Sunday service for 10 January 2021, Baptism of the Lord Sunday

10 January 2021, Baptism of the Lord Sunday
Service prepared by Rev. Teri Peterson, Gourock St. John’s
email: tpeterson (at) churchofscotland (dot) org (dot) uk

Call to Worship
In a new year, with change on the horizon,
yet still carrying the year past,
we come.
Amidst all the ways we mark time—
     calendar
     clock
     administration
     liturgical colours
     age
God breaks in with a new thing.
Beloved, come and see,
and allow the Spirit to re-orient us to a new way of being.
Let us worship God together.

Hymn #757: Come All You People

Let us pray.
God of Love and Justice, you reveal yourself in ways we do not expect. Just when we thought things had settled down, you come reminding us that we cannot rely only on the past to carry us into the future. We confess that we find your words hard to hear. After all the gift giving and heavy-laden holiday tables, the instruction to give away all we do not need sounds harsh in our ears. We do not like to be vulnerable, so can’t imagine having only just enough. Letting go of our extra stuff and our carefully constructed self-image at the same time feels too much to bear. Forgive us for holding on to things that offer only the illusion of security, even as you reach out to hold us in your hand. Turn our hearts and minds, and then our lives, to your way. We ask in the name of Jesus the Christ, who is the Way, Truth, and Life, and who taught us to pray together:
Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name.
Your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as in heaven.
Give us today our daily bread.
Forgive us our sins, as we forgive those who sin against us.
Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.
For the kingdom, the power, and the glory are yours, now and forever.
Amen.

Reading and Sermon: Kuleana (Luke 3.1-22)

Today’s reading may be a familiar story to some of us, but this is one of those times when our familiarity makes it easy to gloss over some of the details in the way Luke tells the story. But those details are important, because they tell us things about how God is working, who Jesus is, and what the Holy Spirit is doing in and through us as God’s people. So today, rather than reading all 22 verses at once and then talking about them, we’re going to read and discuss bit by bit. The reading today is from the gospel according to Luke, chapter 3, verses 1-22, and I’m reading from the New Revised Standard Version. We’ll begin with just verses 1-6.

In the fifteenth year of the reign of Emperor Tiberius, when Pontius Pilate was governor of Judea, and Herod was ruler of Galilee, and his brother Philip ruler of the region of Ituraea and Trachonitis, and Lysanias ruler of Abilene, during the high-priesthood of Annas and Caiaphas, the word of God came to John son of Zechariah in the wilderness. He went into all the region around the Jordan, proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins, as it is written in the book of the words of the prophet Isaiah,
‘The voice of one crying out in the wilderness:
“Prepare the way of the Lord,
    make his paths straight.
Every valley shall be filled,
    and every mountain and hill shall be made low,
and the crooked shall be made straight,
    and the rough ways made smooth;
and all flesh shall see the salvation of God.”’

We are familiar with this quote from Isaiah — usually we hear it during Advent, and it calls up memories of Handel’s Messiah. Isaiah wrote to people who were in exile, waiting for God to come and take them home. To hear God’s promise accompanied by the call to prepare the road on which God would travel to rescue the people meant that they should be hopeful because it would happen soon, they should get ready! Luke uses that same passage to describe what John the Baptist was doing — preparing the way of the Lord, because he was coming soon, so people should both be hopeful and get ready. Now, what John thought that would mean is unclear, we don’t know what he expected the Messiah to do or how he would act, we just know that he was preparing the way.

Usually that’s all we read for this section, but actually we really need to back up to the beginning! All those names and places seem so easy to skip over, but they are there for a reason. Luke tells us that all these things took place during a particular time and in a particular location. They didn’t have a calendar like ours where you could just say the month and year…but that isn’t he only reason he describes that time and location by referencing the important people of the day: the emperor, the governor, and the client kings, and then the high priests of the Jerusalem Temple. These are the people who defined the age, the ones who controlled the politics, economy, culture, and religion. While ordinary people would not interact with any of these leaders, the fact is that even if they didn’t think about it all the time, their lives and options were affected by those leaders’ choices and actions. Their images were on coins and buildings, their movements could ease or disrupt business, their rulings changed how people ate and worked and worshiped, and they were generally just the backdrop to life.

