This is a very meaningful day in the life of this community of faith. We hear this text several times a year, but it always calls us to remember that a 30-year-old man walked into the River Jordan, which is not much wider than this sanctuary at some of the river’s widest places. Generally that river is about the width of this aisle here in our sanctuary. It’s an amazing place.

 

I ask you to think back and try to remember and to look into Jesus’ face as his cousin John baptizes him. I’m asking you to try to feel something of the happiness in heaven as the Spirit of the Living God anoints, names, calls Jesus to become the Christ, the Messiah, the Son of the Living God. The “beloved son” or the “Son whom I love” are the words the Scriptures use. The Scriptures state he was sent to be the Lord and Savior of this world – the world that God creates, sustains, judges, and redeems.

 

Hear that voice again today. “You are my beloved, and my favor rests upon you. You bring me so much pleasure.”

 

Now, what I’m going to ask you to do is think back about your baptism and what it was like. Who can I call on at the spur of the moment? Watch all the heads duck down behind someone else.

 

Michael, you’re not ashamed to stand up in front of everyone. Tell us about your baptism. Do you remember your baptism?

 

Michael Straw:

I was about nine years old when I remember coming down a much longer aisle than this one. I came forward to tell my minister I believed in Jesus and wanted to be a member or our church. Of course, immediately I was surrounded by my parents, my grandparent, and even my great-grandparents, all members in that congregation. It was a wonderful feeling.

 

Later, when it was finally time for me to be baptized, I remember a big, beautiful pipe organ across the front of the church with the baptistry right up there in the middle of it all. I remember looking out on all this congregation of some 600 people and thinking about this moment. It was an occasion that touched my life and my family’s lives. It continues to touch mine today.

 

Michael, thank you. That was not planned, by the way. But it was a pretty good commercial. Don’t you think?

 

Gina, I’m going to ask you to stand up and tell us what you remember about your baptism. Where were you baptized?

 

Gina Muzzy:

I was baptized by a small Baptist Church in Gallatin, Missouri. I remember it was Easter when I made my profession of faith. I even remember the dress I was wearing. I was baptized later that summer along with about ten other children and some adults, too. The church’s baptistry was broken, so they baptized us in the pond on my parents’ farm.

 

That wasn’t planned either. Great stories. I appreciate their willingness to be put on the spot like that. 

 

I don’t remember my baptism, quite frankly. I was just six weeks old. My parents took me to an Episcopal Church to be baptized. But I do remember, as I’ve told some of you before, about the opportunity and the privilege of baptizing a woman in a mountain stream. I baptized a friend out in the surf of the ocean, a teenager in a swimming pool, a patient in the hospital who could not leave that room. I remember the baptisms of our children and what wonderful events those were. I remember the baptism of some of you.

 

You, hopefully, have had a chance to take a look at the names listed in the worship bulletin of the people who have been baptized at this communion of faith since it’s beginning. I trust you have seen the names of some folks you might know and love. How wonderful it’s been.

 

What I want you to know today is that all Christians, everywhere, and in every culture, and in every time had some way of baptizing their people. It’s something we do. It’s been going on since the beginning. It is not an option.

 

Some of you may remember the old movie “Tender Mercies.” It was a movie made quite some time ago. In that movie, Sonny and his father, Mack, who was played by Robert Duvall, were baptized in their local church. It’s the only film I’ve ever seen that took Christian baptism seriously and presented it as such. On their way home from church, after the baptism, they had a conversation – just the two of them, father and son.

 

“Well, we done it, Mack. We’ve been baptized. Everybody says I’m going to feel like a changed person. I guess I do feel a little bit different. But, you know what, I don’t feel a whole lot different. Do you?”

 

“Not yet,” said Mack. “Not yet.”

 

“Well, do I look any different? You don’t look any different.”

 

And Mack says in a fatherly tone, “Not yet, Sonny, not yet.”

 

One of the things we become aware of is that throughout our lives, we go through these kinds of experiences. Amazing things take place, and they begin to take place, but we don’t experience the depth of them until the years pass.

 

Anyone here who has entered into a marriage covenant understands this. You don’t always know what you’re getting into. You come before God, and your family, and friends, however, and you make a commitment to each other. You make a commitment to God, and you make a commitment to the larger community. Out of that commitment is a sort of beginning. That’s where you begin to live out the commitments you made as you continue in those commitments throughout the years.

 

Baptism, for us, is exactly that same kind of thing. It is, in fact, a beginning. It’s the beginning point for us of Christian spirituality. It marks a huge transition – a critical shift from those who have been attending church to those who become the Church. There’s a huge difference. 

 

We can all come to church. Everyone’s welcome. Everyone’s invited. You can go to Sunday School class. You can attend worship. You can do all kinds of things, but until you have been baptized, initiated, incorporated into the Body of Christ, you are not yet the Church. It’s a move from being brought up in the church, or just attending the church, to actually becoming part of the community of faith. It’s an amazing thing.

