Beloved of God, Sharing a Baptism with Christ

Matthew 3:13-17 Baptism of Jesus

It’s hard to believe it is a new year already. I, for one, am still having trouble writing “2017” on documents and correspondence. I’ve heard the lament from more than one of my friends, from many of you, and reflected in words coming from my own lips – “time really flies” – it goes by so fast. Over and over, there is that repeated refrain - “how can it be….?” – and then we fill in the blank – “how can it be … December,” or … “June,” …“a new year,” …“another birthday,” …“his high school graduation,” …“my baby’s wedding day,”  or, if we are lucky, … “our anniversary – 50 years”! Can anyone here relate?

We feel the astonishing passage of time here in church, too. Just last week, our gospel relayed the story of the naming of Jesus. The gospel gave us the story of the day when Mary and Joseph brought an eight-day-old Jesus to the temple for this naming.

So it is, that with a hiccup of surprise we realize that in our gospel text today, Jesus is now a grown man – some 30 years of his life have flown by. That’s thirty years that we don’t know much about – Jesus has grown up in the blink of an eye, or the turn of a page, leaving all those growing up years and the stories that go with them, a mystery to us.

But that doesn’t much matter, because the important stuff, the stuff that tells us about God, and how God is acting in and for the world through Jesus, is revealed through the public ministry of Jesus, and the scriptures are full of those stories – stories that we will encounter as we make our way through the gospels.

It is that public ministry for which Christ is anointed through this baptism we observe today. Right after his baptism, Jesus would go into the wilderness to prepare himself for that ministry. Even Jesus had to prepare.

Back in this baptismal scene, we read about the voice of God which Jesus hears as he emerges from the water – “This is my Son, the Beloved, with whom I am well pleased.”  As Jesus receives the Holy Spirit “descending like a dove” and alighting on him, Jesus is both revealed and acclaimed as the Son of God.

Reflecting on this passage, we might ask ourselves, did Jesus really need to be baptized? As the Son of God, as the blameless, sinless one, did Jesus really need this washing?

The thing is, as Jesus was baptized at the Jordan River, as God claimed him as his Son and filled him with the Holy Spirit, God provided for us what may be the closest connection between Jesus’ life and ministry and our own, making this a very special day for us, as well. Once again, God enacts mercy and grace for us through Jesus.

For, as Jesus invited John to take part in his baptism, Jesus invites him – and us – into the work on which he himself will embark, proclaiming and embodying the goodness and justice of God.

It is in baptism that we too, are claimed as daughters and sons of God. It is in baptism that we are blessed by the Holy Spirit, and filled with the gifts we need for ministry. It is in baptism that God tells us that we are beloved, and that our inheritance is secured; we are given new life and thereby we each become a new creation of God.

How does it feel to know that this thing that we have experienced in our baptism was once experienced by Jesus himself? For myself, I am simply struck with awe of this reality.

One of the most powerful experiences of our Christian lives is remembering our own baptisms. To hear once again the claim that we are beloved of God, as Jesus was; to remember that we are anointed with the Holy Spirit, as Jesus was; To absorb the reality that we are known and empowered by God, forever, is an experience like no other, and it is an experience that we share with Jesus Christ, himself. To be reminded that this baptism commissions each one of us into ministry in the name of Jesus is a holy experience.

And so, I hope that you got good and soaked as I came down the aisle with water this morning and “sprinkled” you in remembrance of that day when you were washed in the living waters of baptism. I hope that as you felt drops of water from the font fall on you, you felt solidarity with Christ himself in the remembrance of this means of grace we share.

Today we reflect on the sacrament of Baptism, through which each of us has received grace upon grace for the living of our lives and for carrying on the holy work that God entrusts to each one of us.

Although we are reminded of our baptism when we gather together each week, as we gather around the table and nurtured for our work as disciples of Christ, our Holy Baptism is best remembered and most explicitly appreciated when, as a community, we celebrate the baptism of a new sister or brother.

On such occasions, we powerfully recall that in baptism God made each of us a participant in the ministry of Jesus for the sake of the world. The importance and the reality of our baptism should never be far from our minds. For, as Jesus shares life, death and resurrection with us, Jesus shares the work and call of ministry with each of us as well.

Christians often describe baptism as an outward and visible sign of an inward and invisible grace that God works on our behalf. It is God’s action that is of import here, not our own. It is God who makes us holy, not we ourselves who accomplish this by anything we do. It is for God’s sake, that we are sent to reflect God’s love as we are empowered, through the sacraments, for the work of God’s mission to love, heal, bear compassion for the poor, the marginalized, the unloved, the unaccepted, the disregarded ones who are part of God’s creation.

It is for this reason that there is but one baptism for the forgiveness of sins and the commissioning of our call as children of God and workers together for the kingdom of God. Yet Baptism is not a “one and done” kind of thing. In fact, it is the opposite of an isolated act carried out once in our lives for our own benefit.

As Martin Luther said, each day, in baptism, we die to sin and are renewed in the new life given to us by God.

