Sermon 11^th January baptism of Christ BCP and Parish

GOSPEL READING: Matthew 3.13-end

Acts 10.34-43

Isaiah 42.1-9

I don’t know about you, but I always find it tricky to go from imagining Jesus as a baby one week and then Jesus at the start of his ministry as an adult the next. But, the Epiphany season that we have just begun, is a time of revelation about Jesus. A time to think about who Jesus is and why he came on earth and reflect what this means to us as Christians. This season invites us all to think a bit deeper about Jesus who calls us to share the good news of the gospels. So, let’s take a look at two of the readings today and think about what they are saying about God and revealing about Jesus.

Our Old Testament reading from Isaiah is part of a longer narrative about the servant. As Christians we believe this servant is Jesus, yet it’s important to be mindful that other faiths don’t see it in that way. However, for today we will focus on the idea of this passage referring to Jesus being the servant. The book of Isaiah was written during a time when the people of Israel had experienced a great defeat for a second time and had been exiled to Babylon. For the next two generations the people lived in a suburb of the Holy City they once called home. They felt beaten and marginalised, surviving any way they could. Many abandoned their faith in God or became cynical of God or confused about what had happened. Yet this passage offers hope to those who felt utterly hopeless. Isaiah talks of God giving the people a servant, a servant who will bring forth a world of justice, but not through acts of violence. The servant will not lift up his voice,….a bruised reed he will not break…a dimly lit wick he will not quench. Isaiah’s vision of the world is created in response to what God has spoken. A world of justice, freedom and peace. This servant whom God has chosen and delights in, will have the Holy Spirit upon them and the evidence of the presence of that spirit is the unrelenting pursuit for justice. Theologically the text suggests that the spirit of God and the pursuit for justice cannot be separated. (pg. 163). So, as Christians this for us is the backdrop from which Jesus comes to earth. The servant with whom God delights, a servant who pursues justice not with the sword but through teaching. Who is given to the people as a covenant, a light to the nations, to open the eyes that are blind.

This brings us to our gospel passage from Matthew and Jesus baptism. We have different versions of the baptism narrative in the gospels, each slightly different from the other. In this version John the Baptist protests the idea of Jesus being baptised. If we think about the reasons behind baptism, we can understand why Jesus doesn’t necessarily have to do it. Baptism is about letting the old self go, the sinful self dying and being born again. As Jesus was both human and divine he is sinless and so has no need for his old self to die. However, baptism is not just about death to an old self or an old way of living, it is also about making a promise to be part of God’s family and with God’s help pursue the coming of God’s Kingdom. When Jesus asks to be baptised by John, he is openly identifying with a new move of God. With the gift of the Spirit, God confirms Jesus’ identity and expands his consciousness by commissioning him to messianic ministry. (Epiphany is all about coming to consciousness pg.176 Connection yr A). Jesus’ baptism is an Epiphany moment, a moment when our eyes are opened to the fact that Jesus has come to be among us and that the Holy Spirit is upon him.

I don’t know if anyone has watched the TV programme sex education. As the title suggests there are scenes of a sexual nature, but the main premise of the programme is about young people figuring out who they are. There is a character called Eric who is Christian and goes to a Baptist church with his family. However, he is gay and knows that his church are not accepting of his sexuality. By the end of the final season he has to make a choice, does he get baptised into a church that does not accept the whole person that he is or does he walk away. Through out the last season God comes to him in the image of a beautiful black woman and tells him that he belongs in the church and the church needs him. So, he stands up he goes to be baptised but just before he enters the water, he tells the congregation that he is a proud gay black man and that if they can’t accept him for who he is then he cant’ be baptised there. Although his mother stands up and says that she accepts him no one else does, so he leaves. He feels as if he has let God down but then she comes to him again and says that he has done exactly as she wanted and that he will be a shining star to others and will help them out of darkness. It’s such a beautiful story line and I wanted to share it because it is one of the reasons why being an inclusive church is so important. Being a place where people can be affirmed as the whole person that God created them to be, means that they can shine as lights in the darkness just as Jesus asks us to. In baptism we are affirmed and confirmed as children of God. Our union with God in Christ expressed in baptism anchors our identity in God’s character and mission, particularly as these are revealed in Jesus Christ. Our mission is to love and accept those who want to come to God and we should not be a stumbling block to their becoming a part of God’s family.

Jesus came among us born into poverty and danger and was revealed to the humblest in society as well as those from a distant land. Through this, God is saying that his Son has come to be a light to all people. At the start of his ministry, he humbled himself through baptism to affirm his covenant to us. In this version of Jesus’ baptism the voice of God is heard saying, ‘This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well please.’ God confirms through God’s own voice that Jesus has the Holy Spirit upon him and that he has come as the servant prophesied in Isaiah.

Through the coming of Jesus, God is revealed in a new way, and our eyes have been opened. Isaiah has shared with us that the coming of the servant is hope out of despair and that we with the help of the servant, will open the eyes of the blind and bring out the prisoners who sit in the dungeons, from the prison those who sit in darkness….See, the former things have come to pass, and new things I now declare. The servant has come to bring light to those who sit in darkness, those who have been rejected and marginalised and so just as Jesus is commissioned, we also are commissioned through baptism to bring light to others.

As we continue through this season of epiphany, let us pray to God to help us understand what former things he wants us to leave behind and that through the coming of Jesus Christ, God has helped us to open our eyes to new things that God is calling us to. Let us ask God to help us pursue Justice by being shining lights in the darkness.

Amen