Reading: Luke 3:15-17, 21-22
This story marks the beginning of Jesus’s
ministry and the unfolding of his identity as son of God. The story echoes many things – the Spirit of God brooding over the chaotic waters of the world in Genesis
1; Noah’s passage through the Flood; Israel’s journey through the Red Sea
to escape bondage to Egypt; and Israel’s crossing – and recrossing years
later, of the Jordan River into the promised land. Far from being a unique story, it's a foundational story of all true and redeemed
The story also reflects how much John
the Baptist was revered by many in the earliest church. John was a charismatic figure, and to some his
message was more attractive than Jesus’. John preached radical and violent change,
high-principled moralism, the destruction of those who are wrong, judgement, and
redemption through punishment, violence and fear – a message that always
appeals to the human heart, sometimes more than Jesus’ even more radical message
of all the world being made good by grace and by love, and that God loves us,
accepts us, and works through us as we are.
The people were waiting expectantly and were all wondering in their hearts if John might possibly be the Messiah.
John answered them all, “I baptize you with water. But one who is more powerful than I will come, the straps of whose sandals I am not worthy to untie. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire. His winnowing fork is in his hand to clear his threshing floor and to gather the wheat into his barn, but he will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire.” And with many other words John exhorted the people and proclaimed the good news to them.
When all the people were being baptized, Jesus was baptized too. And as he was praying, heaven was opened and the Holy Spirit descended on him in bodily form like a dove. And a voice came from heaven: “You are my Son, whom I love; with you I am well pleased.”
Meditation
What keeps us from wading into the water? What keeps me from walking step by single, faithful step into the heart of the river? What keeps any of us from letting ourselves go under, becoming part of its flow, and letting it wash away our old baggage that holds us back? What keeps us from rising in it new, as renewed children of God – sons and daughters of our Father in heaven?
Even Jesus had to do it. Even with all he knew – surely must have known – about himself and his Father, about himself as son of God, about himself as healer and redeemer of the world he was in. Even Jesus had to leave the shore and step into the water, walk step by faithful step into the current and the flow, let himself go under and become part of it, let it wash away whatever needed to be left behind, and let himself be raised anew as the beloved Son of God filled with God’s Spirit for the good and the well-being of others.
I was baptized when I was twelve into a Baptist church in Winnipeg. For me, it was largely out of fear and to calm my fears that I was baptized. Looking back on it now, and in light of today’s reading from the Gospel, I see that it was very much the kind of baptism offered by John the Baptist.
I was twelve. I was feeling all kinds of strange, unruly things within me. Adolescent anger at my parents. Stirrings of pre-teen rebellion and restlessness. Probably the first flushes of puberty. And I was taught, or I convinced myself – or both, that this was evil. A sign of the devil alive and at work within me. It was wrong, there was something bad about me, and God would surely be – was surely, angry with me.
I was afraid of hell, and of going there. So, on my 12th birthday actually, I went forward at an evangelistic rally at our church, to give my life to Jesus, who would surely save me from God. A few months later, after prayer with the minister and some baptismal classes with 10 or 12 other kids about the same age, I was baptized into the church. Largely – primarily, to save my soul. To save myself.
And that’s sometimes how the religious life – how a spiritual life and a walk with God, or for God, begins.
But beyond that, it also grows. And I grew into other reasons for leaving the shore, for wading in, for walking step by step, and for letting myself go under, and to undergo real change in the flow of God’s life and love in the world. Reasons that had less to do with ego-driven fear, and more to do with love – with self-giving love of God and of others.
There were life-shaping things that I gave myself to, step by faithful step until they became my life – like answering the call and the invitation to ordained ministry. It seemed the right thing to do, but the idea I had at the beginning of what being a minister was, never really panned out. The path into the full flow of the river had so many unexpected twists and turns along the way, but at least it got me started … and here I am, and grateful for it.
And there were other kinds of life-changing things that I gave myself to, that started out as a single step – just putting a toe in the water, but then step by step led to something more, bigger, and better than I ever would have agreed to had I known it all at the start – like meeting someone in need, feeling your heart go out to them, and then instead of letting it be just a one-off conversation and even a prayer for them at the end that makes you feel good, you let it become a real relationship, with ongoing – maybe weekly, conversation, and real help and support that changes both them and you for the better – and all because of love for the other, and love for God as you see God alive and active in the other.
You know how it happens. You say yes to one little plea for help, you respond with a simple action, you notice how it feels inside you, and you decide to learn a little more. That leads to another action. And then more learning – maybe about yourself. That leads to … one step after another, until you find yourself doing and being and becoming something you never would have imagined at the start. And now wouldn’t ever want, not to be and to be doing.
Elizabeth O’Connor has written, “Where I put my energies and my treasure, my reluctant heart sometimes follows. If any of us had to be fully committed when starting out, very little would ever be begun. It would be like having to decide to marry on the first meeting. What we have to do is to take one step at a time and if it seems good, take another.” (Cry Pain, Cry Hope, 1987. p. 68)
I think of how Japhia started at the SAM program, a day-activity program for adults with multiple disabilities. It began as a school placement, a requirement of her Social Service Worker Program. It was the first of two practical placements she needed to complete her diploma credits.
And step by simple step, the required placement turned into a deep love – her love of it, and their love of her – and the three-month stint turned into an application for the job, turned into the staff being sure she got it, turned into her never going to a second required placement for the diploma, and turned into her becoming a gift of God to the clients of the program, and them a gift of God to her.
And in the way she was with them and they with her, immersed alike in openness to one another, I can only imagine them and her feeling the flow of God’s love around and over them, and at some point, maybe every day the Holy Spirit descending upon the SAM rooms where they met, and a voice from heaven in some way saying, “You are my beloved child; in you I am well pleased” – both to her and to whichever of her clients she was with.
We’ve all known and answered calls and invitations to take a step like that a hundred times over, in as many ways as there are days and people living them.
And of course, what we offer anywhere is not perfect. How can it be? What we offer is always filtered through our weaknesses, our sins, our own needs, our emotional and physical and spiritual limitations. We are human – divine breath in human and mortal bodies and lives.
But what counts, and makes us count, is the stepping in. The becoming part of the flow. The giving of ourselves – of our gifts, our assets, our weaknesses, our experience, our sinfulness, our humanity – that gives God something to work with, and work through.
Because what else does God have to make a difference for good in the life of the world?
And what holds us back? What keeps us from stepping in, and letting ourselves become part of the flow?
Ironically – at least in my experience, and if you’re at all like me, it’s usually the very thing that got me baptized in the first place. Fear. Ego-focused fear.
Fear that says, what will people think? Will I lose myself too much? Or too much of myself? What if I don’t know how to do it? Surely, I’m not qualified, or experienced enough. What if I get in over my head? What if I fail, or others see how inadequate I am? Maybe someone else should do this, and I should stay where I am – safe on the shore.
I can’t tell you how much of real life with God and with others – for God and for others, I have missed out on because of concerns like these. Ego-driven and fear-based concerns that keep one’s feet firmly planted on the shore.
The question is, though, shall we let fear shape our lives? Or love? Love of God, and love of others? And love of God that we see and come to be part of, in the lives of others?
Where is God calling you?
Not in terms of some big project or some grand goal you can see from the start. But what little step – what good next step, is God calling you to take?
Into what river of God’s love for others, is God inviting you to enter – just step by single, faithful step?
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