Baptism is the Beginning

Genesis 1:1-5

Mark 1:4-11

Today we begin reading Mark’s gospel and we’ll continue that reading over the next couple of months.  And so I invite you to take up a sustained reading of the gospel in your personal life at whatever pace makes sense for you.  I invite you to live with the text over the next month or so, letting it weave its way into your heart and life.

The image of Jesus’ baptism on the front of the bulletin is a 12^th century mosaic.  I like the way it imagines John’s camel hair clothing and the tangled mess of his hair and beard.  John is the one doing the baptizing but he is clearly less important than Jesus himself, who stands at the center.  And the water of the Jordan River is artistically rendered in such a way that we can see that Jesus is naked.  He may well have been naked.  It was customary in ancient times to be naked for baptism.  Luckily, we are not bound by every ancient custom of the church!

A friend of mine served as pastor of a small country church.  And I was visiting during a service when there were to be baptisms.  One girl receiving baptism was around 14.  She walked down into a baptistery filled with water, wearing a white baptismal robe, as was this church’s custom.  But no one had told her to wear clothing underneath the robe, so when she arose from the waters in her very thin, completely wet, and now totally see-through baptismal robe, let us say, we saw her just as God had made her.

People are baptized in all different kinds of ways: naked, robed, in swim trunks, baptismal dresses, or regular clothes.  People are dunked, poured on or sprinkled.  And this happens in rivers, swimming pools, bathtubs, feeding troughs, at a beach, in a baptistery or at a font designed for pouring.

No matter how or where it happens, or what you happen to be wearing, baptism marks the beginning of something.  Today we read Mark’s account of Jesus’ baptism.  And the good news that Jesus himself joins us in baptism provides us a chance to renew and deepen our own baptisms.

Beginnings are important, and for Mark life begins with baptism.  There is no prologue or introduction, like there is in Matthew, Luke, and John.  Jesus comes on the scene to receive baptism.   Then his public ministry begins with the announcement, “The time has come.  The kingdom of God has come near.  Repent and believe the good news!” 

Mark’s gospel is the earliest written of our gospels.  And it hums along with excitement and energy.  God’s way of loving the world through Jesus has swept into our midst.  Don’t piddle around – get on board, Mark warns us.

John was preaching out in the wilderness beyond the Jordan River.  His harsh and urgent message - calling all people to turn forward to face God’s arriving kingdom - hit a nerve.  All kinds of people were attracted by this rough looking preacher – both the village bumpkins and the sophisticated folks from the city.  Apparently John’s message attracted Jesus as well, who may have been one of John’s disciples.  But John’s popularity got him in trouble with the Roman governor Herod Antipas, who arrested him and had him executed (6:14ff).

John dressed up in an outfit that would call to mind Elijah.  Many believed an Elijah-like character would mark the turning to a new age or a new time in God’s plan for the world.  And Elijah is mentioned several times in the Mark’s gospel.  So dressed as the lightning rod figure of Elijah, John was baptizing in the Jordan River – a river marking the boundary between Israel’s wildnerness wandering and its arrival into the promised land.  What John announced then is true for us now: we’re at a new threshold, a boundary line, a transition point: the time has come for the arrival of God’s new reign of love in the power of the Spirit. 

Notice that Mark spends no extra details on the actual baptism of Jesus.  He simply reports that it happened.  Instead he wants to draw our attention to what happened to Jesus at his baptism. 

Just as Jesus was coming up out of the water, he saw heaven being torn open and the Spirit descending on him like a dove.  And a voice cam from heaven, “You are my Son, whom I love; with you I am well pleased.”  (vs. 10-11)

Mark tells us what Jesus saw and heard.  And we are not told whether the crowds saw or heard anything at all.  This is not suprising, actually.  Because the story Mark tells about God’s beloved Son is a story where very few recognize who he is.  And those who do recognize him do so only gradually, and they often keep forgetting.  It’s as if Mark is warning us as readers that coming to grips with Jesus will not be straightforward or easy.

Today is a good day to consider our own baptisms and our own beginnings.  And the first thing to recognize about our baptisms is that they mark us as people who hear the good news that we are loved.  Baptism is, above all else, an experience of being loved.  It’s that simple.  And yet it takes a lifetime to live into the calling of that love upon our lives.

