These Illustrations are based on Matthew 3:13-17
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Sermon Opener - The Water that Brings a New Beginning - Matthew 3:13-17
Water has been in the news a lot recently, at least in the forms of snow and ice. Winter storms and snow literally stopped traffic in many parts of the country. And as much as we try to forge through to get to work or school, sometimes we have to stop and respect what the water around us is doing. Water is part of the drama of our life. It brings life, but not enough or too much can bring destruction. Let us focus on the life giving power of clean, fresh water.
There are two very different ways to think about baptism. The first approach recognizes the time of baptism as a saving moment in which the person being baptized accepts the love and forgiveness of God. The person then considers herself "saved." She may grow in the faith through the years, but nothing which she will experience after her baptism will be as important as her baptism. She always will be able to recall her baptism as the time when her life changed.
The second approach wouldn't disagree with any of that, but would add to it significantly. This idea affirms baptism as the time when God's love and forgiveness are experienced. It also recognizes baptism as a time of change. However, where the first approach isolates the act of baptism as the most important moment, the second approach understands baptism more as a beginning. While it is true that in the waters of baptism God laid claim on our lives, it is also true that we spend the rest of our lives trying to figure out what that means. The first understanding often overlooks the journey which follows baptism.
Baptism too frequently carries the connotation of having arrived….
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An Invitation That Went Astray - Matthew 3:13-17
Anyone here ever been involved in planning a wedding? Have you ever noticed that there are so many details involved in planning a wedding that brides and grooms tend to get really stressed out in the weeks leading up to the big event?
Bride-to-be Cassandra Warren was so hurried to get things done that she accidentally sent an invitation to her wedding to a wrong address. The wedding was to have a Star Wars theme and she was excited about it, but this one invitation went astray.
A week later, the invitation came back in return mail. The mistaken invitee had included a $20 bill in the envelope, and had scribbled this message on the outside: “I wish I knew you—this is going to be a blast. Congratulations—go have dinner on me. I’ve been married for 40 years—it gets better with age.”
Warren sent back a gracious thank-you note, saying, “I am thankful for people like you still being in the world.”
In our Bible passage today, John the Baptist is giving an invitation to the people of Jerusalem and Judea to repent, confess their sins and be baptized because the kingdom of heaven is at hand. He directed his most demanding preaching toward the Pharisees and Sadducees, the religious elites. He’s saying to them, “Don’t think you’re too good for this! You’d better get over here now and get baptized and begin living a life that shows you’ve repented and turned back to God!” That’s not exactly what he said, but that was the gist of his message.
So it’s strange that John suddenly puts the brakes on when Jesus comes to him to get baptized….
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Reasons for Jesus Submitting to Baptism
1. To fulfill all Righteousness: To be consecrated to God and approved by God.
2. The public announcement of the arrival of the Messiah and the inception of His ministry.
3. Identification with human sin and identification of himself with the people’s movement toward God.
4. To be an example to his followers.
Brett Blair, www.Sermons.com
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Welcome To a Journey
The story is told of a pastor's words to a baby shortly after he had baptized her. No doubt, the minister was speaking as much to the congregation as to the infant. "Little sister, by this act of baptism, we welcome you to a journey that will take your whole life. This isn't the end. It's the beginning of God's experiment with your life. What God will make of you, we know not. Where God will take you, surprise you, we cannot say. This we do know and this we say -- God is with you."
And God will be with us as we live out our baptism.
William B. Kincaid, III, And then Came the Angel, CSS Publishing Company
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Unconditional Love
I don’t remember the first time I walked, but I imagine it went something like this: I stood at one end of the room with my mother and my father was a full three steps away. Before that day I could probably do the kind of creative dangling that almost looks like walking, when somebody held me by the hands and shifted me from side to side as my feet barely touched the floor. But this is the day when I will try a real honest walk on my own — all holds barred — with just two eager parents, miles apart, there to cheer me on. So I set out, wobbling at first, stumbling at second, but unmistakably making it on my own from one set of arms to the other. And then I imagine that my father lifted me high in the air with an exultant shout as if no one in human history had ever walked before. Then, after numerous kisses and exclamations, I probably felt like the most loved, most marvelous boy in all the world.
After a time I could walk with more assurance but, for some reason, I didn’t receive so much praise. In fact, I can’t remember the last time that anyone praised me for walking across a room. So I had to do other things. Simply walking just wasn’t good enough anymore. I had to strive to make a splash in other ways, just to get back to that feeling, that feeling of being noticed, of being picked up with a shout of delight, of being valued.
For the most part, we don’t have much experience with unconditional love, so we try to create conditions in which we will feel worthy of love. We do not entirely trust love without reasons, so we strive to create reasons for the love received.
And in all that striving, it’s easy to lose sight of the fact that my parents did not praise me because of my accomplishments. Rather, they praised my accomplishments because they loved me, and would have loved me if there were no accomplishments to praise.
If parents sometimes have something like unconditional love, a love without reasons, for their children, how much more so does God love God’s children? All of our striving to try to win something that is ours already. God values you, not because you have distinguished yourself in some way, but because you are God’s beloved.
Martin Copenhaver, Whispered in Your Ear
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Jesus' Consecration
Some years ago, a Scottish minister told his congregation about dreaming he had died. When he came to the pearly gates, to his dismay, he would be denied entrance until he presented his credentials. Proudly the Pastor articulated the number of sermons preached and the prominent pulpits occupied. But Saint Peter said no one had heard them in heaven. The discouraged servant enumerated his community involvement. He was told they were not recorded. Sorrowfully, the pastor turned to leave, when Peter said, "Stay a moment, and tell me, are you the man who fed the sparrows?"
