Mark 1:4-11

Genesis 1:1-5

As some of you know, this past November I attended my daughter-in-law’s baby shower in Red Hook, New York.  At the shower Maryann received many lovely gifts. I did not observe her open any gifts from her mother Suzanne. The next day, Suzanne showed me a lovely baptismal gown that she had been working on for our shared grand baby.  She told me that she had begun working on the gown when Maryann was a baby.  Her husband didn’t believe in infant baptism, she finally learned, so the gown was abandoned shortly after it was begun.  I could tell when she was showing me that wrapped in this incredible effort of satin and trim, were both hopes and dreams for her daughter and grandchild to come. Suzanne herself is a woman of deep faith…faith she passed on to her daughter and longs to instill in her grandchildren.

One of the most profound baptisms I ever had the honor of participating in was Gary’s. Gary had just gone through a serious and complicated surgery that landed him in Intensive Care with a poor prognosis. I had sat with his extended family through out the ordeal in the waiting room. The family were all active church goers but Gary was not. His family was stunned when the first person he asked for in ICU was me.  When I went back to the room, he asked to be baptized. Of course all the questions a Presbyterian Pastor should ask when one makes such a request flitted through my head at light speed, including an entire thought process about getting permission from the Session as required by the Book of Order and having a ruling Elder present, but instead I whispered yes. So with water held in an emesis pan, and family gathered at the bedside, we baptized Gary.

Many churches have their baptismal fonts by the door, as ours is today, so the people of God can get wet when they enter and remember their baptisms.  The scriptures are filled with stories of water, including the waters of creation that we read in our Genesis text; the waters of the flood of Noah’s day, the parting of the Red Sea, the water that Jesus turned into wine at the wedding in Cana, and of course the story that we read today: Jesus’ baptism by John.

All of our stories about water have power and risk and drama. “Waters haunt all of us who profess the Christian faith” Frank Yamada writes in the Christian Century (12-30-08)  “The human imagination is consumed with images of water.”  We can all close our eyes for a moment and recapture the devastation of the Tsunami that hit Japan following the earthquake in March of this past year.  The power of water was almost beyond our imaginations.

Water is the primary and essential symbol in baptism. Before each of us was born, water protected us in our mother’s womb. Water brings cool refreshment. It sustains life on our planet. Without water we would die. Water also has the power to kill us. Water can drown us. That is why water speaks so forcefully in baptism.

In the early history of the church, when baptisms were done by immersion, the power and centrality of water in baptism was obvious.  Early Christian brothers and sisters had to prepare for three years for their baptisms. Then they fasted the forty days of Lent and submitted themselves to prayers and exorcisms. During the Easter vigil the candidates for baptism would enter into the baptismal font (which was a large pool) after having removed their old garments, and be immersed in the water. After, they would be anointed with oil and receive new white garments signifying their new life in Christ. Then they would enter the sanctuary for the first time and receive communion with the believers.

Augustine, a theologian of the fifth century, believed that too much emphasis was placed on the individual’s ability to be good enough, and prepared enough for God, making the sacrament of baptism dependent on individual works.  Augustine felt that people should not delay their baptisms.

Baptism is the sacrament in which we formally receive, experience and act upon God’s everlasting love for us.  Baptism is clearly a gift of God’s love, and of God’s initiative on our behalf.  Nothing, not years of Bible Study, nor hours of prayer, nor our promises to be faithful to God, can be done to earn God’s love.  Nothing. What better could we do to show our inability to be good enough for God, then to baptize a baby?  God has chosen us long before we are able to make a response. We do not earn God’s love and forgiveness. God’s grace is a gift.  Just as we as parents do not wait for our babies to “understand” before we love and cuddle them, neither does our heavenly parent wait for us.

In baptism we are baptized into the family of faith. This is the sacramental ceremony wherein we become part of the church. In a way it is a lot like a wedding ceremony wherein friends and family come together to be a part of a covenant that is being made.  We the members and friends of the United Churches as a family of faith enter into a covenant with those being baptized. We promise before God to be their companions on the journey of faith.  We promise to show them what we know of God.  That is why this is a public ceremony, because we are partners in this covenant..

Finally, our baptism is a symbol of death and new birth. In the same way that the candidates in ages past removed their old garments and put on new ones, those being baptized today are putting off their old lives and putting on new lives.

John Westerhoff who is a writer and a Christian Educator tells of a baptism that he observed in South America.  On the day of the baptism, the family of the infant entered the church in solemn procession.  First came the child’s father who carried a small coffin that he had made himself.  He was followed by all of the other children in the family, with their mother bringing up the rear, carrying the family’s new baby.  When the father reached the chancel of the church at the front of the sanctuary, he placed the small coffin on the alter. The family and the community gathered around while the mother placed the tiny infant in the coffin. There was silence in the church. All at once, the priest lifted up a large pitcher of water and poured the water in the coffin pronouncing the child dead.  No one said a word. Suddenly the priest reached into the coffin and lifted the baby out of the coffin, holding her above his head.  Then the priest proclaimed the child alive and resurrected in the name of Jesus Christ.

Perhaps this custom would be too dramatic for all of us, but it is a clear reminder that baptism is a symbol of dying and rising with Jesus Christ. We are partakers in Christ’s death and therefore have died to the sin in our lives. We participate in Christ’s resurrection though our baptism and put on new lives.

Jesus, the Christ, as the gospel of Mark tells us, was baptized.  Remember he was baptized by John at the Jordan.  Remember that John’s baptism was a baptism of repentance. Did Jesus need to repent?  Why was he baptized?  Mark’s gospel makes the distinction that Jesus was baptized INTO the Jordan.  The word in Greek, eis, indicated that Jesus did something different than those around him. The Jews of Judea and Jerusalem were “letting themselves” be baptized in the Jordan while confessing their sins.  There were apparently standing in the water, holding some control over their own lives.  Jesus, without any confession of sin, abandoned himself to the full depth of his baptism.  Surrendering himself to John’s baptism, Jesus alone expressed the repentance that God’s forerunner was demanding.  Just like our infant in South America, Jesus’ immersion in the Jordan was symbolic of drowning and death.  In effect with Jesus baptism, old ways of doing things died. Jesus baptism ended his participation in the current structures and values of his society.  In his rising out of the water, Jesus saw the heavens were torn apart and the Holy Spirit descending upon him in the form of a dove. Perhaps this symbol reminds us of the dove that came bearing a freshly picked olive sprig to Noah, conveying to him and his family that the flood waters had subsided, and that the world had a new beginning.

Jesus rises up out of the water, claimed as God’s son, invested with Divine power to change the world.

As we are baptized, we are claimed by Christ to do great things in this world. We are empowered, we are set free to dream, to vision, to work as Christ’s hands and feet in this world to touch and change lives. We too, are given the divine presence to make a powerful difference in this world.  John 14:12 reminds us in these words of Jesus:…the one who believes in me will also do the works I do, in fact will do greater works than these.

Marking our birth as Christians, baptism is the sign of the grace of God, of the covenant that God established with us, of our participation in the death and resurrection of Christ, our cleansing from sin, of the presence and the power of the Holy Spirit to empower us to change the world.  You can make good on your baptismal promises because you have been claimed by God through Christ and have been empowered by the Holy Spirit! I urge you every day when you get wet, even just washing your face, to remember who you are, marked by God’s infinite love and grace, beloved, and empowered to change the world.

Amen.