WATER UNDER THE BRIDGE
A sermon preached by
Rev. Dr. Randle R. (Rick) Mixon
First Baptist Church, Palo Alto, CA
Sunday, January 11, 2009
Texts: Mark 1:1-13
The seven year old boy steps out and moves up the aisle of the venerable old First Baptist Church. He is responding to the invitation of the visiting evangelist. He is determined to give his life to Jesus, even if he is not entirely sure what that means. Of course, the preacher’s kid would make his profession of faith in response to a guest evangelist, rather than to his own father’s ardent appeals. Perhaps it had something to do with the table full of gifts, trinkets really, that the evangelist gave as rewards for those who brought someone to one of the services. The boy was particularly proud of the miniature of Sallman’s head of Christ he had received for bringing his second grade teacher one night. In his mind, this evangelistic crusade was exciting, out of the ordinary and it had captured his attention.
Still, walking that aisle was not a decision he made lightly. He did have a sense that these were serious steps he was taking. It was not as if he had never heard his own father proclaim the gospel or seen others walk the same aisle, promising to follow Jesus or rededicating their lives to discipleship. And it was his father, along with his faithful Sunday School teachers, who would help him understand the meaning of the steps he had taken before he ever entered the baptismal pool to - by his own earthly father - be “buried with Christ in baptism” and “rise to walk” with that same Christ “in newness of life.”
I know you have heard me tell before some version of my joining the church. I also know that most of you have your own story to tell about baptism. On this Sunday, which liturgical tradition labels “Baptism of Jesus Sunday,” it is difficult to read the texts in whichever gospel of Jesus’ baptism and not remember our own. This is also the Sunday we make the transition from the stories of Jesus’ birth to those of his adult life and ministry, which will eventually take us to the passion, crucifixion and Easter.
This is lectionary year B and the focal gospel is Mark, the one generally considered to be the first written, the spare, active gospel through the pages of which Jesus and his followers move swiftly to the enigmatic conclusion. Though the opening lines echo the first words of Genesis, the Hebrew scripture reading for today, they also offer a sense of stepping into a swiftly moving stream, one in which we are shocked by the icy water, flowing down from the snowy mountain’s height. “The beginning of the gospel, the good news, of Jesus Christ, the Son of God.” Do we need to know more to be drawn into the text? It is a bracing and compelling beginning. It promises a story that will be intriguing and fulfilling, one that will be difficult to put down until we have read it though to its remarkable conclusion.
There is no birth narrative in Mark’s account – none of the wonder and mystery of angels singing to shepherds and wealthy astrologers traveling to Bethlehem to find an infant king nor any paean to the “Word made flesh.” “The beginning of the good news” is like this – a messenger already at work, crying in the wilderness “Prepare the way of the Lord.” Oh and isn’t this messenger a curious fellow, holding forth in the desert, miles from the population center, and dressed like a denizen of that desert in a camel’s hair shirt and a leather skirt, living on native carob and tree sap! Who would take such a character seriously? Yet, here they were streaming out to see and hear, coming from Jerusalem and all over the Judean countryside. John the baptizer was no fool; he may have been a practitioner of high drama but he knew what he was doing. Dressed like the prophet Elijah, he played on the eager anticipation of the people that the ancient prophet would return as a forerunner of the Messiah, God’s anointed one, the son of David who would save Israel from its oppressors – and these people were ready for that, or so they thought.
John’s message was harsh, abrasive - “Confess your sins and repent.” In Bible study last Tuesday we wondered who would be drawn to such an odd personality with such a hard, convicting message. Would we even go across the street to hear John the Baptist, let alone travel by foot into the desolate Judean desert to be harangued by him into confession and repentance? What caused them to go and what keeps us from joining them? It was a different time and place in which prophecy carried much weight, especially for a people who believed themselves to be God’s chosen people yet labored under the oppression of Roman occupation and their own collaborating leaders. Characters like John were not as uncommon as they might be today. If nothing else, he must have been great entertainment in a time before television and movies, video games and Ipods.
Still, I cannot help but believe that there was something compellingly authentic about John and his message, something that got under the skin and spoke to the heart. As Paul writes in his letter to Romans, “All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.” Perhaps, even us sophisticated moderns need to be reminded of that now and then. The word is not that we are fundamentally bad people, but who of us has not had occasion to entertain a thought or a feeling or an action that put distance between our authentic and inauthentic selves, between us and our friends, neighbors, colleagues, loved ones, between ourselves and God? Who of us has not had occasion to ask if the way we are headed may not be the wrong way? Who has not wondered if we oughtn’t turn around and head a different direction?