"Yes," the Scotsman replied, "but what does that have to do with it?"
"Come in," said Saint Peter, "the Master of the sparrows wants to thank you."
Here is the pertinent, though often overlooked, point: great and prominent positions indicate skill and capacity, but small services suggest the depth of one's consecration.
And so it is with Jesus' Baptism. He submits to John's baptism of repentance even though he himself was perfect and had no need to repent. Jesus identified with our sins by being baptized. He joined in the popular movement of his day. It was a grass roots movement started by a desert monk named John the Baptist. John was calling for the repentance of Israel. Jesus chose to be baptized because he wanted to participate with the people in their desires to be close to God.
Brett Blair, www.Sermons.com. Adapted from G. Curtis Jones, 1000 Illustrations for Preaching and Teaching, Nashville: Broadman, p. 241.
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Meaning of Baptism
Those who are baptized in Jesus do not need to strive after a new life. They have already attained new life through dying with Christ. But they do need to nurture that new life so it can grow and mature. That's what church is for. That's what Bible study is for. That's what prayer is for. It is like the Parable of the Sower. Many of those seeds sprouted up, but only a few grew into maturity. The rest withered and died.
A wealthy businessman was horrified to see a fisherman sitting beside his boat, playing with a small child.
"Why aren't you out fishing?" asked the businessman.
"Because I caught enough fish for one day," replied the fisherman.
"Why don't you catch some more?"
"What would I do with them?"
"You could earn more money," said the businessman. "Then with the extra money, you could buy a bigger boat, go into deeper waters, and catch more fish. Then you would make enough money to buy nylon nets. With the nets, you could catch even more fish and make more money. With that money you could own two boats, maybe three boats. Eventually you could have a whole fleet of boats and be rich like me."
"Then what would I do?" asked the fisherman.
"Then," said the businessman, "you could really enjoy life."
The fisherman looked at the businessman quizzically and asked, "What do you think I am doing now?"
The baptism of Jesus is dying to our self-centered endeavors and being resurrected into a life marked by grace and love. When we live in the baptism of Jesus, we touch the hearts of others and help open them to the Holy Spirit and new life in Christ. Are you living and growing in the new life you have been given?
Paul Peterson, The Waters of Death
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We Draw the Circle Too Small
Roy Lloyd, a Lutheran minister, once interviewed Mother Teresa. He said that one of his questions and one of her answers stands out in his mind as "a bright sun burning in my mind." He asked her, "What's the biggest problem in the world today?" And she answered, without hesitation, "The biggest problem in the world today is that we draw the circle of our family too small. We need to draw it larger every day."
With all that is evil and wrong in this world today it would be easy to answer that question with a hundred different events. That's what makes Mother Teresa's response so jilting. She is saying that the problem is not so much with the world as it is with us. We need to see more people as our neighbor than we are currently doing.
I see Jesus doing this in his baptism. In his baptism he included us in his righteousness. He identified with humanity, with our need to be cleansed, and our need to be made pure. If you have been baptized you have been drawn, by Jesus' baptism, into the circle of God's family.
Brett Blair, www.Sermons.com.
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The Puzzle Began to Fit
About 2000 years ago (give or take a few) a small group of Jewish people, living under the tyranny of Roman rule, began to listen to the words of an itinerant preacher. They saw him reach out in love to the hurting people, the broken people, to comfort them and heal them. They heard him give radically new interpretations of the ancient Scripture. Then they watched in horror as he was arrested, tried on trumped-up charges, beaten, mocked, spat upon, and finally nailed to a cross to die between two thieves. They experienced the incredible pain of seeing him dead and buried on Friday, and the equally incredible joy of seeing him alive again on Sunday morning. They heard his promise that his spirit would remain with them all the days of their lives and beyond.
And as they remembered what he had said and done, maybe they remembered the day of his baptism by John in the Jordan River. Maybe they remembered that a voice from heaven had declared, "This is my Beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased." And maybe the pieces of the puzzle began to fit a little better for them.
Johnny Dean, www.Sermons.com
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What Will You Do with Your Gift?
There is a folk tale from India that summarizes our thoughts this morning. It seems that there was a good king who ruled wisely and who ruled well. One day the king called his three daughters together and told them he was leaving on a long journey. "I wish to learn about God, so I will need to go away and spend a long time in prayer. In my absence I will leave the three of you in charge. Before I leave I would like to leave each of you with a gift; a gift I pray will help you learn how to wisely use your power to rule." Then he placed in each of their hands a single grain of rice.
The first daughter tied a long golden thread around her grain of rice and placed it in a beautiful crystal box. Every day she looked at it and reminded herself that she was powerful. The second daughter took one look at the common grain of rice, and threw it away, thus squandering her father's mysterious gift. The third daughter just looked at her grain of rice for a long, long time - until she finally understood what to do with it. She went outside and planted it in the ground. And it became a seed, giving life beyond itself, eventually turning into vast fields of hope and nourishment for others.
When the father returned years later, he asked his three daughters what they had done with their grains of rice. Though he was polite to his first two daughters, he did not respond to their explanations with much enthusiasm. It was only after the king saw the fields of grain resulting from his third daughter's wisdom that he responded with delight. Taking the crown off his head, he placed it on hers, saying, "Beloved, you alone have learned the meaning of power." From that day forward, the youngest daughter ruled the kingdom. She ruled long, and she ruled wisely, and she ruled well.
