Men of the Morning Prayer Line

John the Baptist didn’t waste words in the desert, and neither will I. He showed up looking like he just rolled out of a long patrol (camel hair, leather belt, living on locusts and whatever honey he could scrounge), yelling one clear mission: “Repent. The kingdom is at hand.”  That’s the same mission we’ve got this Second Sunday of Advent, brothers. Get your soul squared away, because the King is inbound.  I’ve been in formations where the commander walks the line and you can feel the tension rise. John did that to the whole nation. Crowds came out to the Jordan (regular people, soldiers, tax collectors, and then the brass rolled in): Pharisees and Sadducees, the religious elite, the ones who thought rank and heritage bought them a free pass. John didn’t salute. He called them exactly what they were: a brood of vipers slithering up to the water looking for a photo op. “Who warned you the fire’s coming?” he asked. “You can’t coast on Abraham’s coattails. Rocks on the ground ha...