Luke 3:15-17, 21-22
Isaiah 43:1-7
Psalm 29
Acts 8:14-17
My commentary for this first sunday after Epiphany focuses on the Gospel text and the reading from the book of Isaiah.
Luke 3:15-17, 21-22
As the people
were filled with expectation, and all were questioning in their hearts
concerning John, whether he might be the Messiah, John answered all of them by
saying, ‘I baptize you with water; but one who is more powerful than I is
coming; I am not worthy to untie the thong of his sandals. 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 granary; but the chaff he will
burn with unquenchable fire.’
Now when all the
people were baptized, and when Jesus also had been baptized and was praying,
the heaven was opened, and the Holy Spirit descended upon him in bodily form
like a dove. And a voice came from heaven, ‘You are my Son, the Beloved; with
you I am well pleased.’
The
baptism of Jesus has always been one of my favorite Gospel texts. It appears
nearly verbatim in all four Gospels, with the words of God, “You are my Son,
the Beloved; with you I am well pleased.” It’s also one of the very few Gospel
texts that mention the Holy Spirit. But I think I love it most because it’s
evidence of an active God who descends from an opened-up heaven into this
world.
My
work leads me into places where I NEED to know that God is not far away. In
bloody trauma rooms and at interminable bedside vigils and in chilly morgues, I
need to know that God has already shown up and has gone before me. I need to
hear that God continues to break open the clouds and descend upon this broken
world with the grace of a dove. Baptism is not a baby blessing or a welcoming
party to the Christian community, it’s a defiant declaration that death does
not have the final word and that God walks among us and lives in us.
We
are all beloved, no matter how wretched our lives may be, and with us, God is
well pleased.
Isaiah 43:1-7
But now thus says the
Lord, he who created you, O Jacob, he who formed you,
O Israel:
Do not fear, for I have redeemed you; I have called you by 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 give Egypt as your
ransom, Ethiopia and Seba in exchange for you.
Because you are precious in
my sight, and honored, and I love you,
I give people in return for
you,
nations in exchange for your life.
Do not fear, for I am with you;
I will
bring your offspring from the east,
and from the west I will gather you;
I will say to the north, ‘Give them up’,
and to the south, ‘Do not
withhold;
bring my sons from far away and my daughters from the end of the
earth— everyone who is called by my name,
whom I created for my glory, whom
I formed and made.’
Do not fear…for I have
redeemed you. I have called you by name;
you are mine.
One
of the most powerful tasks of my role as chaplain is to bless and commend the
dying to the care of God. To name the beloved and entrust them to the care of
God. It is a bookend of sorts to baptism, where we name God’s child and entrust
their keeping to the Body of Christ on earth. To proclaim, “Well done, good and
faithful servant. Go in peace.”
Yesterday,
I knelt next to a woman who was in her last hours. Her awareness was flickering
and her eyes only opened when I spoke her name aloud and said, “As you complete
your baptismal journey, rest deeply in the arms of God who calls you by name.” A
small smile passed over her face and she drifted back into her liminal sleep.
In
baptism, we are named and claimed, and in our death, we are also named and
claimed by the one who created us. Saying, “Do not fear” is easier said than
done. With death comes fear of pain, fear of the unknown, fear of how we will
cope without our mother or spouse or child. But in this naming and claiming, we
hear a more powerful message, “You are mine.”
This is not a guarantee that we will never experience suffering, but
rather, that we are not alone in that suffering.
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