"Who Is This Messiah and Why Is He Being Baptized?" by The Rev Donald L. Hamer, Rector
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Trinity Episcopal Church
1st Sunday After Epiphany – January 8, 2017
Feast of the Baptism of Our Lord
“Who Is This Messiah and Why Is He Being Baptized?”
Matthew 2:1-12
Now that we are through the Christmas holidays, our Sunday Scripture passages now begin to lead us into what will be our Gospel focus for the rest of this liturgical year, the Good News according to Matthew.”
Matthew’s Gospel is notable in at least two ways. First of all, he is writing to a primarily Jewish audience, and so he roots the story of Jesus deeply in Jewish history and scripture. Time and again we hear in Matthew’s Gospel that what Jesus does or what is done to him is to fulfill something written in the Hebrew scripture. Beginning the Gospel with a rehearsal of Jesus’ genealogy, Matthew paints the picture of a messiah who is the fulfillment of the prophecies of the Hebrew Bible. The Jesus of Matthew’s Gospel also establishes a model of messianic leadership based upon service to, and empowerment of, others.
Today we celebrate the Feast of Jesus Baptism as retold by Matthew. But to fully appreciate this story, we have to go back to the Feast we celebrated this past Friday, the Epiphany, or Three Kings Day as many Christian traditions know it.
Remember that the word “epiphany” means “manifestation” or “making known.” During this season after the Epiphany, our Gospel passages will tell of the many and varied ways in which the true identity of this child and later the man Jesus is revealed to the rest of the world.
In the Gospel for Epiphany, Matthew recounts the story of “Wise Men” or astrologers or in the Greek, “magi” who come from the east, following a mysterious star which has arisen and which they have been following. The celestial star that draws the attention of the wise men signals the divine origin of this child, that this miraculous birth as foretold by the angel to Joseph is indeed sent from God. For Matthew and his Jewish audience, this
is an early indication that the messiah, though foretold by the Hebrew scriptures, is to be the messiah to all the world, and not only to those who are followers of Torah.
In Matthew’s Epiphany story we learn something else about this Messiah Jesus. As the wise men arrive in Jerusalem on their journey, King Herod hears about them and his interest is piqued and so he seeks an audience with them. Ever concerned about challenges to his precarious power and authority, he tries to trick the Wise Men into becoming his agents, asking them to return to him once they have found the child under the pretense that he, too, wants to go pay homage to this child. Once they have paid their own homage to Jesus, they are warned in a dream not to return to Herod, and they go back to their homeland “by another road.” We see in this part of the story that the life of this Messiah, and those who are his followers, will be one marked by challenges from an establishment – be it government or society in general – that feels threatened by one who preaches and practices righteousness and social justice.
Which brings us to this morning’s recounting of Matthew’s version of the Baptism of Jesus. In a few moments we will renew our own baptismal vows, and at (the 10 a.m. service) we will have an actual baptism. As we recommit ourselves to the promises made by us or on our behalf at our own baptisms, we may wonder why it was that Jesus had to be baptized at all. After all, he was God! He had no need to be saved from sin; he had no need to be “adopted” by God. What could be the need for baptism?
In his version of the baptism of Jesus Matthew gives us some insights into these questions. Matthew tells us that John didn’t want to do this – he felt Jesus should be baptizing him. Jesus’ insistence on being baptized by John relates in an interesting way to what is to follow his baptism, when Jesus is led up to the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. His words to John both maintain Jesus’ authority and at the same time echo Matthew’s concern for righteousness and fulfillment of the Hebrew scriptures. And while it was not a part of this morning’s passage, we all know what happens in the wilderness: The devil tries in three different ways to get Jesus to exercise his divine authority to consolidate earthly power. Each time, Jesus refuses.
By submitting to John’s baptism and refusing to submit to the devil’s temptations to consolidate earthly primacy, Jesus sets up a pattern that will define his earthly ministry: He encourages and empowers others – in this case, John – to lead and to be the instruments of God’s work, and declines to appropriate to himself that power. His messianic authority focuses not on drawing power to himself, but on strengthening and empowering, through the Holy Spirit, those who follow him. His is a messiahship of faithful service, not one of control and authority.
