The Baptism of Christ

One evening a New Testament professor visited a high school youth group. After the professor finished speaking about the significance of Christ's baptism as a revelation of God's presence in Jesus, one of the boys said without looking up, "That isn't what it means."

Glad that the student had at least been listening enough to disagree, the professor asked what the boy thought it meant, and the boy replied, "The story (Mark 1:4-11) says that the heavens were opened and the Spirit of God came down" The boy paused and finally looked up and leaned forward, saying, "That means that God is on the loose in the world. And it is dangerous !"

I suspect that when most of us think about baptism we don’t really think too much about danger, certainly in this country and yet for many, even today, it is dangerous to be baptized – with the threat of persecution, and for Jesus too his baptism symbolized the start of a dangerous ministry. 

After his baptism, Jesus went into the wilderness, and it was dangerous. Jesus taught in the temples, and it was dangerous. Jesus healed on the Sabbath, and it was dangerous. Jesus confronted the authorities and turned over the tables, and it was dangerous.

And the danger of God being loose in the world today is that he still wants to challenge injustice, he wants to fight for the homeless, the neglected, the poor, he wants to bring an end to conflict, he wants people to understand and know true peace, he wants to challenge an often selfish, greedy, demanding, uncaring world with a message of love and compassion without limits !

And offering us the help of the Holy Spirit, he has commissioned us to be involved in his work… For centuries Christians have been at the forefront of some of the great life changing movements, ending slavery, ending apartheid, ending child labour, providing money and gifts to people in need, looking after those who can’t look after themselves properly and so on.

Today Christians still take part in lots of things which make a difference, which help to make the world a better place, and that is the responsibility of our baptism – wearing the badge of Jesus, as a member of his family, we are to represent him in all that we do.

It begins with our decision to seek the help of the Holy Spirit, not just to guide us through the tough times in our lives, but to make a difference for others as we share a radical and a dangerous message of love…

In life there really are 3 kinds of choices that we can make with regard to our response to God… 

The first is to ignore him. Whether we’re baptised or not, we can choose to live as if God doesn’t !

Secondly we can choose to live as part of the family of God, but as a fairly passive member of that family – sitting at the table but never really joining in the party, or thirdly we can live as I’m sure God wants us to live, joining in the party – the celebration of life as a wonderful gift of God, the celebration of the gifts he has to offer us, a celebration of the wonderful relationships he offers with him and with other people, a celebration of the word he offers in the bible, a celebration of the prayers that we offer to God… A celebration of His eternal love… 

Christmas now seems a long time ago – much has happened, normality has been resumed with Neighbours back on television, and decorations have been taken down and packed away for another year. The news has begun to refer to the fact that this is the most depressing time of year – the time when winter gloom really sets in, the euphoria of Christmas has ended and people have to get back to living real life.

Christmas is a wonderful interlude in our lives, but now it is very much time to get on with life, and this is once again the sense of our readings on this day that we commemorate the baptism of Jesus. John the Baptist of course preached a message of repentance, and practised baptism as a way of symbolically cleansing those who accepted his message, but Jesus, without sin, did not need to be baptised at all, but he did so to identify himself with us and also to mark the start of his ministry.

In identifying himself so closely with all of humanity, Jesus was letting us know that he was setting himself up as an example for us to follow of how to live, and in his baptism, as he took on his ministry, he was confirming to us all, that in baptism, whether as a child or an adult, we are being born into a ministry.

With Jesus as our example we are all called into a ministry of service. As children of God, our baptism has commissioned us to continue the work of Jesus today.

The world today is filled with chaos. We live in a time of great financial instability; we live in a time of unrest in many parts of the world, not least of course, in the land of Jesus himself. We have turmoil at times in the Church with all kinds of arguments about different things, usually very petty, but hugely distracting from concentrating on the work of Jesus, and of course many people have chaos in their own lives, for a variety of reasons. 

In the Bible turmoil and chaos is sometimes portrayed in terms of water – we think of the great flood, or Jesus calming the storm out on the waters, and in the psalm today (29) we have a message that God is still in control – his voice we are told, is upon the waters; his voice is mighty in operation, his voice is a glorious voice.

And that is our hope and our belief – that whatever chaos and misery surround us, or whatever turmoil there is in the world, God is there. 

In the Old Testament reading we hear of a formless void being transformed as God said, ‘Let there be light’. God had entered the world in creation and he did so very visibly in the form of Jesus. He came into a world filled with turmoil and chaos, he saw the pain, he felt the needs of real people, and he offered them peace….

Today perhaps that is our greatest opportunity for ministry – to bring hope into a troubled world, and into lives filled with worry and pain. We do that, not by being incredibly clever, not by having the right words to say all of the time, or some training which will miraculously transform us into marvellous pastoral visitors, but by offering ourselves, by listening, by showing we care, and by encouraging people to trust that, whatever pain they face, they are not alone – God is with them, and we are with them…

I have no doubt that the support of God is more than enough for anyone, but that doesn’t mean people don’t need the support of others as well. There’s that wonderful story about the little girl lying in bed one night crying because she was scared in the dark, so she called her mother, who shouted up that she didn’t need to worry because God was with her, and the little girl replied, ‘I know God is with me, but I need someone with skin on as well…’

All of us need to support each other – one of the joys of baptism is being part of a family that must support each other in good times and in bad…

As Jesus came out of the water after his baptism, his life took a new direction. As we think of the baptism of Jesus and his life and example we can look forward to the task ahead, trusting that some day it may be said by that voice from heaven, as it was of Jesus, “You are my beloved son (or daughter !), with you I am well pleased.’

The light of the world is here – Jesus came amongst us and remains with us constantly. With the Holy Spirit we are equipped to go about doing his work… We are equipped to let his light shine brightly… 

There’s a story about a woman who was walking along the street one night and came upon a man parked outside her apartment building walking around under the streetlight and gazing intently at the ground. She asked what he was doing and he replied that he was looking for his car keys which he’d dropped.

She offered to help and started looking as well. After about 15 minutes of intense searching she asked, “Are you sure you dropped them over here?” “No, I dropped them near my car which is over the other side of the road”, he replied. 

“Well, why are we looking over here”? she responded, barely able to hide her sarcasm. “Well, because we’d never find them over there. There’s no light over there!”

There is only one place to find the true light of the world and that is in Jesus – and there is only way to serve him, and that is by offering ourselves to live as he lived – full of compassion, offering hope and peace, forgiveness and encouragement, working for peace and justice, and showing love in everything we do and say. 

The gift of baptism is God’s invitation to join his worldwide family – it is God’s way of saying that he doesn’t care what we have done or failed to do, he still loves us, and the gift of the Holy Spirit takes us on from there, as that is God’s invitation to see how we can live – fully, abundantly, joyfully, peacefully, surrounded and protected by his love.

In the reading from Acts (19:1-7) Paul found disciples who knew nothing of the Holy Spirit – and we too might live like that sometimes, but the Holy Spirit is a gift of God giving himself to us once again – to be our strength, our inspiration, our guide… 

May we each open our lives to the Spirit of God, and allow ourselves in turn to be used to pour out his love and his power to all people. AMEN