Against that backdrop, we have John, son of a priest, out in the wilderness — unsupervised, in other words — preaching and baptising outside the institutional and liturgical structures of the time. So after naming all the people who have power in the empire in one way or another, who define our lives, suddenly Luke changes focus, drawing our attention away from all those things that have consumed our energy and around which we have oriented our worldview. The word of God is in the wilderness. Out on the margins, away from the centre of earthly kingdom power, the kingdom of God is breaking in, and it will change the way we see. It will change the way we mark time. It will change what we think is important, and what will define our lives and actions and options.

All those imperial powers are still there, but they are no longer the star of the story or the defining characteristic of the age. Instead, we tear our eyes away from their antics and we are drawn toward something happening out at the edges, where we have the space to re-orient our worldview around God’s kingdom instead of the empire.

Unlike some other gospel writers, Luke does not tell us about John’s clothes, he only tells us about his words. He was pointed in his preaching, as we hear in verses 7-14:

John said to the crowds that came out to be baptised by him, ‘You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come? Bear fruits worthy of repentance. Do not begin to say to yourselves, “We have Abraham as our ancestor”; for I tell you, God is able from these stones to raise up children to Abraham. Even now the axe is lying at the root of the trees; every tree therefore that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire.’
And the crowds asked him, ‘What then should we do?’ In reply he said to them, ‘Whoever has two coats must share with anyone who has none; and whoever has food must do likewise.’ Even tax-collectors came to be baptised, and they asked him, ‘Teacher, what should we do?’ He said to them, ‘Collect no more than the amount prescribed for you.’ Soldiers also asked him, ‘And we, what should we do?’ He said to them, ‘Do not extort money from anyone by threats or false accusation, and be satisfied with your wages.’

It doesn’t seem that John is interested in winning people over with charm — it’s hard to imagine many people would love being called a brood of vipers! He wants people to realise that the fact that their name is on the roll of the chosen people is good and all, but that’s the beginning, not the end. They can’t rely only on their past to carry them into the future — how we live as God’s people matters. After all, the psalms tell us that all creation sings the glory of God in its own way — including the stones. So if all God wanted was names on the roll, the rocks would suffice. But we are meant to bear good fruit for the kingdom of God — this kingdom that is breaking through the world’s ways and drawing us out.

What then should we do? The people stand at the waters edge, dripping wet, receiving God’s grace and wondering how to live in response. How will their everyday lives reflect the change they have undergone in the river?

If you have two coats, give one to someone who doesn’t have any. That way everyone in the community has a coat.
If you have two servings of your meal, give one to someone who doesn’t have any. That way everyone in the community has enough to eat.
If you have a position of power, don’t use it to enrich yourself, but rather to serve others.

Now tax collectors, who were Jewish but also collaborated with the Roman Empire, augmented their wage by inflating the amount people owed. That way they could keep the extra and so live more comfortably themselves. And soldiers were Romans, an occupying force meant to keep the peace, but they did so by terrorising people into submission.

All of these people — those with an extra coat, those collecting taxes, even the soldiers — are normal everyday people, the middlemen of the empire. They’re not the leaders, but they’re also not the poorest of the poor. They’re people with more than enough. People like most of us. And John tells them that what they ought to do if they want to live according to the grace they have received is to take responsibility for one another.

Having two coats and giving one away might make us feel vulnerable. What if I need that coat tomorrow? But in this kind of community, that moment would be met by someone else giving their extra one to me. It’s a way of life that is both generous and dependent at the same time.