In Baptism, we received the everlasting, perpetual declaration of love and pleasure that God takes in us, and the grace God repeatedly extends to us for the sake of the kingdom of God.

In baptism, we recognize that God loves us and is well-pleased with us simply because of who we are – his own beloved children. This realization frees us to live into the baptismal promises with gusto.

We are freed to live out the gospel goodness of God; to feed the hungry, to give water to those who thirst, to work for the life of all people. In the next several weeks, through the scriptures we encounter, we will learn how to share the light of Jesus by living as Jesus teaches, in humility, serving our neighbors and giving comfort to those who are hurting. Soon, we will hear from Jesus’ own mouth, the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus’ recipe for living into the grace of God.

There are challenges in this, for sure. It can be risky, sometimes, to offer hope to those in deep despair, to those who look around and see only desolation in the world and in their lives. Through our baptism and the grace of God revealed to us in Christ we are bold to offer comfort to those who live in fear of terror attacks, and shootings, and disease and hunger, and the uncertain and frightening possibilities of what our future world might look like, living today in a world full of division, apathy and anger as we are.  

We live into our baptismal commission when, as the Body of Christ, we continually seek new ways to engage with our community and our neighbors to ease suffering and isolation, homelessness and fear locally and in places far away from here. Our baptism calls us to share in the goodness and justice of God. That means seeing all people, even those with whom we disagree, even those who look, speak and worship differently than we do, as sisters and brothers created by God and beloved of God as well and therefore equal to us in every way.

We are blessed when we remember our baptism, and reflect on the mercy and forgiveness showered upon us in drops or currents of water on that day and we are blessed by the Holy Spirit to live each day as an opportunity to rejoice in the daily death of sin and birth into new life and a new creation of God.

As a congregation, this year we will seek to intentionally and continually remember our baptism by engaging in prayer and bible study reflecting on the history of our faith, and seeking to discern God’s plan and mission for this Body of Christ in this time and place.

We will remember God’s words, spoken of Jesus, “This is my Son, the Beloved, in whom I am well pleased,” and we will recall that as these words shine a light on Jesus, that light is reflected upon all the baptized and all who remain close to him by following him and his holy word.

Please pray with me.

O Most Holy God, who blessed the world through the birth and revelation of Jesus as your own Son, now bless us as we seek to follow him, reveling in the gift of our baptism, and emboldened by your holy word. Grant us the wisdom and grace to live as your daughters and sons, washed in the waters of life for the sake of Jesus Christ, Our Lord. Amen.

           

Forget Me Not

 Luke 23:33-43 ~ Christ the King 

I read a story recently about a woman named Jill who has the first diagnosed case of hyperthymestic syndrome. This is the continuous, automatic, autobiographical recall of every single day of her life since she was 14 years old. She is now nearly 50. For some reason yet unknown, her brain has been cataloguing each and every day for more than thirty years now, storing information that can be recalled either by date or by event. November 14, 1981, she’ll tell you was a Saturday, her dad's 45th birthday, and that night she was initiated into a group that she was joining at school. July 18, 1984 was a Wednesday: a quiet summer day, when she picked up the book Helter Skelter and read it for the second time.

Ask her about a particular event and she can tell you not only the date on which it occurred, but also the day of the week it happened to be. The end of the FBI siege on the Branch Davidian compound: Monday, April 19, 1993. The final episode of MASH: Monday, February 28, 1983 a rainy day in L.A.; the next day while she was driving her car, the windshield wipers stopped working.

She says her memories are like scenes from home movies, constantly playing in her head, relentlessly flashing forward and backward through the years. The emotion of them isn't dialed down as she recalls them, either; they are exceptionally vivid. It's as though she’s actually living through the events again, she says. I wonder how such remembering in fact shapes Jill’s life and her actions.

Memory and remembering, are both blessing and curse. There are days when I could wish for a memory like Jill’s. Instead I’m stuck with a memory that is contrary. It often fails to recall details I’d like to or need to recall, while at the same time refusing to allow me to shake the memory of some things I long to forget.

For example, I have been known to miss a meeting or an appointment because I misremembered or plumb forgot where I needed to be or when I needed to be there. Earlier this week I drove an hour to a meeting only to arrive to find the building empty. I had forgotten that the meeting had been moved to another venue, in another town altogether. And the busier I am with “life” the more likely I am to let things slip the bounds of my memory.

I find that the older I get the more I struggle to remember things that I used to know like the back of my hand. Yet I vividly remember some things I’d much rather forget. Like mistakes I’ve made, things I’ve done wrong, people I’ve hurt, injury I’ve received from other people, losses I’ve suffered. Some embarrassments stay with me and memories of traumatic events still elicit many of the same emotions as they initially did. Is it the same for you?

Memory can soften over time, which is sometimes a good thing, and yet for those for whom it slowly leaks out and disappears, and for their loved ones, grief of the loss of memory is profound. 