Brothers and sisters, this day as we remember the blessings and power of our baptism, as we set apart brothers and sisters for particular tasks of ministry, I pray that all of us will continue to be God's delight - powerful servants - pouring out our power for the hope and nourishment of the world.
William R. White, Stories For The Journey (Minneapolis: Augsburg Press, 1988), adapted by Susan R. Andrews, The Offense of Grace, CSS Publishing Company
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ADDITIONAL ILLUSTRATIONS NOT IN OUR EMAIL
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A Miracle Story by Leonard Sweet - Acts 10:34-43
Because of a devastating childhood illness at nineteen months, Helen Keller (1880-1968) was left both blind and deaf. Her life was rightly written up as a “miracle story” and became a play called “The Miracle Worker” (1957) with Anne Bancroft starring in the Broadway production (1959). But the “miracle” Helen Keller experienced was not any return of hearing or vision. The “miracle” she received was the miracle of her committed, loving family, and of her relentlessly optimistic and patient teacher Anne Sullivan.
When Helen was seven years old, trapped in a world where she could only communicate through a few hand signals with the family cook, her parents arranged for a twenty-year old, visually impaired teacher to come and work with their daughter. Using American Sign Language, Anne Sullivan spent months “spelling” words into Helen’s hands. Everything Helen touched, everything she ate, every person she encountered, was “spelled out” into her hand.
At first Helen Keller didn’t get it. These random motions being pressed into her palm did not connect with experiences she felt. But Sullivan refused to give up. She kept spelling words. She kept giving “tactile-verbal” references for everything Helen encountered.
Finally there was a “watershed” moment, which was indeed water-powered. Helen’s breakthrough moment was as she was having water pumped over her hands and Anne Sullivan kept spelling the word for “water” over and over into her palm. Suddenly Helen “got it.” Suddenly she realized those gestures meant something real and tangible. They were naming what she was experiencing.
The world of communication, reading, literature, human interaction were all made possible to one person through the gift of another person. The “miracle” Helen’s teacher Anne Sullivan worked was the miracle of patience. She simply kept on and kept at it, showing Helen there were “words” for “things,” and there was true meaning behind all Helen’s experiences.
Patience is not a very well-regarded virtue these days…
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Messages from God
A few years ago there were billboards scattered throughout the United States with messages from God. Some guy had purchased the space and conducted an advertising campaign for God. Actually, the person responsible for these "Messages from God" chose to remain anonymous. The Smith Agency in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida, launched the advertising campaign in September 1998. Andrew Smith, the agency's president, said that an individual simply appeared in their office one day and hired them on the spot. He said that their agreement with this individual prohibited them from releasing his name but he did say that the person is quite well known.
These 15 messages signed by God have appeared on billboards and buses:
1. Let's Meet at My House Sunday Before the Game.--God
2. C'mon Over and Bring the Kids.--God
3. What Part of "Thou Shalt Not ..." Didn't You Understand?--God
4. We Need to Talk.--God
5. Keep Using My Name in Vain And I'll Make Rush Hour Longer.--God (This add is placed in congested Urban areas).
6. Loved the Wedding, Invite Me to the Marriage.--God
7. That "Love Thy Neighbor" Thing, I Meant It.--God
8. I Love You ... I Love You ... I Love You.--God
9. Will The Road You're on Get You to My Place?--God
10. Follow Me.--God
11. My Way Is the Highway.--God
12. Need Directions?--God
13. You Think It's Hot Here?--God (During the Summer)
14. Tell the Kids I Love Them.--God
15. Have You Read My #1 Best Seller? There Will Be a Test.--God
It's a cute campaign and clever and it would be nice if God actually would spend a little more time advertising his thoughts. But this exposes the fault in us humans. We want a definitive answer. We want some rules to go by and we want to be told how to behave and what we should do. The Ten Commandments do this for us but we slowly found out --through centuries and centuries of countless sins and human atrocities--that we were not able to abide by them.
So what is God to do? Take out an add campaign on our city buses and billboards? No, I don't think so. Instead he does something very different. He says, "This is my Son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased." What a difference! Instead of rules written on tablets, buses, and billboards, he says, "I'd like to introduce you to someone special. Here, I want you to meet my son. I love him a great deal. I am so proud of him."
What do you do about that? It's one thing to forget a commandment. It's quite another to slam the door in the face of a relative.
Brett Blair, Sermons.com.
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Life as a Piece of Music
Think of your life as a piece of music. Life in the microwave world provides you the staccato notes, the quick and sometimes dissonant voice. By itself, it is confusing and lacking in substance or form. It may even seem chaotic and annoying.
A long baptismal obedience in the same direction provides the sustenuto, the sustained voice, the continuo line. It gives body and substance to the piece. By itself, it could become tedious or dull.
But when the sustained voice undergirds and supports the staccato notes -- when life in the microwave world is sustained and supported by God's gift of a long baptismal obedience in the same direction -- then life is a magnificent fugue -- beautiful, rich, multi-textured, varied; surprising yet graceful and grace-filled.
Such a life is beautiful music; played and sung to the glory of the composer God: Father, Son and Holy Spirit, into whose eternal name we are baptized!