Last week I learned a new word from a friend who lives in Hawaii. The Hawaiian language has a word, kuleana, that’s hard to translate, but basically it means reciprocal responsibility. So for example, Hawaiians say they have a kuleana to the land, to care for it and respect it, and in return the land has a kuleana to us, to feed and provide. I think this word perfectly encapsulates this sense of responsibility to one another that John is preaching: I have a responsibility, as someone with more than enough, to give away that excess to those who do not have enough. And when I am in a vulnerable position, those with more than enough have a responsibility to give their excess to me. And so as a community, we depend on one another, in a constant give and take. No one is hedging against future vulnerability by storing up for themselves, like you would do in the imperial worldview, but rather by being part of a community of reciprocal responsibility. We have a kuleana to each other in the kingdom of God.

This was such a radical idea — remember that the word radical means “root”, and John said that the axe was lying at the root of the trees, changing things by going back to the very foundations, and his preaching was really bringing people back to the very beginning of how God’s creation was meant to work, in kuleana to each other from the ground to the animals to the humans made in God’s image! It drew people in and re-focused them, and they wondered…as we hear in verses 15-22.

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 baptise 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 baptise 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.’
So, with many other exhortations, he proclaimed the good news to the people. But Herod the ruler, who had been rebuked by him because of Herodias, his brother’s wife, and because of all the evil things that Herod had done, added to them all by shutting up John in prison.
Now when all the people were baptised, and when Jesus also had been baptised 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.’

For those who have never been to a threshing floor — chaff is the outer husk of wheat, and when the grains of wheat are agitated to loosen the chaff and then tossed into the air, the chaff separates and blows away. But it is very dangerous — even the tiniest spark of electricity can ignite that cloud of chaff and the fire can burn the whole field.

Each of us will have chaff that needs separating…and every community does too. Those practices that are dangerous and can easily ignite a fire of bad behaviour that destroys the community need to be separated and blown away. It may not be pleasant, but it is important.

Sometimes I think we forget that John said this right after giving those instructions about the kuleana of life in the kingdom of God, so we tend toward reading it as if there are bad people who are going to be burned away. And that may be one possible reading, but when we read the whole story together, it sounds to me more like the chaff is those ways of living that John was asking us to leave behind, to repent of — repentance literally means to turn around 180 degrees, to change the way of living and thinking. Chaff is a protective husk — and John has just asked us to shed our protections and entrust our welfare to the whole community of reciprocal responsibility. And chaff floating randomly in the air can be dangerous — we have to fully let it go, because grasping at those unhealthy old ways can destroy that community of care.


Perhaps that is one reason that baptism is the symbol of entering into this community — because the water washes that chaff away and we live differently in response. Isn’t it fascinating that Luke tells us that Jesus was just baptised with everybody else — he’s part of this community. Yet he’s also, of course, different: he sees the heaven opened and hears God’s voice proclaiming Love. He is one who does not need the chaff washed away himself, but he will still be in this community of kuleana, and so he shows us from the very beginning how to live in ways that bring God pleasure and delight. It will be a different way of life than the one defined by those important guys at the beginning of the chapter — we will need to turn 180 degrees and put that behind us if we are to instead focus on God’s kingdom living, here and now. This is what it means to be baptised: to live differently because we have experienced God’s grace and now can’t help but act on it.

May it be so. Amen.

Traditionally on Baptism of the Lord Sunday, we recall our own baptisms, that moment of meeting God at the water and encountering overwhelming grace that leads us to a new way of life.

Martin Luther famously repeated “I am baptised!” whenever he was in distress. In the face of all that is going on in the world and in our lives and our community, it is an important reminder that the powers that serve as the backdrop to daily life are not in fact the defining realities of life in the kingdom of God. And in the midst of a year when we have learned to wash our hands, what better than to repeat “I am baptised” as we make use of the gift of water?

Water is indeed a gift. In the beginning it flowed over creation, carving mountains and valleys. Throughout history it has nourished the earth, and so nourished life. We who are used to clean water coming from taps inside our homes find our thirst quenched, our bodies cleansed, our cooking and cleaning easy.

