delivered 10 January 2010
by Rev. Dr John Evans
Isaiah 43:1-7
Psalm 29
Acts 8:14-17
Luke 3:15-17, 21-22
John the Baptist says: “I will baptize you with water . .. he, Jesus, will baptise you with the Holy Spirit.”
Water – precious water. Oh how it has risen in our estimation of being important. Water these days is just constantly in the news. It is the emblematic aspect of climate change; the constant reminder things are different. We will have too much of it as the polar icecaps melt; we will not have enough of it as droughts ravage our sort of land.
Just in recent times there have been the following water issues: the desalination plant – its expense, location and perhaps everything about it have been controversial. Then there is the north south pipeline which is the back up for Melbourne water supply, if the desalination plant is not built in time. Then there has been the controversy over the buy-back of water rights.
All of this because we may not have enough water. Remember when we used to be called the garden state!
Just to complicate things; there are floods in north western New South Wales. Once I think we took water for granted – but now our dependence on water is one of the big political issues of the day. Forget trains running on time, or the ticketing system working – having enough water will be the maker and breaker of governments in the future.
From biblical times water has been important. . . . especially when one considers the arid nature of those bible lands themselves. In a land where ones very existence was often precarious, people knew about, in an elemental sense, their dependence on water. It in fact led to an understanding their dependency on God. The lack of water always meant murmuring against God. And doubt. The Children of Israel on their wanderings from Egypt to the Promised Land rebelled again Moses because there was no water. According to the theologians of the time – particularly the writers of the book of Deuteronomy, the people only were lead through such experiences of deprivation in order that they might know that they could only live by the word of God. Indeed the image of the promised land was not only about milk and honey. Deuteronomy 8 says “for Yahweh your God is bringing you into a good land, a land of brooks of water, of fountains and springs, flowing forth in valleys and hills”(vs 7) Water. Later in prophetic writing water is an integral part of a new future of a restored Israel. Amos for example stated that justice should “roll down like waters” and righteousness like “an ever flowing stream”. Water became a symbol of salvation, as in the summons to “draw water from the wells of salvation” (Is12:3) or come “to the waters” (55:1) – a favourite image of African American gospel music.
Indeed, a bit like we do today, water was also graded. For us today at the top of the pile we have bottled water – twice as expensive as petrol; but we then speak of potable – drinkable water, recycled water, grey water, and if you get your water from an artesian basin there is bore water. Apparently in bible times there were differences in water too: there was water that was stored in large jars and pots, through to small pools and cisterns, then there were wells, and finally there was “living water” – water that was flowing in a river or from a spring. In part this explains some of the background to that story recorded in John’s gospel where Jesus met the women beside the well in Samaria. Remember Jesus asks for a drink – and in the conversation ends up promising her living water. She replies “sir you have no bucket , and the well is deep. Where do you get that living water?” Among the many features of this intriguing encounter, is that you do not get living water from a well! That is a different sort of water.
Water, and living water become important then in ritual and cultic practices. Ritual washing is important, and is prescribed in the holiness code of Leviticus. Such practices were about restoring a state of ritual cleanness. They would follow such things as contact with a corpse or recovery from a skin disease. After such ritual washing you were then fit to enter into the presence of God. Much later the Pharisees developed codes for ritual hand washings and there formed the daily practice of piety in the time of Jesus.
Following the Jews period of exile in Babylon, converts to Judaism were expected to undergo an immersion, a washing, a ritual of entry into the faith. This became known as “proselyte baptism” and also later became associated with acts of repentance in such religious groups as the Essenes – that Jewish sect at the time of Jesus down at the Dead Sea. So John’s baptism was obviously in living water – the flowing river Jordan (though I should note it really is a miserable little water course looking a little like the Murray Darling after all our years of our degradation and over drawing of water.) and his baptism drew on all this history.
1. The baptism would be a washing clean. A movement from uncleanness to cleanness and so the baptised would be fit to enter into the presence of God.
2. The baptism would be a mark, a sign of conversion. A sign possibly of moving from being a gentile to a Jew, but certainly it would mark the entrance into a new community.
3. The baptism was a sign, a mark that the baptized person had repented, had turned around their life. They would in the future live their life in a different way. Remember John’s teaching about “bearing the fruits worthy of repentence” (Lk 3:7). So whoever has two coats must share with anyone who has none, whoever, has food must do likewise” and so on.
This was John’s baptism – it was the baptism we assume Jesus undertook; however, the baptism of Jesus would be different . . . or perhaps more correctly, would have the additional dimension of the Holy Spirit.
So why would Jesus want to be baptised by his kinsman, John, in the first place?
Those themes of how baptism was then viewed in the time of John I think provide provide some clues. Jesus wanted to be fit to enter into the presence of God; he was shown to be a part of a new community and it would show his commitment to a new life. Indeed this theme of new life, of repentance and forgiveness is an important theme in Jesus’ life, death and resurrection. Jesus we assert, in faith, was sinless – and so this action atd the beginning of his ministry, and then at the end of his ministry with his death on the cross – because of our sinfulness and for our sins, is emphasizing a theme of this ministry, perhaps the theme of his ministry: forgiveness and a renewed relationship with God. His baptism and then death on the cross form neat bookends in this ministry of forgiveness and new life: a clear beginning and end. Indeed, in the statement we say at the time of baptism here each time we baptize, we emphasise this point:
“In his own baptism in the Jordan by John, Jesus identified himself with humanity in its brokenness and sin; that baptism was completed in his death and resurrection.”
However, perhaps more significantly at his baptism by John, Jesus received the Holy Spirit, and that in turn Jesus would baptise not with just water – like John, but with the Holy Spirit.
All the gospels record that Jesus’ baptism was different to John’s. And all gospels record something “happened” when he was baptized. It was a special moment in some way: a God filled moment right at the start of Jesus’ ministry. It was like the Spirit of God variously descending like a dove, or as a dove – as the account we have today from Luke says. Thee even was a voice from heaven, which said “this is my beloved son with whom I well pleased”. How our modern mind copes with such scenes, words and descriptions I wonder – however, I think we can confidently assert this was. It was a special time, a special occasion; it was a unique start to his ministry..
It is however, the Holy Spirit that separates Jesus’ baptism out from John’s baptism. John’s baptism is about marking – there being a sign that something is different and significantly water is used. And as we have seen water is very important. Howeve,r the Holy Spirit adds something.It is true others, like the prophets and indeed those associated with his birth – people like Mary and Elizabeth – also received the Holy Spirit. Receiving the Holy Spirit was not a unique event. However, within the context of Jesus’ baptism and baptism in his name, the linking of baptism with water and baptism in the Holy Spirit, means the very Spirit of Christ himself – the way of bringing about that new relationship – a relationship of forgiveness – is present. Baptism in water and the spirit injects into that baptism who Jesus actually is. It becomes more than just the mark of new life and a new creation – it holds within it the hope of that new creation.
Continuing in the statement we make about baptism in our baptismal liturgies
“By God’s grace, baptism plunges (a good water word), plunges us into the faith of Jesus Christ, so that whatever is his may be called ours.
By water and the Spirit we are claimed as God’s own and set free from the power of sin and death.”
Our baptism not only has all those features of baptism that John’s baptism contained, through the Holy Spirit actually, this new life in Christ is incorporated into, becomes a part of this newly baptized person’s life form there on. Again our statement
“Baptism is Christ’s gift.
It is the sign by which the Spirit of God joins people to Jesus Christ and incorporates them into his body, the Church.”.
Water.
Precious stuff.
Baptism, in water and the Holy Spirit is also precious.
Remember that you are baptised.