Mark WM Radecke, God in Flesh Made Manifest, CSS Publishing
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Sermon Ending
By the grace of God, during my sojourn at seminary, I was assigned by one of my professors (although I didn’t consider it a blessing at the time) to read and report on a little book by a German theologian named Oscar Cullmann. The book was entitled Baptism in the New Testament. Now, the writings of German theologians quite often are difficult for me to understand, sometimes because of linguistic problems in the translation, and sometimes just because their logic escapes me. Not so in this circumstance. This little book was a Godsend. In it, Dr. Cullmann not only acknowledges the difficulty in understanding why Jesus submitted to a baptism of repentance. He also offers a simple explanation for it, one that had for some reason eluded me.
I had dived deeply into the pool of the intellect searching for an answer that was floating in plain view on the surface. Cullmann says, "It was not a baptism of repentance for HIS sin; it was a baptism of repentance for MY sin, and yours. Just as Jesus died on the cross, not for his own sin, but for yours and mine, so also was he baptized in solidarity with, and on behalf of, you and me."
By this act of going to John to be baptized, by this act of joining people who were acknowledging that their lives were totally messed up and empty and uncertain and in need of a fresh start, Jesus publicly demonstrated the meaning of Emmanuel. God is with us; God has come to us; God has joined us in this world, in our human condition, in our human predicament. God understands! God knows what life and death are really like for you and me!
Johnny Dean, www.Sermons.com
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Spiritual Perception
Back when the telegraph was the fastest means of long-distance communication, there was a story, perhaps apocryphal, about a young man who applied for a job as a Morse code operator. Answering an ad in the newspaper, he went to the address that was listed. When he arrived, he entered a large, noisy office. In the background a telegraph clacked away. A sign on the receptionist's counter instructed job applicants to fill out a form and wait until they were summoned to enter the inner office.
The young man completed his form and sat down with seven other waiting applicants. After a few minutes, the young man stood up, crossed the room to the door of the inner office, and walked right in. Naturally the other applicants perked up, wondering what was going on. Why had this man been so bold? They muttered among themselves that they hadn't heard any summons yet. They took more than a little satisfaction in assuming the young man who went into the office would be reprimanded for his presumption and summarily disqualified for the job.
Within a few minutes the young man emerged from the inner office escorted by the interviewer, who announced to the other applicants, "Gentlemen, thank you very much for coming, but the job has been filled by this young man."
The other applicants began grumbling to each other, and then one spoke up, "Wait a minute--I don't understand. He was the last one to come in, and we never even got a chance to be interviewed. Yet he got the job. That's not fair."
The employer responded, "While you have sat there the telegraph has been ticking out the following message: "If you understand this message, then come right in. The job is yours."
A man's entire livelihood, indeed his life, depends upon his ability to discern the meaning of these words: "You are my Son, whom I love; with you I am well pleased."
Gary Preston, Character Forged from Conflict.
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The Unbaptized Arm
Ivan the Great became the great sovereign ruler of all of Russia during the Fifteenth Century. He brought together warring tribes and independent provinces. He has been called the gatherer of all of Russia. As a fighting man he was courageous. As a general he was brilliant. He drove out the Tartars and established peace across the nation.
However, Ivan was so busy waging his campaigns that he did not have a family. His friends and advisers were quite concerned. They reminded him that there was no heir to the throne, and should anything happen to him the union would shatter into chaos. “You must take a wife who can bear you a son.” The busy soldier statesman said to them that he did not have the time to search for a bride, but if they would find a suitable one, he would marry her.
The counselors and advisers searched the capitals of Europe to find an appropriate wife for the great tsar. And find her, they did. They reported to Ivan of the beautiful dark eyed daughter of the King of Greece. She was young, brilliant, and charming. He agreed to marry her sight unseen.
The King of Greece was delighted. It would align Greece in a favorable way with the emerging giant of the north. But there had to be one condition, “He cannot marry my daughter unless he becomes a member of the Greek Orthodox Church.” Ivan’s response, “I will do it!”
So, a priest was dispatched to Moscow to instruct Ivan in Orthodox doctrine. Ivan was a quick student and learned the catechism in record time. Arrangements were concluded, and the tsar made his way to Athens accompanied by 500 of his crack troops--his personal palace guard.
He was to be baptized into the Orthodox church by immersion, as was the custom of the Eastern Church. His soldiers, ever loyal, asked to be baptized also. The Patriarch of the Church assigned 500 priests to give the soldiers a one-on-one catechism crash course. The soldiers, all 500 of them, were to be immersed in one mass baptism. Crowds gathered from all over Greece.
What a sight that must have been, 500 priests and 500 soldiers, a thousand people, walking into the blue Mediterranean. The priests were dressed in black robes and tall black hats, the official dress of the Orthodox Church. The soldiers wore their battle uniforms with of all their regalia — ribbons of valor, medals of courage, and their weapons of battle.
Suddenly, there was a problem. The Church prohibited professional soldiers from being members; they would have to give up their commitment to bloodshed. They could not be killers and church members too.
After a hasty round of diplomacy, the problem was solved quite simply. As the words were spoken and the priests began to baptize them, each soldier reached to his side and withdrew his sword. Lifting it high overhead, every soldier was totally immersed-everything baptized except his fighting arm and sword.
That is a true historical fact. The unbaptized arm. What a powerful picture of Christianity today. How many unbaptized arms are here this morning? How many unbaptized wills are here? How many unbaptized talents? Unbaptized check books? Unbaptized social activities? How many are there here this morning?
