Baptism of Our Lord (year C)
January 13, 2013
Luke 3:15-17, 21-22
Grace
to you and peace from God our Father and our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.
As
I was sitting in my office this week, the phone rang – it was an unfamiliar
number. I answered. “Who is this?” asked a voice. I said I was the pastor. He
started off on some spiel that sounded remarkably similar to the guy who had
just called a moment before trying to tell me my computer was in grave danger
unless I did what he said right now, so I sort of rolled my eyes and waited for
a break to say I wasn’t interested. But then he said, “And I’m interested in
baptism.” Well! That caught my attention! He wondered what was involved in
getting baptized at my church, and I told him. I asked why he wasn’t going to be
baptized in the church where he was already connected in the city. “It’s going
to take too long,” he said. “There’s this whole process, and I need this done
fast!”
Well,
that opened another conversation entirely, during the course of which I found
out that he was already baptized, but it was “just a sprinkling” and “they”
said he needed to be fully immersed. (Who “they” are, I’m still not quite
sure!) He was feeling God moving him to act right now, and he didn’t want to
wait. He had to be fully immersed as soon as possible!
So…
what would you have said? As I was listening to him explain his situation, I
was thinking, “Boy, I’m glad I have done so much research and thinking about
this through my years of study, so I have a sense of how to respond to this on
the spot!” But then I thought, “Not everyone has had the benefit of such
focused study on baptism. So what would my congregation, or any average
church-goer sitting in the pews, say if someone presented them with these
questions?”
Since
today is the day we celebrate the Baptism of our Lord, it seemed a perfect
opportunity to have a conversation about what we believe baptism is all about.
What do you say? You game? (All right, good answer!)
Let’s
start by saying there have been volumes upon volumes written about the theology
of baptism, and there’s no way I could include everything in this 10-12 min
sermon. Both the theology and the history of baptism are fascinating: the
imagery of sin being drowned so that we can arise as new creatures in Christ,
the assertion that we are connected to Christ in our baptism because in that
sacrament we also experience a death and resurrection, the evolution of the
rite from Jewish rituals, through the Early Church, and into modern times… But
that’s not what I’d like to talk about this morning. I’d like to talk about a
few ways that an awareness of our baptism can become a deeper part of our
everyday lives.
So
here’s an opening question, that I usually ask parents preparing to have their
child baptized: what happens in baptism? I usually direct parents to the Small
Catechism, which says a lot of what I just told you. But let’s look instead at
our Gospel text for today to answer this question. The most important answer to
that question is not what is happening, but who is making it happen. Look at the
text again in your bulletin. Who baptizes Jesus here? … Not John, as you might
assume. In fact, in the two verses omitted from our reading, Luke tells us that
Herod had thrown John in prison! So who baptizes Jesus? It is the Holy Spirit!
The Holy Spirit descended upon him in bodily form like a dove. The very same
Spirit that baptizes us! And who does the talking? … The Father! A voice came
from heaven, “You are my Son, the beloved. With you I am well pleased.”
God
does the work. Not the pastor. Not the person being baptized. Not the water, though the water is the physical
element the Word is connected to, the means by which we come into physical
contact with that Word. But God does the work. This is the response to why we in the Lutheran church typically
baptize babies. While Christians who are of the Baptist, fundamentalist, or
evangelical persuasion insist upon an adult baptism, in which the one being
baptized has the opportunity to state his or her own faith, we baptize these
helpless, vulnerable beings who have not done much of anything for or against
God. They are mostly passive participants in the reception of God’s grace in
the sacrament.
But isn’t that a wonderful image
for us for how we come before God? Passive as they are in the face of God’s
grace, infants remind us of how we are to receive God’s love: with humble
gratitude, knowing that we don’t do anything to deserve this, but God gives it
to us anyway. God acts on us and in us. God forgives us. God claims us as sons and daughters. And there’s nothing
we can do to earn, or to mess up that relationship that God establishes with us. Nothing!
So that’s the first thing to
remember today about baptism: God is the actor. The second thing we can learn
from our text today about what happens in baptism is from that voice that comes
from heaven. “You are my Son, the Beloved. With you I am well pleased.” In
baptism, see, we are given an identity: we become God’s child, God’s son or
daughter. Identity is not always easy to come by these days. All the things to
which we have traditionally looked to constitute an identity – job, hometown,
family – look different now. People change careers, they move away from home,
they have complex, blended families. But in all the changes that life brings
there is one part of our identity that never changes: we are God’s beloved
children, through good and bad, and we always will be.
So
if ever you are faced with a situation in which someone asks you what you
believe about baptism, these are two things you can always remember: 1) baptism
is God’s work, not ours, and because of that there’s nothing we can do to mess
up that relationship; and, 2) in baptism God claims us as His own, beloved
children, and in all the changes of life, this identity never goes away. There
are many more things to know about baptism, but let’s just focus on these for
today!
Of
course, you don’t need to wait until someone asks you to think about your
baptism. There are lots of ways that we can remember the gifts of God through
baptism every day of our lives.
Tell me something: how many of you
know the date of your baptism? [surprisingly few at both congregations] How many of you were given something at your
baptism – a candle, a cloth, a gown? [many] How many of you still have those? [slightly fewer] How many
of you still use or look at them? [not many at all]
When I was baptized, I was given a
felt banner that had my name, a dove, water, and the date of my baptism on it.
It hung on my door, so I knew the date, and since I was (am!) a glutton for special
days about me, I was happy to celebrate this day with my family! We lit my
candle on my baptism day, August 28th [see picture of lit candle below - I showed the congregation]. Twenty-eight years later, I
was ordained on that same day, August 28th, so it is a very special
day for me! In my office, you can see both my baptism and my ordination certificate framed on my wall. If you don’t already celebrate your baptism day, or your kids’ or grandkids' baptism day, I encourage you to do this, and to remind each other of the
baptismal promises of grace on that day. (What were those promises again?)
But even that special anniversary
only comes once a year. What about the other days? Well, there is one physical
part of baptism that we see every day, indeed that is essential to life. What
is it? Water! Luther suggested that every time we wash our hands, or take a
shower, or go swimming… we remember our baptism. While we Lutherans believe in
baptizing people only once, it was never meant to be a once-and-done event, but
rather, something to be remembered often. So every time you have an encounter
with water, you can say aloud or in your heart, “I am God’s beloved child,
called and sent to make a difference in the world.” Let’s practice… [proceed to splash water from font on people on congregation and say this together each time.]
I don’t expect you get a lot of
calls from strangers asking about baptism – my hunch is that this is something fairly unique to
pastors. But that doesn’t mean you can’t think about it, as often as
possible! Because these promises of God – that God acts, and that we are
claimed as part of God’s family – as well as baptism’s other promises – that we
are forgiven and forever tied to Christ – are certainly worth remembering and
celebrating every day.
Let us pray: Dear life-giving
God, when your Son was baptized, you came to him by way of the Holy Spirit, and
called him your Beloved Son. Help us to remember our own baptism, and all the
promises of grace and love that come with it. In the name of the Father, and
the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen.
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