 

Think of some of the things that have been first-time events in our lives. Think of what it’s like to sit on your parents’ laps, or to go to Sunday School and worship and to begin to hear the stories of Scripture about Jesus and about God. Somewhere along the line, we move from being in that environment and in our homes, and we go to school somewhere. We are opened to the world of knowledge. What a big day it is in our lives when we go to school for the first time.

 

Think of the times that you’ve gone to get ready to be a driver – getting your license to drive – and what a huge event that is. 

 

Baptism is right among the key events that take place. It is a time and point in which we freely choose to stand up before God and everybody else and to accept God’s invitation to enter into covenants. It is that wonderful relationship God offers all humanity, that promise that goes all the way back to the beginning in Genesis where God says and God continues to say, “I will be your God, and you will be my people. I am yours, and you are mine. And we, together, will never end our relationship.”

 

We believe that’s a critical thing that happens here in baptism. We enter into that covenant. It is so wonderful to watch young people in our retreat when I tell them, “This is your decision. Some of you may be here under duress. Some of you may be here because your parents, quite frankly, made you come to this event. But what I want you to know is that this is your decision. I will go to your parents with you and stand with you and tell them that you’re not ready to be baptized, if that’s exactly how you feel. This is something you must decide for yourself.”

 

We offer that. We don’t even offer baptism to anyone prior to the fifth grade. This is when we introduce them to the possibility. We try to teach. We try to encourage. We try to lead and inform, but it’s a decision they make. We feel very, very strongly about that.

 

Secondly, baptism is a commitment. It’s a life-long commitment to be follower, a disciple of Jesus. That’s a huge thing for us. This is baptism. This is where the choice, the promise, the covenant is made. Without it, we believe a person cannot move to the next level of their spiritual life.

 

So, we are here to baptize with water, but everyone in the room needs to know we believe that the Spirit of the Living God is here to baptize with that Spirit. We are here as church and family and friends to baptize, to confirm those who, in spite of their pasts or because of it, now awaken to the fact that they are indeed truly, unconditionally loved by God. And because of God’s real and everlasting love, there are people who want to pursue that relationship. They want to return that love. They want, and they are glad, they are joyful to be part of the Christian community. They want to enter a life of Christian service. They want to believe, and they want to behave in appropriate ways.

 

Now, some people ask us, “Why in the world do you do it this particular way? Couldn’t we just have a little private ceremony somewhere, maybe in the afternoon or some evening and just have a couple of people present? Why do we have to get in water? We’re wearing these little, strange, white robes that you can see through when they get wet. You come out of the water and your hair is in your face, and you look like a little drowned rat.”

 

I’m painting a pretty picture here. Aren’t I? But what I want you to know is that we do that very intentionally. Everything we do here today in this service is symbolic. It’s incredibly, incredibly important.

 

We’re not going to just take a little handful of water and sprinkle it on their heads. If that happened to you, that’s OK, but for us, we want to do it a little differently. We don’t take the person and just have them lean forward and dunk them in the water. No. What we do is we take them and put them at least waist-deep in the water, and then we put them on their back. We put them all the way under the water. This is very important, because they’re very vulnerable at that point. 

 

Then, we remember that there’s a hand underneath us that is lifting us up out of the water. That’s a sign and a symbol that there is a hand underneath the people of faith. Regardless of what life hands us, whenever we need to be lifted up, even at the moment of death, that hand is always there. It’s always there! We act that out in this service. It’s a huge commitment. It’s a huge thing.

 

The final thing I want to tell you about is that baptism also is a voice. Our people in this community of faith hear the voice of God at a variety of times, and baptism is one of those times. It’s a time when we begin to hear a voice that says, “I have called you by name. I know you. In fact, I have known you from the very beginning. In fact, I know you in ways that you don’t even know that I know you. You, my dearly beloved one, are mine, and I am yours. I’ve molded you in the depths of the earth, knit you together in your mother’s womb, carved you in the palm of my hand, hidden you in the shadow of my embrace. I look at you – each one of you – with infinite tenderness. I care for you. I love you more than a mother and a father can love a child. I’ve counted every hair upon your head. I’ve guided your every step, and wherever you go, I go with you. Nothing, absolutely nothing in life or death, will ever separate us. Ever!”

 

This is baptism, folks. This is confirmation. This is the life of a Christian in miniature. This is what it really, foundationally, is all about. We’re going to act that out. Now. Today. We’re glad you’re here. Join us in this celebration.

 

 

Whatever you need to do, Lord, do in me. Make today the day that renews me! Let me be washed in your forgiveness, breathe in the holiness of this moment, and embrace the promise of our eternity together. Amen.