And for John, this was especially important because, indeed, one was coming who would evaluate people against the standards God had laid out for us creatures made in God’s own image and likeness. One was coming who would make real God’s reign on earth with all the disrupting transformation of conventionality that that entails. A new reality was on the horizon, one characterized by justice and peace, by hope for the poor and downtrodden, by love for neighbor and enemy alike, by a leveling of power and class and privilege, a reality that would make room at God’s table for all God’s children. “Let me tell you,” says John, “you may be impressed with what you have seen and heard from me but, [t]he one who is more powerful than I is coming after me; I am not worthy to stoop down and untie the thong of his sandals. I have baptized you with water, but he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit.”
Yes, for all his quirkiness, John’s message was both powerful and persuasive, so much so that a day laborer from Galilee heard the word and came to see what it was all about. Jesus suddenly appears on the scene, having walked all the way from Nazareth, and Mark simply says he is baptized by John, no qualifying explanations about why the Messiah would need to a “baptism of repentance for forgiveness of sin,” no protests from John that he should be baptized by Jesus, just a simple statement of what happened. Barclay suggests that for Jesus this baptism was a symbolic of a decision. The time had come for Jesus to act, to answer God’s call and to fulfill God’s will for him. It was a defining moment for him and required a clear gesture in taking on the mantle of responsibility to which God called him. Barclay says, “Jesus knew when John emerged that the moment of decision had come. Nazareth was peaceful and home was sweet, but he answered the summons and the challenge of God” (William Barclay, The Daily Study Bible Series: The Gospel of Mark, p. 10.)
And Jesus’ baptism was also an act of identification. Though Jesus himself may not have needed to repent from sin, he saw in John’s followers a group of people sincerely trying to find a way to walk with God and he chose to identify with that movement. Barclay again suggests that though some people “may possess ease and comfort and wealth…if [they] saw the emergence of a movement which was going to bring better things to the downtrodden and the poor and the ill-housed and the over-worked and under-paid, that is no reason why [they] should fail to identify [themselves] with it” (William Barclay, The Daily Study Bible Series: The Gospel of Mark, p. 10.) Jesus saw who these people were who had followed John out into the desert and he knew that of such was the realm of God. These were his people, so he cast his lot with them as he hoped they eventually would with him.
But the drama does not end there. As Jesus comes up out of the water, Mark tells us “he saw the heavens torn apart.” Donald Juel says that this image is “dynamic, violent, final. What is opened may be closed; what is torn apart cannot easily return to its former state.” In the end of Mark’s gospel, we will see the curtain of the temple torn in half as well. In both, cases we may understand that the barriers between God and creation have been rolled back. God has become flesh and dwelt among us full of truth and grace, yes, but also full of the mystery and power that only God may unleash on the earth.
Finally the Spirit of God descending with all the gentleness of a dove, lighting peacefully on Jesus’ shoulder and whispering in his ear, “You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased.” God approves of, affirms and blesses Jesus’ life and ministry. I wonder if any of us heard that whispered affirmation as we came up out of the baptismal waters. A lot of water has gone under the bridge since that baptismal day and it may be difficult to remember. And like that boy so long ago, are we ever really sure what it means to hear God call, to feel God’s touch, to give ourselves to Jesus, to become his disciples and promise to follow?
Just in case we have lost sight, Tom Wright reminds us that, like Jesus, “when the living God looks at us, at every baptized and believing Christian, he says to us what he said to Jesus on that day. He sees us, not as we are in ourselves but as we are in Jesus Christ...God looks at us and says ‘You are my dear, dear child; I’m delighted with you.’” As we come to a time in our service when you may choose to renew your baptismal vows, I invite you to consider this suggestion of Wright’s, “Try [repeating] that sentence slowly with your own name at the start, and reflect quietly on God saying that to you, both at your baptism and every day since” (Tom Wright, Mark for Everyone, pp. 4-5.) “Rick, Dona, Jim, Kathy, Mike, Marilyn, Thelma…‘You are my dear, dear child; I’m delighted with you.’” Now you are free to live as a child of God. Amen.