Wayne Dehoney, Walnut Street Baptist Church.
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William Barclay Commentary
In the life of every man there are certain definite stages, certain hinges on which his whole life turns. It was so with Jesus and every now and again we must stop and try to see his life as a whole. The first great hinge was the visit to the temple when he was twelve, when he discovered his unique relationship to God. By the time of the emergence of John, Jesus was about thirty (Luke 3:23). That is to say at least eighteen years had passed. All through these years he must have been realizing more and more his uniqueness. But still he remained the village carpenter of Nazareth. He must have known that a day must come when he must say good-bye to Nazareth and go out upon his larger task. He must have waited for some sign.
When John emerged the people flocked out to hear him and to be baptized. Throughout the whole country there was and unprecedented movement towards God. And Jesus knew that his hour had come. It was not that he was conscious of sin and of the need of repentance. It was that he knew that he too must identify himself with this movement towards God. For Jesus the emergence of John was God's call to action; and his first step was to identify himself with the people in their search for God.
But in Jesus' Baptism something happened. Before he could take this tremendous step he had to be sure that he was right; and in the moment of Baptism God spoke to him. Make no mistake, what happened in the baptism was an experience personal to Jesus. The voice of God came to him and told him that he had made the right decision, but more--far more--that very same voice mapped out his entire course for him.
God said to him, "You are my beloved Son; with you I am well pleased." That saying is composed of two texts. You are my beloved son--that is from Psalm 2:7 and was always accepted as a description of the Messianic King. In whom I am well pleased--that is part of Isaiah 42:1 and is from a description of the servant of the Lord whose portrait culminates in the sufferings of Isaiah 53. Therefore in his baptism Jesus realized, first, that he was the Messiah, God's Anointed King; and, second, that this involved not power and glory, but suffering and a cross. The cross did not come on Jesus unawares; from the first moment of realization he saw it ahead. The baptism shows us Jesus asking for God's approval and receiving the destiny of the cross.
William Barclay, Luke, Philadelphia: Westminster, 1975, p. 37
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The Question about the Dove
At ten years of age Jeremy suddenly became more curious about baptism, since his infant cousin Jason was being baptized at the worship service this morning. Jeremy's inquisitive eyes and mind focused today on things that in the past had passed him by without much notice.
The baptismal font in this contemporary church building had a dove suspended above it, held in place by wires that could not be seen from farther than a few feet away. Was that bird always there? Or did they put it up there just for today, he wondered? And the worship bulletin for this Sunday also had a dove featured on the front cover. He had the urge to ask his dad about the bird -- he didn't really know if it was a dove or a pigeon or what -- but he knew from experience it would be better to wait and ask the question on the way home. And now his whole family joined his uncle and aunt at the baptismal font.
"In Christian love you have presented Jason for Holy Baptism. You should, therefore, faithfully bring him to the services of God's house ..." Jeremy heard those words being spoken by the pastor, but he only half-listened to the baptismal service. He kept glancing at the dove hanging over his head. He would definitely have to ask about that bird. "Pour out your Holy Spirit, so that Jason who is here baptized may be given new life," the pastor continued.
After worship, in the car, Jeremy said, "I'm hungry. When are we going to eat?" His father replied, "We're going to your uncle and aunt's house for a baptismal dinner, but it shouldn't be too long."
"Why are we baptized?" Jeremy asked. His father was glad he had taught Sunday school for the past five years and that some of the lessons had dwelt on baptism. As best he could he tried to explain about the forgiveness of sins and God's acceptance of us into his family through baptism.
Jeremy wasn't through with the questioning. "The pastor said in his sermon that Jesus was baptized. Did he have to have his sins forgiven, or what?"
"Oh lordy," Dad thought to himself, but he struggled through an answer he hoped was at least halfway correct. "No, Jesus didn't have any sins to forgive. But he was baptized kind of as a sign that ... that ... that God had a special task for him to do." Whew!
"What's the bird hanging above the baptizing thing?" Jeremy asked.
"I can deal with this," Dad thought to himself with some relief. "That bird is supposed to be a dove. And it reminds us of God's Spirit coming to us -- as it did to Jesus -- in baptism. Also it reminds us that God was pleased with his Son Jesus."
"Oh," Jeremy replied nonchalantly. "I wonder what we're having for dinner."
Merle G. Franke, Lectionary Tales for the Pulpit, CSS Publishing Company, Inc.
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Humor - Who Will You Listen To?
An old fable that has been passed down for generations tells about an elderly man who was traveling with a boy and a donkey. As they walked through a village, the man was leading the donkey and the boy was walking behind. The townspeople said the old man was a fool for not riding, so to please them he climbed up on the animal's back. When they came to the next village, the people said the old man was cruel to let the child walk while he enjoyed the ride. So, to please them, he got off and set the boy on the animal's back and continued on his way. In the third village, people accused the child of being lazy for making the old man walk, and the suggestion was made that they both ride. So the man climbed on and they set off again. In the fourth village, the townspeople were indignant at the cruelty to the donkey because he was made to carry two people. The frustrated man was last seen carrying the donkey down the road.
Traditional
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The Messianic Age
The Messianic Age. This is what every Jewish child of God was hoping, praying, and waiting for. It is easy to see why when we hear God's Old Testament promises about the Messianic Age:
(Isa 2:2) In the last days the mountain of the Lord's temple will be established as chief among the mountains; it will be raised above the hills, and all nations will stream to it.
