Baptism of our Lord Isaiah 43:1-7 & Luke 3:15-17, 21, 22 January 10, 2010

        Baptism of our Lord2010               Isaiah 43:1-7 & Luke 3:15-17, 21, 22             January 10, 2010

We have now entered fully – with the Magi – into the Season of Epiphany – a wonderful season for Blessings of the Home.  As the Magi came to the home of Mary, Joseph and Jesus, this season lends itself well to house blessings.  A number of people gathered recently at a home for a blessing and everyone wanted copies of the one blessing the Occasional Services book didn’t have.  Can’t imagine why the book doesn’t offer a blessing for the bathroom! No more important room than that!  So I adapted one used years ago at Holden Village:
           
Dear God, thank you for modern plumbing.  Let flowing and stopping be kept in correct balance.  May the plumber not be needed, but when the inevitable happens, may he/she come quickly and be efficient. Amen

That really does relate to the liturgical day of Baptism of our Lord.  Baptism is sometimes called “the bath.”  We are bathed in the waters of grace. Today is really about Jesus’ baptism and his doing what might be considered an embarrassing thing in the eyes of the world.  Jesus was not like us in complicating his life with sin and sadness, but he didn’t reject being fully human and fully a part of our humanity. He came to be with us in our imperfect, struggling humanness – and his baptism attests to that.  He took his place in line with all the rest to be baptized by his cousin, John, in the Jordan River.  And he did so for a reason. 

Jesus, son of God, came to show us what it means to be children of God.  We, like Jesus, are called to a spiritual path. God has an intention for our lives – which is precisely that we would become our true selves – the unique people God created us to be. It takes courage to be on a journey of discovering what it means to be our true selves.  To be on a spiritual path is to be open to discovering how it is that God created us to reflect God’s glory – even if it flies in the face of logic and tradition, security and success. 

Success in God’s eyes may be very different than success in the eyes of the world.  That truly was the case with Jesus and his baptism.  Who in their right mind would sign up to be on the struggling team when you had an “in” with the coach of the favored team? Jesus’ baptism doesn’t make sense. He was the son of God.  Why wait in line to be baptized in the murky waters of the Jordan?   

The ordeal in the Jordan – getting all wet and muddy – was making clear to Jesus and to us what is needed if we are going to fulfill our callings.  Our callings are the reasons we’ve been born – which Isaiah 43 says, is for God’s glory and not our own.  Jesus’ baptism tells us the most important thing there is to know about that.  The point is that being a baptized Christian – a follower of Christ – isn’t about being perfect. We know Jesus was without sin, but he didn’t come to model perfection.  Thankfully, that’s not being asked of us.  We don’t have to try to be that. That’s not following Jesus.  Jesus let go of his perfection and got muddy with the best of us. 

It’s not Jesus’ being without sin that helps him fulfill his God-given mission. What Jesus’ baptism shows is that his power isn’t his own.  His power is his acceptance of God’s favor and Spirit’s blessing of belovedness.  What matters in Jesus’ fulfilling of his calling is his openness to the Spirit’s empowerment for ministry.

Jesus earthly ministry begins immediately following his baptism and the Spirit’s descent upon him.  It was the Spirit who empowered him and the same Spirit comes to empower us for ministry – even as we stand knee deep in the muddied rivers of our lives.   

Since Advent, we have been dwelling in the Year of Luke. Dr. Alexander Shaia’s upcoming book from Harper One to be published February 2nd, The Hidden Power of the Gospels, tells us that Luke’s Gospel is about our obligation to learn to act on the truth of who we are. Shaia asserts that following Jesus in Luke is about “learning to act and speak from our individual truth with as much of our integrated self as we can muster, and not shrinking from speaking and acting because we are afraid.” Luke calls us to act from our “capacity for living compassionate lives.”   

Jesus chose compassion over perfection. He got his feet dirty and he got beaten up for having done so, but that is the path the Spirit called him to and the Spirit took care of him through all the storms of his life.  Now being nailed to a cross may not look like being very well taken care of, but the promise is larger than this life.  Jesus was cared for into all eternity and so will we be.

Being baptized a Christian isn’t necessarily a safe thing this side of heaven.  If we follow Jesus in actively living our faith – as Luke calls us to do – we may get our feet into murky waters.  It happened to Jesus.  It can happen to us.  Marty E. Marty has written a book on baptism in which he calls baptism a dangerous thing. 

I’ve been working with an adult who was never baptized as a child and wished she had been.  She says it would have been easier to have been baptized as a baby and have it over with.  Now she is having to make a decision about it.  She wishes someone would have made that decision for her, but then she also knows it wouldn’t have mattered much because her parents were not believers and wouldn’t have helped her grow to embrace her faith and learn what a gift it is.  So she is struggling to trust that it is OK to come to baptism without all the answers, as a child comes, even though she is an adult. 

I asked her to read a section from Martin Marty’s book, and she did.  And she liked it, all except where he talks about baptism being a dangerous thing.  She struggles with thinking of it as dangerous, but is going ahead with it anyway because she also senses that along with it being dangerous, it is a gloriously happy thing.  She will be publically named beloved of God and marked for God’s purposes.   

Martin Marty may be right that baptism is dangerous.  But it is also the most freeing gift we will ever receive.  Today’s Isaiah 43 reading celebrates the promise:

Do not fear, for I have redeemed you; I have called you by name, you are mine.  When you pass through waters, I will be with you; and through rivers, they shall not overwhelm you; when you walk through fire you shall not be burned, and the flame shall not consume you, for I am your Savior. You are precious in my sight, honored, and I love you. Do not fear, for I am with you; everyone who is called by my name, whom I created for my glory, whom I formed and made.
Now if that isn’t worth memorizing I don’t know what is. And did you hear the world’s most important three little words in there?  “I Love You!” Right there in Isaiah 43! “You are precious in my sight, and honored, and I love you.”  If you ever need to hear those three little words – here they are! These are words to live by; words that free and empower us to be our true selves.  

The witness of Jesus is that was impossible for him to fulfill his vocation without the power of the Holy Spirit. And if it was impossible for Jesus, it will surely be impossible for us.  But the Spirit descends daily upon us naming us beloved and empowering us to be the men and women God created us to be.

Don’t be afraid of being your truest self. You are not called to be perfect. You are called to be you – and to trust the Holy Spirit to descend upon your real and human life.  “You are precious in my sight and honored and I love you,” says the Lord your God.  No floods or flames will ultimately consume those who are so loved and who have been created for God’s glory.  May this New Year find us helping each other trust that these powerful three little words are words for us!  “I love you,” says the Lord our God.

                                                                                                                        Amen

Baptized and Set Free!  ELW 453

   +Pastor Peg Schultz-Akerson, to the glory of God
Faith Lutheran Church, Chico, CA