God brought our ancestors through the chaos of the Red Sea, and drew them to the banks of the River Jordan. Today God calls us to the water again — remembering those stories of faithfulness but not taking them for granted. God calls us to the water again that we may take our place in the story, living Christ’s way that others may count us among their cloud of witnesses. In each of our places, from near and far, the Spirit gathers us into Christ’s Body, and every drop of precious water we encounter is a reminder of this gracious summons to abundant life.

Having heard anew this call to embody God’s generous mercy, caring for our neighbour, recognising our place in community, and sharing our resources, let us re-commit ourselves to live for God’s delight.

I invite you to answer these questions, honestly in your hearts and truthfully with your lives:
*Do you reject sin,
and confess your need of God’s forgiving grace;
And, believing the Christian faith,
do you pledge yourself to glorify God
and to love your neighbour?

*At your baptism we proclaimed that you will always have a place in the family of God.
Do you commit yourself to that family,
this Christian community of reciprocal responsibility —
to depend on the grace of God,
to serve the Lord,
and to continue in the fellowship of the Church
all the days of your life?

*Do you renew your commitment to be faithful
in studying scripture,
in prayer,
in giving a proportion of your time, talents, and money
to the work of the Church in the world,
and to serving Christ in your daily work?

Let us pray.
Out at the edge of our understanding you speak, O God.
Through the voices of those pushed to the margins
we hear your call to mutual responsibility and vulnerability,
your call to be our neighbour’s keeper.
Through the voices of those beyond our controlled structures
we hear your call to a way of life that is more than
just a name on the roll.
Through the voices of those ordinary people just like us,
seeking to be faithful,
we hear your call to humility and a teachable spirit.
Out at the edge of our understanding you speak, O God.
May we turn aside to see,
and find our hearts opened and lives changed
as we remember our baptisms — your grace, both gift and call.
In the name of Jesus Christ we pray. Amen.

Hymn 336, verse 2 (tune: Highland Cathedral)
Christ is our love! baptised that we may know
the love of God among us, swooping low.
Christ be our love, bring us to turn our face
and see you in the light of heaven’s embrace.

Next time you wash your hands, sing this hymn (it takes 25 seconds!). Touch your wet fingers to your forehead and remind yourself “I am baptised!” with all that means about God’s love for you and God’s call for your life to reflect God’s kingdom. Amen.

Hymn #706: For the Healing of the Nations

Benediction
As you go to live according to the Kingdom of God even against the backdrop of the kingdoms of the world, may the Spirit of God go above you to watch over you; may the Spirit of God go beside you to be your companion; may the Spirit of God go before you to show you the way and behind you to push you into places you might not go alone; and may the Spirit of God go within you, to remind you that you are loved more deeply than you can possibly imagine. May the fire of God’s love burn brightly in you, and through you into the world. Go in peace. Amen.

Announcements

All worship is online (or on the phone at 01475 270037, or in print) until further notice — the building is closed during the government’s lockdown and during level 4 restrictions. We will let you know when in-person worship begins, and whether any new procedures will be in place at that time.

The Kirk now has online giving! If you have not already set up a standing order in order to facilitate your spiritual discipline of giving, or if you would like to make an extra gift to support the ministry St. John’s does in our parish, you can give online. If you would like to set up a standing order, please contact Peter Bennett, our treasurer, or Teri and she can give you his details. You can also send your envelopes to the church by post or with a neighbour who is coming to in-person worship and we will ensure they are received. Remember: no one is coming to your door to collect your envelopes, so please stay safe!

The theme for worship during the season of Epiphany is “Confounding Expectations.” We will be considering how Jesus and his ministry are beyond, around, beneath, outside, blowing-open, confusing, and generally…confounding, compared to what we expect!

* Don’t forget to follow us on Facebook and Youtube, and to sign up for our email devotions! Midweek you can watch Wine and the Word on Youtube, pray with video devotions on Facebook, and consider a new angle on something with a devotional email. Feel free to share with your friends, too!