Remembrance is important in all kinds of ways and there is ample evidence that something about remembrance is at the core of faith. Remembering, in fact, is noted throughout the gospel of Luke. At the very beginning of the gospel in both Mary’s song and Zechariah’s, God remembering God’s promise of mercy and of salvation are embraced – not only does God remember God’s promises, but God acts on those promises.  Later, in the parables of Jesus, Abraham tells the rich man who hoarded his riches to remember how he had lived. Following the crucifixion, when the women carried spices to the tomb and found it empty, two men in dazzling clothes stood before them and told them to remember how, when Jesus was with them in Galilee he had foretold not only his death but also told them that he would rise from the dead. The women indeed remembered and they ran to tell the disciples what had happened. Remembrance involves first seeing the picture and then acting out an appropriate response.

In our gospel text for today, we hear these words from one of the criminals, the second one to speak: “Jesus, remember me, when you come into your kingdom.” With those words this man, who confesses that he himself belongs up there hanging to death on a cross for he has done things in his life, has in fact earned his place there, at the same time, confesses that Jesus is Lord. He confesses that the ultimate kingdom is one in which Jesus reigns. Yet Jesus is hanging on a cross just like him, suffering just like him.

The criminal isn’t asking Jesus to remember that he was a bad man, or even to remember him as a person at all. He wants Jesus to remember his confession. He wants Jesus to remember his faith, as late in the day as it may have come. Still, sinner that I am, remember, Jesus, I believed. Jesus, as you come into your kingdom, as you come into your reign, remember me. I doubt very much that the criminal really understood what it was he was asking. But he recognized that Jesus had the power not only to remember him in paradise, but to act on that memory.

Isn’t it what we all want?

We celebrate Christ the King Sunday today, the last Sunday of the “church year” and on the surface we might question why, on a Sunday that is supposed to point to the kingship of Christ, we would read this gospel account. Look around – we celebrate this day as a festival Sunday! Yet in our gospel for this day, no one except this lone criminal seems to get it, no one else seems to understand that Jesus has any power. After all he is hanging on a cross! This gospel doesn’t mention kingship, it is a Good Friday reading – it speaks to death! That certainly doesn’t illustrate “power” in any credible way, does it?

In Luke’s gospel, as Jesus hangs there, what is happening around him? The people stand and watch; the leaders scoff at him; the soldiers mock him; the first criminal derides him. Like Satan once did in the wilderness, they all seem to be saying “save yourself” if you can. Indeed, if any of those witnesses had any inkling that some of what they had heard about Jesus was at all true, they are standing around most likely waiting for the show to begin. Because surely, if Jesus is the Son of God, if Jesus has come to reign, then he is not about to actually suffer the pain and humiliation and scandal of dying like a criminal alongside criminals on this device of torture. Because that is not godly. That is not evidence of power, but just the opposite.

And yet, this king, this Messiah, has done nothing according to any human script, has he? His birth in a stable was about as humble as it can get. He stirred up trouble wherever he went, he ate with tax collectors and sinners, he preached about a God who loves the whole world and not just a few chosen people, he healed the sick and embraced the poor, (on the Sabbath, yet) and proclaimed resurrection of the dead would come through him, to all who would believe.

Christ does indeed reign as king, in an entirely new realm and new world order, initiated through his death on the cross and his rising again. We know that through his death on the cross Jesus indeed had the last word, because that death could not hold him, the grave could not hold him, the stone was rolled back and with it the veil of death was torn in two and new life began.

In this text we observe that as Jesus hung on the cross, in his agony, he did two things: He forgave, and He offered salvation. Jesus looked this man in the eye. He regarded him and accepted him for who he was, he remembered God’s promises to him, and he acted on that memory and gave him a second chance. Jesus assured him his place in Paradise. Because that is how the realm of Jesus works.

In the realm of the kingdom of God, in the power and authority of Christ the King, there is new life, hope and grace. Above all, in the realm of Christ our King, there is the kind of love that never gets tired of giving second chances.

In the kingdom of God there is remembrance for each of us. Jesus himself told us it is true. As Jesus looks us in the eye, and loves us, accepts us, and forgives us, he embodies God’s promise of redemption for each and every one of us, no matter what. The ultimate judgment of the world happens at the Cross, where Jesus, through his suffering and death has earned our salvation. At the cross, Jesus gave each of us new life.

Remembrance is important, and it is formative. As people of faith, and as the Body of Christ, we remember that Christ is King, who bought for us an eternal kingdom through his dying and rising again.

Each time we gather in this place, we remember all that God has done for us and we remember the stories of our faith that never fail to have import for today. As we gather at the table we remember the deliverance of the people of Israel from slavery in Egypt and we remember our own deliverance from sin through the power of the cross. At the Last Supper, Jesus told his disciples that whenever we partake of the precious body and blood of our savior, we do this in remembrance of him. And that remembrance shapes our faith and provokes us to action on behalf of the kingdom of God.  

What might our lives look like if they were always living out the prayer, “Jesus remember me”? What would our lives look like if we began each day acknowledging Christ as reigning over our lives and then praying that prayer? How would each day be shaped if we intentionally remembered Christ’s power and grace, and then acted on it?

Let us pray, Remember us in your kingdom. Amen.