Jesus too, hears clearly that he is loved by God the Father.  He hears it booming from the torn open heavens here at his baptism.  And he’ll hear it again much later in his ministry on a hilltop with Peter, James, and John at his transfiguration (a story recounted in Mark 9).  So yes – at a few powerful, pivotal, life-changing moments, Jesus hears the voice that he is loved and that this love is his truest calling.  But for most of his life, and most of his ministry, the heavens remained closed.  And there was no voice from God.

Very seldom in life do we see the heavens torn open, when everything is bathed in God’s love.  Very rarely are we are allowed to see in a flash of light ourselves, and everyone else, and all the world, awash in God’s love.  These are these heaven torn open moments.  But these are the exceptions.  For most of Mark’s gospel, the disciples, the crowds, and certainly the religious and political leaders don’t see it and don’t get it.  Your baptism marks the beginning of a life of love.  But you will need to walk that way even when the heavens seem closed and God’s voice has gone silent.

We may want to ask, if Jesus is God’s beloved Son, why does God not protect him from harm?  Why does God lay such a difficult path before him?  Why did God not rescue him from harm in a world full of violence and hate?  And of course these are questions about Jesus but also about us.  “If God loves us so much, why does God leave us exposed to so much pain and heartache and with so much hard work to do?”

For Jesus and for us, baptism isn’t a magical ritual that protects us from the hard way.  Baptism is the beginning of a life that is committed to God’s costly way of loving.

That’s why Jesus warns the crowds, “Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me.  For whoever wants to save their life will lose it.  And whoever loses their life for me and for the gospel will save it.” (8:34-35).

Baptism is the beginning of a life where you know you are loved.  In Presbyterian terms, we are “chosen” or “elected” not for privilege or ease, but for service and ministry in Christ’s name.  Our baptism begins a life of passionate devotion to God’s way of love in the midst of opposition and hardship.

And in our culture there are many forces that make it difficult to live of costly love.  Terrorists and militants killed cartoonists in a Paris office this week.  They have raided schools and killed women and children.  Violent shootings continue to happen in our own schools.  And just this week we lived through a threat that evacuated our own school system.  This is a difficult, scary world.  It is hard not to be pulled into the direction of hating and fearing others. 

But of course all of us experience resistance of all kinds in a more personal way– illness, depression, financial struggle, loneliness, disappointment, and failure.  Often the heavens seem closed.  And we cannot hear the voice of God declaring that we are loved.

And we all get tired of the hard work it takes to love others well.  In that way we are not surprised by Mark’s gospel, that the way of God’s Son in the world is the way of suffering, costly obedience.  Our congregation is involved in a number of compassion and healing efforts.  But none of it is easy.  And rarely do our efforts to love others feel like a rousing success.  Our congregation will share with others the work of a new program in our community called “Circles Out of Poverty.”  Several of us will attend another planning meeting this week.  It is a wonderful program that helps move individuals and families out of poverty.  We know it works.  And we also know it takes enormous effort and energy.  And I am glad to be a part of it.  But part of me wishes there were some quick fix, some easier way to love and help people.  But there isn’t.

During our Session meetings, we light a candle in the middle of the table to remind us that the light of Christ is in our midst.  And on the table beside the candle is a simple bowl of water, there to remind us that we find our ministry, our leadership, and our truest selves most fully in the waters of baptism.

During worship services we fill the baptismal font with water.  And not just on Sundays when there will be a new baptism.  We do it each week - the image of the water pouring into the bowl, the sound of the water splashing into place, a reminder that we gather here as people who have our beginning in our baptisms.

Begin with baptism.  That’s what Mark’s gospel does.  That’s how Jesus begins his ministry.  Baptism is the beginning.  And it starts with repentance, and the confession of our sins, and turning forward into the new light of God’s arriving kingdom of love.

If you’ve never received baptism I encourage you to do so.  It’s simply our way of responding to God’s love for us.  And it marks the beginning of our path into a life of costly but committed love.

For those of already baptized, I encourage you to keep to the way of baptism.  God never tires of inviting us to live more fully into our baptisms.  Don’t begin with baptism and then stop.  It was just a beginning.   Don’t miss the chance to live a radically different kind of life as a follower of Jesus.  And don’t minimize your baptism by allowing yourself to be defined by your age, or your job, or your accomplishments, or your failures.  You don’t get to hear it everyday.  But you’ve heard it again today.  You are God’s beloved child.  God spared nothing to love you in this way.  And you have been called with Jesus into a life of costly love.