The Third Sunday of Advent is called "Rose Sunday" represented today by our pink candle and the pink hues in the floral arrangements. The readings this Sunday are meant as a bit of a respite from the deep solemnity that is Advent. This Sunday is also known as "stir up" Sunday, after our Collect today: "Stir up your power O Lord and with great might come among us." Let's see what we can stir up....The name, Rose Sunday, comes from the Isaiah reading we heard today about the desert blossoming at the coming of the Lord: "the desert shall rejoice and blossom...." We have blooming cactuses and crocus and singing and rejoicing in this Isaiah reading: all a hint of the joy to come 9 days from now when we celebrate the birth of God Incarnate, the Christ child. This Isaiah reading is alluding to the coming end of Israel's captivity in Babylon, indicating that instead of the desert being a place of suffering and difficulty it will be a place of refreshment and hope and joy. This Isaiah passage is a prophesy of hope for people in the desert: a promise of an ending and a beginning.

With that understanding, this Isaiah passage is wonderfully paired with our Gospel selection from Matthew for we have an ending and a beginning here too. In this passage, John the Baptist is languishing in prison, where he hears about the great deeds Christ is doing. John sends his followers to ask Jesus: "Are you the one?" John is in his own desert here, sitting in jail knowing he is about to die. This is really quite a heartbreaking scene. John the Baptist's entire life has been one where he has been loudly proclaiming the coming of the Christ: he's issued very harsh warnings instructing people to prepare. And now he sits in jail, probably thinking that he has only a few hours or days to live, and he has to be wondering...I think he wants to know, "did my life make any difference? Or did I waste it all on a mistake?"  

It seems to me that we all can have these moments of doubt as we walk through life. Am I doing the right thing? Will I regret it forever if I take this route in life? Am I closing a door that can never be opened again? These are all questions many of us ask at some point along the way. We do this questioning because we only have one life here; it's not a very long one either. None of us get today back, no matter how long we live.

John the Baptist is sitting in his dark cell today, questioning what he has done with his life in the wilderness, where he demanded that we prepare the way of the Lord. And Jesus replies to John's inquiry by quoting the Isaiah passage we heard today. In Isaiah we hear that the desert will bloom at the coming of God, and "Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened, the ears of the deaf unstopped; then the lame shall leap like a deer and the tongue of the speechless sing for joy." What Jesus says to John's followers is "Go and tell John what you hear and see: the blind receive their sight, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised and the poor have good news brought to them." Jesus knows why John has sent his followers, and Jesus has compassion on John's self-doubt, telling him by word and deed that John's life was a worthy one.