    All of us.
That’s what Isaiah is describing.
Regardless of race or color or nationality.  No matter where you have come from.  No matter what you have done.  Isaiah says that someday, maybe today, maybe
tomorrow, maybe next week, whenever it is the Lord comes back, we’ll all get to
go home together.  Our hatred and our
pride and our anger and our depression and oppression will all disappear and together
we will all sing for joy.  
    Notice what Jesus tells John’s disciples
when they come and ask if it is true.  Is
he the one Isaiah spoke of?  Is he the
one the world has been waiting for?
    John
has run into a storm of his own.  He’s
sitting in jail about to lose his head to a king who has been trying to seduce
his own stepdaughter.  We have to wonder
if he is beginning to doubt the identity of Jesus or if he is maybe still
trying to teach something to his disciples.

    What seemed so certain about Jesus on the
banks of the Jordan River now seems to be questionable at best.  While the presence of Jesus was once
comforting and warming and sustaining for John, the joy now all seems to be dissipating
in the presence of a coming storm that will cost him his life…and John can’t
help but wonder if he was right about Jesus.
He can’t help but wonder…Are you the one the world has been waiting for?
    What did Jesus say in response to the
question?  As usual, he didn’t answer with
a straight answer.  As usual he asked for
input.  As usual he asked for
connection.  As usual he asked for a
commitment.  
    “What do you see?” Jesus asked.  “What do you see” as you open your eyes to all
that is going on in the world around you?
Open your eyes to all that is going on.
Open them wide…wide enough to see the truth that lies within the storms
of life.
     The storms of life are out there.  The winds blow and the snow and the sleet and
the rain comes.  It comes and it beats us
down.  The storms of life come day after
day and they cause us to feel angry and afraid and lost and alone.
    But if we focus our eyes way out there…if
we focus on the light that glimmers way out there in the darkness beyond the
storm…we can see the blind receiving sight, the crippled being able to walk, the
outcast no longer being excluded  and those
people that are broken, with broken hearts and broken promises and broken hopes…the
broken are healed.
    Reconciliation is real.  Forgiveness is real.  Reconciliation and forgiveness that promotes
healing.  No matter how big the storm, no
matter how strong the wind, no matter how much rain or snow falls, there is
always a light that is shining in the storm.
A light that we can focus on.  A
light that will help us get through the storm.
    That’s how we get over it.  The disciples were yelling and screaming that
day in the boat when the storm engulfed them and they were afraid they were
going to die.  But Jesus knew what he
could do.  He knew the power he had over
the storm and he reduced the storm to nothing.
It wasn’t that big of a deal according to Jesus.
    Nothing needs to be a big deal if we are
willing to lift our perspective over the storm that we are faced with and look out
toward something bigger and better.
    With death threatening him, John the
Baptist stood strong in the storm because he knew that the storm was not the
final answer.  He could see beyond what was
in front of him and he wasn’t afraid.
    We too, with our belief in who Jesus
really is, can stand strong in the storms of life as well.  We can stand up for truth and for
justice.  We can call for repentance and we
can call for reconciliation.  We can do
anything we want if we have a kingdom perspective…if we see things as Jesus
sees them…if we have a hopeful vision…if we believe in the power of God.
    All this brings us back to Gaudete (Gow
day tay) Sunday.  All this brings us back
to joy.  The joy we have believing in the
power of Jesus.  Joy is the confidence
that we are on the right road, the road deemed the Lord’s highway…a highway that
none of us can ever get lost on if we live and believe in where it is taking
us.
    Joy is the faint taste of someday, of
spending eternity with God, if we are willing to pay attention to what we are
told and to what we believe.  Joy is
hope, not the kind of hope we have of receiving a certain Christmas present
that we wanted so badly, but the strong, gripping hope we have in Jesus Christ
when we are confronted by the storms of life.

    Who do you see when you look at
Jesus?  Where does your hope lie?  Where does your future lie?