The Baptism of Christ

I'm slightly baffled to have preached this past Sunday--I feel like I keep getting pretty weighty material--but here it is as best as I could manage.

The lectionary can be found here:

http://www.lectionarypage.net/YearC_RCL/Epiphany/CEpi1_RCL.html

“For I am the Lord your God, the Holy one of Israel, your Savior.” These words from Isaiah are a reminder of the Israelites privileged status as God’s own people, a part of a covenant that reaches back countless generations to Abraham and Sara--the patriarch and matriarch of all.

It is worth pausing here for a moment to parse exactly what the difference between a contract and a covenant are. A contract is, of course, entirely secular, bound up in the law of the day while a covenant invokes a mystical aspect; there are oaths with promises of blessing (or cursing) and the entire proceeding is sealed, according to ancient Near Eastern custom, with an animal sacrifice, the implication here being that whomever should break the covenant will come to an equally ignominious end. Should a contract be broken there is specific recourse that can be taken through the courts or some sort of neutral arbiter which will, theoretically, help recoup the loss. But if a covenant is broken the offending party should expect far worse than bankruptcy or jail time--bodily harm and/or death are pretty much guaranteed.

It is this context which should color all our interpretations of God’s relationship to Israel (and Israel’s relationship to God). There had been many covenants between the Israelites and God up to this point--Abraham, Moses, and David can all claim specific promises made for them and their extensive kin--but the most basic component, I AM THE LORD YOUR GOD, is a promise not easily forgotten. The people of Israel are God’s people and that cannot be taken away.

But this is a covenant after all and Israel’s favored position is not without requirement--613 requirements according to the law of Moses. And as a covenant the punishment for its betrayal will be harsh and violent in nature. 

The prophet Isaiah is speaking to a people shaken to its very core by such violence, a nation dispossessed of its homeland and packed off to exile in the distant cities of Babylon. The Babylonian captivity has lost some of its power through the centuries, this first uprooting seems mild in the context of Roman diaspora, the Spanish Inquisition, centuries of pogroms, and the brutal efficiency of the Holocaust, but the shock of this first fall from grace, the final culmination of a slow but inexorable decline, could not have been easy for a people once covered in glory, the royal subjects of David, God’s beloved. It would have been easy to doubt God’s favor at this time, to assume the the Lord had abandoned his people, that the covenant was irreparably damaged but Isaiah, like numerous other prophets proclaiming death and doom, also has a message of hope. Despite the injustices committed, despite the law disregarded, despite the innumerable ways both big and small that the Israelites have scorned and broken God’s covenant they are still and will continue to be God’s people. “You are precious in my sight, and honored, and I love you.”

Israel needed these words at this time, God’s people needed the reassurance of God’s everlasting promise, but when I hear Isaiah today I cannot help but claim them as my own. For all of us have a stake in this gentle reminder of love and redemption, all of us who are “called by [God’] name, who [God] created for [God’s] glory.”

And so we come to today’s gospel passage and with it the recognition of a new covenant with God offered in the person of Jesus Christ. As Christians we believe that Jesus opened up the promises of God’s love to all people, that in Christ we can all see and receive the same redemption God is offering to Israel. We are all God’s people and we are all called to enter into a relationship of divine love. But lest we forget, it is a covenant, and thus is not without requirement an essential feature of that being ritual itself.

Though we have a number of ritual sacraments within in our faith tradition undoubtedly the two most important are baptism and the Eucharist. I do not believe I have the time nor the depth of learning to properly analyze these age-old rite, rituals that have their roots in the very first generation of Christ’s followers, but I think it is worth noting that both sacraments were personally lived and experienced by Jesus. Jesus was baptized too. We find in Jesus an example, certainly, but equally important, we find a reminder of our own sacred humanity. Jesus was baptized too.

One of the most beautiful explanations of the sacraments that I have heard emphasized the every day nature of these holy objects; pageantry and symbolism aside they are still only bread and wine and water. As humans I think we have the tendency to over-complicate matters, an impulse displayed in our most ornate sacred spaces, churches and shrines overflowing with the finest glass, stone, metal and tile work that money can buy, but despite our tendency to glorify God (and ourselves) in the most gaudy ways possible we cannot escape the simplicity of the elements; marble and gold doesn’t make it any holier.  By calling attention to the sacred in these humble items can we begin to see God in everything; what makes these objects special is not exclusive to them, it is in calling attention to their sacred nature that they become something more. The Holy Spirit is not confined to the water of baptism nor is Jesus only present at the Eucharist.

And so in Christ’s baptism, in our Lord’s example, do we see ourselves mirrored. Yes Jesus was sacred as God fully human but in his humanity we must see our own divinity. As one person was made holy we are all made holy. 

It is God’s personal recognition of Christ after the baptism that I find relevant here: “You are my son, the beloved, with you I am well pleased.” Just like Christ, we have all been called by name. We are all beloved. And this covenant invites us to discover our own divinity.