Sermon Sunday 10th January The Baptism of Christ Genesis 1:1-5, Psalm 29, Acts 19:1-7, Mark 1:4-11
Revd Tudor Vaughan Roberts, All Saints Church Lydiard Millicent.
Israel at the time of St Mark and John the Baptist, for 400 years had not seen a significant Prophet or heard one. It had been a lean period. Now in the events that Mark records they are under Roman occupation, Augustus Caesar is the Emperor and Herod the local ruler since 44 BC. A Pax Romana exists but in Judea people are hungry for something new.
Right now, in January 2021 we are not in a “Pax Romana” there is in fact very much a sense that life is out of control , there is the good news about the 3 vaccines we have for the UK, and yes Brexit has gone through peacefully, but with rapidly rising rates of Covid 19 worldwide and in the UK, plus the events in Washington USA, many are ill at ease. People in 2021 are hungry for something new. Were that something new to be launched where would be a significant place to do it? The top of Mount Snowdon in North Wales, Stonehenge, or in Hastings at the Scene of the 1066 battle, In Yorkshire maybe, where would you pick? Dublin, Cardiff, Edinburgh, or London perhaps.?
In Israel in Mark chapter 1, a man of strange appearance called John dressed like Elijah of old in camel hair clothing with a leather belt around his waist, who ate honey and locusts chooses to make his big public appearance in ,Jerusalem? No, Rome? No, He appears in the wilderness of Israel. John the Baptist appears in the wilderness declaring a baptism of repentance and the forgiveness of sins. He was doing baptisms on a huge scale with all of the Judean villagers and all of Jerusalem going out to him.
Ritual washing was what Jews did, but what John was doing was different, this was baptism, or dipping of the whole person over your head, submerging in the cool waters of the River Jordan.(The word baptism from Greek Baptizo means to “be submerged”) This was in the context of a corporate repentance and an individual one, people saying sorry as a nation and for their own sins. In Daniel 9:4-8 Daniel make this confession which Jews would have known well. It is worth us reading it too.
Daniel 9:4-8
English Standard Version
4 I prayed to the Lord my God and made confession, saying, “O Lord, the great and awesome God, who keeps covenant and steadfast love with those who love him and keep his commandments, 5 we have sinned and done wrong and acted wickedly and rebelled, turning aside from your commandments and rules. 6 We have not listened to your servants the prophets, who spoke in your name to our kings, our princes, and our fathers, and to all the people of the land. 7 To you, O Lord, belongs righteousness, but to us open shame, as at this day, to the men of Judah, to the inhabitants of Jerusalem, and to all Israel, those who are near and those who are far away, in all the lands to which you have driven them, because of the treachery that they have committed against you. 8 To us, O Lord, belongs open shame, to our kings, to our princes, and to our fathers, because we have sinned against you.
At the end of that prayer in Daniel 9:19, Daniel prays these words
Daniel 9:19
English Standard Version Anglicised
19 O Lord, hear; O Lord, forgive. O Lord, pay attention and act. Delay not, for your own sake, O my God, because your city and your people are called by your name.”
Right at the beginning of Mark’s Gospel you get the same thing: a corporate confession led by John and joined in by the people of Judea and Jerusalem. It’s a new beginning which is how Mark begins his gospel viz The beginning of the Good news about Jesus the Messiah Mark1:1 reflecting the first verses of Genesis 1:1-5 our old Testament reading today.
For the Jews who went out, hot from their journey from the Judean villages and Jerusalem ,it must have been humbling ,public, frightening yet amazingly restoring to be baptised by John the Baptist. He was someone new and authentic and real, and people going through John’s baptism got very wet and clean in the process. Amazingly, repentance was something that actually attracted people, deep down it was what they wanted,(do the Alpha course# and see how we too can come to God afresh too in repentance) and the message of forgiveness was not something that they heard so readily from their teachers.
So before moving let us look at some verses of repentance in the Bible
Jeremiah 15:19
New International Version
19 Therefore this is what the Lord says:
“If you repent, I will restore you
that you may serve me;
if you utter worthy, not worthless, words,
you will be my spokesman.
Let this people turn to you,
Ezekiel 14:6
English Standard Version
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6 “Therefore say to the house of Israel, Thus says the Lord God: Repent and turn away from your idols and turn away your faces from all your abominations.
Acts 17:30
New International Version
30 In the past God overlooked such ignorance, but now he commands all people everywhere to repent.
Revelation 2:5
New International Version
5 Consider how far you have fallen! Repent and do the things you did at first. If you do not repent, I will come to you and remove your lampstand from its place.
Matthew 12:41
New International Version
41 The men of Nineveh will stand up at the judgment with this generation and condemn it; for they repented at the preaching of Jonah, and now something greater than Jonah is here.