(Isa 2:4) They will beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks. Nation will not take up sword against nation, nor will they train for war anymore.
(Isa 35:5-7) Then will the eyes of the blind be opened and the ears of the deaf unstopped. (6) Then will the lame leap like a deer, and the mute tongue shout for joy. Water will gush forth in the wilderness and streams in the desert. (7) The burning sand will become a pool, the thirsty ground bubbling springs. In the haunts where jackals once lay, grass and reeds and papyrus will grow.
(Isa 60:3,10-13) Nations will come to your light, and kings to the brightness of your dawn. (13) "Foreigners will rebuild your walls, and their kings will serve you ... (11) Your gates will always stand open, they will never be shut, day or night, so that men may bring you the wealth of the nations-- their kings led in triumphal procession. (12) For the nation or kingdom that will not serve you will perish; it will be utterly ruined. (13) "The glory of Lebanon will come to you, the pine, the fir and the cypress together, to adorn the place of my sanctuary; and I will glorify the place of my feet.
(Isa 65:20-21,25) "Never again will there be in it an infant who lives but a few days, or an old man who does not live out his years; he who dies at a hundred will be thought a mere youth; he who fails to reach a hundred will be considered accursed. (21) They will build houses and dwell in them; they will plant vineyards and eat their fruit ... (25) The wolf and the lamb will feed together, and the lion will eat straw like the ox, but dust will be the serpent's food. They will neither harm nor destroy on all my holy mountain," says the LORD.
What wonderful, beautiful promises. No wonder God's Jewish children could hardly wait for the Messianic Age.
The Old Testament Scriptures clearly state that the beauty and wonder of the Messianic Age will become a reality; but this will be so only with the coming of the Messiah. The Messiah. It is He Who brings about the Messianic Age.
Today, in the story of Jesus' baptism, Matthew tells his Jewish audience that the Messiah has come and that the Messianic Age is about to begin. And, in a departure from Jewish expectations about the Messiah, Matthew tells his Jewish audience that Messiah Jesus has come to take the sinner's place.
Adrian Dieleman, Jesus: A Baptism of Repentance?
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Just Proud To Belong
You may remember the episode of The Andy Griffith Show in which the Women's Historical Society had discovered that a living descendant of a Revolutionary War hero was living right there in Mayberry. The news generated excitement and curiosity throughout the town as people made plans for recognizing the hero's relative. Barney Fife, of course, twisted his own family tree to the point that he put himself in line for the honor. The rest of the townspeople felt special just because someone among them was related to the hero.
Everyone was shocked when the news came. A careful analysis of the genealogical records determined that the hero's descendant was Otis Campbell, the town drunk. Despite instructions to find a "substitute Otis" for the presentation, the real Otis showed up for the ceremony. When the ladies gave him the plaque which they had engraved especially for him, Otis gave the plaque to the town. He said, "Just because you're the descendant of a hero doesn't make you one. So I would like to present this plaque to the town of Mayberry, to which I am just proud to belong."
Well, aren't we all? Aren't we all just happy to belong, to be included! We can refer to this part of our baptism as incorporation. We are included, incorporated into the body of Jesus Christ. This incorporation came about as a result of a love that was determined to draw us in. And long after the act of baptism, that love holds us together without ranking us as more or less important, allows us to disagree with each other without deserting one another, and leads us to use our different gifts without any need to compare them with somebody else's gifts.
William B. Kincaid, III, And Then Came The Angel, CSS Publishing Company, Inc.
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Saved Twelve Times
Garrison Keillor tells the story of Larry the Sad Boy. Larry the Sad Boy was saved twelve times, which is an all-time record in the Lutheran Church. In the Lutheran Church there is no altar call, no organist playing "Just As I Am," and no minister with shiny hair manipulating the congregation. These are Lutherans, and they repent the same way that they sin -- discreetly and tastefully. Keillor writes, "Granted, we're born in original sin and are worthless and vile, but twelve conversions is too many. God didn't mean us to feel guilty all our lives. There comes a point when you should dry your tears and join the building committee and start grappling with the problems of the church furnace and the church roof and make church coffee and be of use."
William B. Kincaid, III And Then Came the Angel, CSS Publishing Company, Inc.
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A Higher Value than Freedom
If there’s one thing we Americans value above everything else, it is freedom. We cherish, guard and exercise our freedom, and woe be unto those who threaten it in any way. We’re even willing to go to war to defend freedom, whether it’s ours or someone else’s. We are the world’s self-appointed watchdogs of freedom.
But Jesus says there’s a higher value than freedom. The first words the writer of the Gospel of Matthew has Jesus speak are not about freedom, but about obedience to the will of God. That’s what righteousness is all about, according to the gospel writer. Matthew uses the word righteousness seven times in his story of the life of Jesus, always connecting righteousness with being obedient to the will of God.
When Jesus comes to John the Baptist to be baptized in the Jordan, John protests. "It really should be the other way around here. You should be baptizing me. Why are you doing this?" And Jesus replies, "Just do it, John; for in this way it is fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness."
Johnny Dean
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The Restaurant in Downtown Jericho
The way it happened in my mind is that he walked into this little restaurant in downtown Jericho, took a deep breath and hollered, "Repent!" Folks stopped eating mid-bite. It got so quiet you could hear the motor running in that tall machine over in the corner that kept slices of pie turning around behind the glass all day. Every eye in the place was on him, and that was what he was waiting for. He started talking, and shouting, and waving his arms, and every time someone would try to laugh at him and go back to their coconut cream pie, he would walk right over and slam a fist on their table, or just stand and stare at the pie eater until their appetite simply disappeared. All this without missing a beat of his sermon.
