Sunday, January 13, 2013

Epiphany 1 - The Baptism of Our Lord


The Ven. Richard I. Cluett

Both the Isaiah passage and the story of Jesus’ baptism bring us Good News. And the good news is this: that a relationship with God, the blessing of God, the love of God, the mercy of God, the presence of God are ours from our very beginning, through whatever life brought us yesterday or is bringing us today, all the way into forever.

It is through Jesus that we claim our inheritance as a child of God. It is through Jesus that we too are named as God’s very own, as God’s beloved, and it is through Jesus that the promises of God to Israel told by Isaiah become God’s promises to us. And it is in the waters of baptism that we affirm our identity and we are named as God’s very own child, God’s very own girl, God’s very own boy, God’s very own man, God’s very own woman. And we are given God’s community as our own.

Maya Lin, designer of the Vietnam Memorial, explained why she thought the memorial seemed to have such a strong grip on the emotions of the American people. “It's the names,” she said, “the names are the memorial. No edifice or structure can bring people to mind as powerfully as their names.”

What is your name? Say it to yourself. God says through Isaiah, “I have called you by your name, you are mine.” It is a guarantee of so much. It reminds Israel of their creation and their creator, of being created and formed by God. It banishes fear and announces redemption. It offers God's protecting hand in fire and flood. God woos Israel with a declaration of love and confesses that Israel is “precious in my eyes, and honored, and I love you.”

What is new in the Baptism of Jesus is that this gift, this knowledge, this identity, this call are for all people – for everyone, without restriction, without merit, without limit, without requirement. Not even the requirement of John the Baptist that we repent.
In our tradition, we usually receive the baptism of Jesus as a child, before there is any need of repentance. We are the beloved of God before, during, and after repentance. The baptism of Jesus was God's Revelation of that Good News, and our baptism is the sign that Good News is for us, too.

As we all know, there is ample opportunity in one’s lifetime (at least there has been in mine) – ample opportunity to repent, and repent, and repent, and repent as we live out our lives and live in this relationship with God and with other people. The Good News is that no matter what, no matter whom, we can be baptized in the name of God: Father, Son, ad Holy Spirit, and know that we are the beloved of God.

It is in the waters of baptism that we receive our identity as we are named as God’s very own. And it is in the wild, raging waters of Life that our identity is tested and that God’s promises are tested as well.

I want to ask you this morning, “Where do you find the ability to hang in there in this world? Where do you find the ability to keep going when the going really gets tough? Where do you find the ability to continue to believe in love in a world that is filled with hate? Where do you find the ability to continue in a world that is addicted to violence? Where do you find the ability to continue in a world that is filled with so much suffering and pain? Where do you find the ability to continue to believe that ultimately God's kingdom will prevail and God's will, as revealed in Jesus, will be done in all of creation? Where do you find the ability to be a disciple of Jesus in this life?

It is possible to live this life missing the obvious; miss­ing the vision of God; missing the presence of God; missing the radiance of God's glory; missing the empower­ing, comforting Word of God's love.

What we can lose sight of is the powerful, available presence of God in Jesus, in us, and in this life. We are so in touch with the limitations of our selves, the reali­ties of life. We know, so well, the difficulties and the hills that we must climb that it is easy to miss what God is doing; to miss the truth that it is in all circumstances of life where Jesus is to be found.

As one writer put it, “Whether it is our own failures or illnesses, our economic uncertainty, academic struggles, family tensions or life’s precious moments of joy, God is with us… through it all.”

It is precisely into the confusing, anxious, chaotic, haunt­ed, sometimes amusing, comfortable, and occasionally boring lives such as the life that is yours and mine that God comes. God comes – power­fully, presently, per­sistently to change our lives, to give us our identity, to prescribe where home is, to express love, and to give us our calling, our vocation, our ministry, and our community. We are God’s People.

Some of what we symbolize in the sacrament of baptism is that Home is the Kingdom of the God whose love is limitless, whose power for life is eternally available and whose work we are to be about.  Theologian Hans Kung has said that "Christians live in the already and the not yet," but we who are called have to de­cide to move into the not yet, decide that God’s promise is true.

What we read of Jesus' baptism, what we observe in the bap­tism of an infant, what we dream of in the long night hours is true. God is in this life. His spirit is upon us. His love is consis­tent. His power is ours. And he has shown us His purpose and our purpose.

As Jesus was called to move out of Nazareth and to go deep into the waters, so we are called to move deep into God’s kingdom and God’s promise of Life.

What is your name?

Thus says the Lord…
Do not fear, for I have redeemed you;
I have called you by your name, you are mine.
When you pass through the waters, I will be with you;
and through the 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 the Lord your God,
the Holy One of Israel, your Savior.
I have called you by your name. You are mine.

Thus says the Lord.

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