February 21

John the Baptist

            The beginning of the good news of Jesus Christ, the Son of God. As it is written in the prophet Isaiah,

“See, I am sending my messenger ahead of you, who will prepare your way; the voice of one crying out in the wilderness: ‘Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight,’”

John the baptizer appeared in the wilderness, proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. And people from the whole Judean countryside and all the people of Jerusalem were going out to him, and were baptized by him in the river Jordan, confessing their sins. Now John was clothed with camel’s hair, with a leather belt around his waist, and he ate locusts and wild honey. He proclaimed, “The one who is more powerful than I is coming after me; I am not worthy to stoop down and untie the thong of his sandals. I have baptized you with water; but he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit.”

Mark 1:1-8

            The people of Israel had gone a long time without hearing the voice of God.  It had been centuries since a prophet had been sent to the nation which, for a people founded and based upon following God’s voice, had been disastrous.  Israel had the scriptures so that they would not forget what had been previously spoken to them but multiple religious sects had arisen with their warring interpretations, confusing the meaning of what had been written.  On top of that, Israel was an occupied nation and the Romans were bringing in their own deities to worship.  They cited their military might as proof that their gods were clearly more powerful than the God of Israel.

            Into that time of confusion and conflict stepped John.  People flocked to see him and hear what he had to say.  They went, not because he had a cool nickname or because they wanted to see a new dietary trend.  They went because they thought that he might be a prophet; he might actually have been sent by God.  He spoke with power and authority.  He railed against the corruption of the religious and political leadership.  He called for the people to repent and turn their hearts back to God.  And he reminded them of the prophets of long ago.  Dressing in camel hair was not an accident.  Elijah, the greatest prophet in the Israelites’ history, dressed in camel hair, lived in the wilderness and was fed by animals.  Everything about John reminded people about the stories of Elijah and inspired hope in the people.  They flooded to John because he was in the right place at the right time wearing the right clothes and bringing the right message to a group who were eager to hear.  The success of John’s ministry was deeply dependent upon the context that he entered into.

            I repeatedly told my care providers that context is critical.  Nothing happens in a vacuum.  Everyone that they met, everyone that they worked with, had a backstory that we were entering into.  When they showed up at their client’s house that morning, the most important thing was to figure out what context they were stepping into.  Did their client sleep the previous night?  Did they eat breakfast?  Are they changing medications?  Had they argued with their parents or house staff that morning?  Was there an event coming up later that day that the individual was excited about or dreading?  Any one of those questions could lead to a rough day if they did not know the right answer.

            Similarly, I knew as a supervisor that each of my employees had a backstory and context that they were bringing with them to work.  Did they have kids that were sick and did not sleep the previous night?  Were they going through marital issues or health issues?  One employee was having a really rough week with her clients.  I called her in and discovered that her doctor had brought her in for tests and one of the options on the table was that she might have to choose between her unborn child and her own life.  That kind of context makes high-quality job performance incredibly challenging.

            When I interact with my son, I have to remember context.  For example:  When he was in kindergarten, we enjoyed watching The Muppet Show.  One episode had Animal leap at the screen, which startled him.  Animal was then associated with all the muppets and my son would run out of the room when we put on the Muppet Show.  We went to his kindergarten class and found that he kept trying to run away from the room, fingers in his ears.  It turned out that the teacher had a poster of Kermit that she put up in the room which reminded him of muppets, which reminded him of Animal, which reminded him of that episode, which reminded him of being startled which made him panic and want to run away.

            Context.  Everything and everyone has a context.  It is not always easy to follow the actions to the core of the issue, especially when someone has communication problems, but the reasons are there.

             

A moment to reflect:

What is one of your child’s most perplexing behaviors.  What could be at the root of it?  See if you could come up with a few options and then brainstorm how you could determine if any of them are accurate.