What shines out from these verses about repentance is that most of the instances record corporate repentance, as when Daniel prays, he prays individually but on behalf of all Israel. Most of the other verses mentioned here are about corporate repentance which in the history of revival often precedes a great work of God. And now in Mark One, Mark records how everyone that could, came out to John to repent and be baptized. (Think how much of our repentance is corporate and how much individual ? e.g., as a Nation in the UK we have realised how we need to repent of racism) Probably the River Jordan then was deeper than it is now in the 21st C with much water taken off for Israel’s modern agriculture. But let’s not worry about that detail, what matters is the big picture of what was happening preceding the baptism of Jesus, it was a widespread turning back to God. But John concentrates not on his mission but on the Mission of one greater than he.
Mark 1:7-9
New Revised Standard Version
7 He proclaimed, “The 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. 8 I have baptized you with[a] water; but he will baptize you with[b] the Holy Spirit
So, John says I baptize you with water but after me will come one who will drench you, submerge you, baptize you in the Holy Spirit. Paul explains the outcome of that in our Acts 19 reading which we had in our service today. Paul explains that John’s baptism was about repentance, but the baptism Jesus brings is by the Holy Spirit, We need both repentance in our lives and the infilling of the Holy Spirit, so often both go together. Repentance makes us more open to the Holy Spirit and being filled with the Holy Sprit makes us more aware of the sin that dwells within, so we repent.
When Jesus comes to John, he comes from Nazareth in Galilee, Jesus comes from obscurity (Nazareth was not an important place then) into the vastness of the desert wilderness, and there in the Jordan river which represents the border between the wilderness and the promised land, which Israel crossed so boldly with Joshua and the priests holding the ark, John baptizes him, Jesus bravely goes through this public baptism of repentance even though he did not need to repent, for the Markan Jesus is one who will identify with humankind and ultimately experience the humiliation and horror of death on the Cross.
As Jesus is baptized, heaven is torn open, the heaven that was mentioned at creation, now responds to the saviour’s commissioning and is torn asunder just as the curtain in the Temple will be when Jesus cries, It is finished from the Cross. Now as it were, as Jesus is baptized the voice of the Father comes along and says to His son “This is My Son with him I am well pleased” and maybe he was saying too It is only just beginning and this new beginning comes in grace. God’s words to His son are not based on what he has done, nor on what he will do, but simply on the centrality of the Father-Son relationship, few other Bible readings give us such an intimate insight into the relationship between Father, Son and Spirit as his baptism recorded by Mark. The Father speaks, the Holy Spirit comes down like a desert dove, and the Son submits to water baptism: Speaking, Hovering, Being Submerged and Washed, The Trinity is at work and it was all for us. Have you experienced that and responded to God in obedience?
It is all about grace!,Jesus has not said a word in ministry, nor healed a person, nor walked a mile in search of the lost: that is all to come, Jesus clears the water from his eyes and ears, he sees the Holy Spirit like a dove descend, he hears the Father’s voice, and for one moment I think he leaned back in the water and loved that special moment, one of complete unity and joy of the Godhead.
Maybe you and I should lean back and enjoy it too, if we know Jesus, if we have been born again, and follow him then God is our Father who loves us and is pleased with us. Sometimes and maybe particularly now in 2021 we need to hear this voice above the clamour of what we should do, or want to have done, So stop just a moment, re-read Mark 1:7- 11 and allow God to baptize you in his love for you. Many a psychologist or psychiatrist would say even if they do not have a faith, that if even half their waiting room knew they were unconditionally loved by God almighty, they might not be there so often. Does that mean that Christians never have problems? of course it does not, and mental health in the Church is a big issue, but we do have a loving Father who adores us, and maybe you and I should dwell on that truth just a bit more than we do.
Note please, Jesus did suffer emotionally, mentally, physically, and spiritually. Knowing God is not a free get out of jail card. We will suffer from the same problems the rest of the word does, but we have a saviour, and we are invited afresh each day and each Sunday to acknowledge him as Lord and Judge and Saviour and rescuer of our lives.
Jesus would move on from our story and fight with the fear of wild animals, and with Satan himself in the desert with the devil testing him, but he did so with the words running in his head and heart from his father “You are my dear Son with whom I am will pleased”. May we know that this week and into this new year.”
Where do you and I need to repent? How can we be baptized by God? Do I need to stop and ask God to speak those words to us afresh? You are my dear child I love you
Amen.
Eternal father
who at the baptism of Jesus
revealed him to be your Son,
anointing him with the Holy Spirit
Grant to us who are born again by water and the Spirit
that we may be faithful to our calling as your
adopted children
through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord
who is alive and reigns with you
in the unity of the Holy Sprit
One God now and forever Amen