And so what does this say about our own baptism? And what does it say about the commitment that will be made by our sister, Anne Rapkin, as today she formally invites Jesus into her heart when she receives the sacrament of Baptism.
Bishop Michael Curry, in his book Crazy Christians, talks a lot about what it means to enter the Christian life:
The dream of God is in part the motive for God’s involvement and God’s mission in the life of the world, from the days of the Bible until now. That dream inspired the Hebrew prophets, who used God’s thunderous, “Thus saith the Lord,” to courageously challenge injustice and mistreatment of the poor. That dream is the reason God came among us in the person of Jesus of Nazareth, who showed us the way to live beyond what often are the nightmares of our own sin-filled human design and into the direction of God’s dream. Over time I began to see that being a Christian is not essentially about joining a church or being a nice person, but about following in the footsteps of Jesus, taking his teachings seriously, letting his Spirit take the lead in our lives, and in so doing helping to change the world from our nightmare into God’s dream.
Bishop Curry identifies a three-fold pattern in the way that Jesus attracts his disciples:
n People come. “Come and see,” he says, “”follow me” (John 1:39; Mark 1:17). Jesus beckons his disciples to him in order to enter into a deepened relationship, through him, with God and with each other in community. That is what baptism is about, a deepened relationship with God and each other in Christ.
n People learn. “They learn not just through his words but also from his actions and even his presence. They learn the good news: ‘Come to me, all you that are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. . . ‘ (Matthew 11:28-30).
n And third, as a result, then they live differently. “They walk in God’s paths. They live God’s ways of love and life. They ‘beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks.’ They do not make war anymore, because they have learned God’s ways.
People come. They learn. They live differently. And in so doing, they are transformed and share in God’s transformation of the world.
And so today, as we remember and celebrate the baptism of our Lord, we reflect on the meaning of that baptism – a baptism into which Jesus himself invites us, a baptism to which most of us were committed without knowing what was happening. And that can be a danger. Like the unknowing residents of Downton Abbey – Do you remember that episode when the residents of Downton Abbey were offering public tours in order to raise money to support the operations? Members of the public were lined up out to the main road to get in, and began asking questions about the history of the place, what certain things symbolized, how old things were, etc? And none of the residents knew anything! We Christians who were kind of born into the faith don’t’ always appreciate what we have. Like the Downton Abbey residents who on a daily basis lived amidst a rich history that they neither knew nor understood, it is all-too-easy for us who inherited the Christian faith to take it for granted. We can tend to accept it as a badge of distinction that we did nothing to merit or deserve, that once bestowed requires nothing more from us. We can tend to forget that with the water and the anointing of baptism comes the responsibility of Baptism, the charge to actively participate in making God’s dream of shalom a reality “on earth as it is in heaven” -- a community of peace and justice where all of God’s creation coexists in peace and harmony. It is bringing about what in the Jewish tradition is called tikku’n ola’m – the repair, the rebuilding and the healing of all creation.
Today we welcome as a sister in Christ Anne Rapkin, who now joins her husband Steve as a member of the Body of Christ, the newest member of The Jesus Movement. In the tradition of St. Matthew, she doesn’t enter into this relationship in the sense of turning her back on her Jewish heritage, which she rightfully continues to cherish. Far from turning her back on that heritage, she understands that by embracing Jesus and his followers, in following in his footsteps, in modeling her life on the life and teachings of Jesus, she is expressing and living out that very heritage in a new and vibrant and exciting way.
As we renew our own baptismal vows this day, let us join Anne in committing to do a new thing, to live out our Christian life with a renewed energy and a renewed vision, dedicating ourselves to making that dream of God, that dream of Shalom, our own, in our own day.
GOD IS GOOD. ALL THE TIME. Amen.