And what a sermon it was. He started out, "Some of you folks are from around here, aren't you? Born and raised right here? Well, that don't count for one blasted thing in God's book. Your ancestral tree might take you all the way back to Abraham himself, but as far as God is concerned, that won't pay for that cup of coffee you got sitting in front of you." He went on for quite some time, made his way from one table to the next, even the big round one in the back where the Pharisees sat at their weekly noon-time alliance meeting. People couldn't help but smile when he walked around that big round table and called them all a bunch of hissing old women who couldn't spell salvation if they had a dictionary in their hands.
Then he was done. He walked out of the door just as he had come in. Except on the way out he was not alone. Several from the restaurant walked out with him, and followed him straight to the river. From there on it was history. More and more people came, and more and more went back home to tell their friends they had better go, too. By the time they got there, the crowds were huge.
At one point in his baptizing, John looked up to see who was next in line, and when he did he froze in his tracks. There standing before him was Jesus. He recognized him immediately. This is where the story gets a bit hard for me to follow. Jesus steps up to be baptized like everyone else, but John shakes his head and says, "How can I baptize you? You ought to be baptizing me." They debate that fact for a bit and John finally gives in and baptizes him. Then, as Jesus gets out of the water, the sky opens up just like it had French doors, and this dove flies down and lands on him. Then, to confuse me even more, a voice comes out of that same door and says, "This is my Son, who I love; with him I am well pleased." And the story is over.
John B. Jamison, Time’s Up!, CSS Publishing Company
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Lost Hope
Do you know how the great composer Tchaikovsky died? There is more than one version of the story but according to one reliable source the end of Tchaikovsky's life was determined four days after one of his symphonies received an unfavorable reception in St. Petersburg. The great composer, despondent some said, already feeling ill according to others, deliberately drank a glass of unboiled water in the middle of a cholera epidemic. His friends who witnessed this were appalled. Tchaikovsky told them that he was less afraid of cholera than other illnesses. Cholera, however, did not share his opinion and it soon finished him off.
How sad. How tragic. How utterly criminal. One of the world's leading musicians snuffed out by such a fatalistic act. And yet there are people everywhere who are slowly killing themselves because they have grown hopeless about their lives. They may not drink unboiled water but they are killing themselves nonetheless. Unhealthy lifestyles, senseless risk taking, oppressive stress, and all because they have lost hope. But here is the good news for the day: Change is possible! Baptism tells us so.
King Duncan, Collected Sermons, www.Sermons.com
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A Call to Improve
In a Peanut's comic strip, Lucy is walking along the road with Charlie Brown. Charlie Brown asks her: "Lucy, are you going to make any New Year's resolutions?" Lucy hollers back at him, knocking him off his feet: "What? What for? What's wrong with me now? I like myself the way I am! Why should I change? What in the world is the matter with you, Charlie Brown? I'm all right the way I am! I don't have to improve. How could I improve? How, I ask you? How?"
Most of us know ways in which we can change. With Christ's help we want to initiate a new life. We want to be identified with his message and his ministry. Thus we embrace the way he has indicated. We accept the sacrament of baptism. Why? Because he did and he is the Lord of our life.
King Duncan, Collected Sermons, www.Sermons.com
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Want to Be Happy? by Leonard Sweet -- Matthew 3:13-17
A week before Christmas a man in his sixties went into a big toy shop and began looking around at the various displays. He returned several times to a counter that featured a little train set. He was particularly fascinated by the great sounding whistle that came from the engine as the train scurried around its oval track.
Finally, he said to the clerk who was demonstrating the toy: “I’ll take one.”
Whereupon the clerk said, “Your grandson will love it.”
“Then I’ll take two,” the man replied.
It’s one thing to take two. But it’s quite another thing to take toys, whether little-boy train sets or big-boy Hummer houses, as the measure of happiness.
Every commercial in one form or another seduces us with the notion that money can buy happiness. You want to be happy? Buy that car, wear those jeans. Consumption brings happiness. The advertising world even has us broken down into categories so they can evangelize us with the message that money busy happiness faster.
Forget soccer moms and metrosexuals . . . Here come the Denim Dads, Karma Queens, Geek Gods, Innerpreneurs, E-litists, Culture Crossers, Parentocrats, Middlemen. In the world of advertisers, you fit into one of those categories. The New York marketing firm Consumer Eyes has identified 9 influencers that are shaping the future. Their book is called Karma Queens, Geek Gods & Innerpreneurs (2007). Where one of these 9 consumer types would you fit into? (Again, if you can show on a screen the images of the celebrities that embody each one of the influencers, super!).
Innerpreneurs (think Rachel Ray)
Culture Crossers (think Gwen Stefani)
Karma Queens (think Christy Turlington)
Middlemen (think Johnny Knoxville)
Denim Dads (think Peter Saarsgard)
E-litists (think Al Gore)
Ms. Independents (think about the women from Lipstick Jungle or Cashmere Mafia)
Parentocrats (think Bree from Desperate Housewives)
Geek Gods (think your local Apple genius clerks)
What is common about each one of these 9 influencers? Money talks, and money buys happiness.
Did you read where India’s richest man, 50-year-old Mukesh Ambani, is building a house for his family in Mumbai? It’s only 60 stories high. Of course, it does include accommodations for his servants and staff . . . all 600 of them.
When money is the only thing that talks, you are listening to the gurgling, death-knell sounds of a society.
When money is the only thing that talks, kindness and compassion go for long walks.
When money is the only thing that talks, the voices of the weak and poor are drowned out…
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The Puzzle of Baptism
The baptism of Jesus was an important feast in the early church, more important than Christmas. Like Epiphany, which was one of the three important feasts, it is a celebration of the true nature of the incarnation of God. It is a feast of light which illuminates God’s nature. Baptism celebrates our identity as being formed by the aim of God, being light and novelty to the world, and our role in living in the light - what God wishes us to be.
So this Sunday we celebrate the Baptism of Jesus. I suspect that for many Christians there is a puzzle about baptism. There is something curious and almost antiquated about the act of baptism. If you ask people why they want their children baptized they would be hard pressed to say why, other than, “That’s the way we’ve always done it.” Those of us who attend church faithfully would be hard pressed to say what their baptism meant to them. Do we do it for the grandparents? Is it a cultural act? Is it a beginning to form our children in what is most basic to us - a sense of God who loves all of creation?
George Hermanson, Being Bathed in the Light
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The Connection between Baptism and Mission
There is a vital connection between baptism and mission. Another way to put it is that there is a vital connection between going down and going out. We do not play our part in the world's redemption when we climb ladders so much as when we are pulled downward. It is out of our pain that we heal. It is out of our poverty that we make others rich. It is from our ignorance that we enlighten others. It is by our brokenness that others become whole. It is from our dying that others come to life. We must follow Jesus in his descent, we must accept his downward mobility and our own if we are to be his true disciples, if we are to allow resurrection in our lives.
In this terrible demand that we go down with Jesus in downward mobility, that we go down with him in the murky waters of the river and the dark waters of death -- in this terrible demand there is good news for us. For we already know what it means to go down. Perhaps you went down at some time in the past -- an unhappy childhood, a broken marriage, a career failure, a horrible bereavement. Perhaps you find yourself down at the bottom right now -- estranged from a loved one, troubled by an aging body, upset at a world that's changed too fast. You already know what it means to go down. You feel confused, ashamed, and without any power. Your downward descent leaves you groggy.
The good news is this: there is power in that downward descent. Not power to grab and keep yourself, but power to use in serving other people. Whatever it is that has taken you to the bottom has been a baptism – if you stand out of the way and let it work. The death you have experienced can be life for someone else. That baptism of yours, horrible and unwelcome though it was, can lead you to some unexpected mission where Christ will rise again in you and your neighbor.
Charles Hoffacker, Downward Mobility
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Both Baptisms
A couple weeks ago I had breakfast with a man who had served with the Marines in Vietnam. This man now operates a small business here in town. He's also involved in ministry at a prison in Macomb County. This man is not ordained, but he is baptized, baptized with the water in the name of the Trinity, and baptized also through his Vietnam service. That battlefield experience took him down, down to the bottom, down to the place of mud and stones, of blood and death.
I don't know about you, but if I were a prison inmate sentenced to spend years inside the same four walls, I would want someone like that man there to help me. He can help a prisoner deal with the hell of confinement because he has experienced the greater hell of the Vietnam battlefield. His present ministry builds upon both of his baptisms.
Each of us has had experiences of descent. Each of us has gone down to what has been for us the place of mud and stones, of blood and death. It is these baptisms that have empowered us for our ministry. Our downward mobility has been a time, strange to say, when the divine voice affirms us and the Spirit enlivens us.
Charles Hoffacker, Downward Mobility
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Accepted Warts and All
The next part of Matthew’s description is, to my way of thinking, one of the most wonderful statements in the Gospels. A voice rings out from heaven, and for everyone to hear, says, “This is my Son, the Beloved, with whom I am well pleased.”
Everyone in this church this morning is someone’s child. And if you’ve been alive very many years, I promise that there have been times in your life when you craved hearing those words from your own father. Most of us have had times where we rebelled or for some other reason the relationship got strained with our parents. Or perhaps you were in the situation where the parent was just lost to you, either physically or emotionally and as a result those words never reached expression. Or perhaps the parent thought he made the words plain to you, but somehow you two were just not speaking the same language. “This is my son, the Beloved, with whom I am well pleased.” These words — spoken so seldom by most of us parents and longed for so often by all children — affirm not only that we are loved, which is a huge affirmation, but they also affirm that we are accepted and acceptable, just as we are, as my grandfather used to say, “warts and all.”
John Bedingfield, Belonging to Something Greater
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An Accelerated Pace of Life
We live in a microwave world. A hurry-up, get-to-the-point, move-it, move-it, move-it, world! We want what we want and we want it now! We want freezer-to-table meals in 15 minutes at the outside; we want 0 to 60 acceleration in 8.5 seconds; we want the phone answered in 3 rings or we're hanging up; we want that personal pan pizza in 5 minutes or we're outta here.
No one reads classical literature any more. Why bother when you've got Barnes and Noble, Monarch Notes and Klassic Komix? Or, if you really must, there's always the Evelyn Wood Speed Reading Course. (I'm reminded of Woody Allen's comment about that course. The comedian said, "I took the Evelyn Wood Speed Reading Course. I read War and Peace in an hour and a half. It's about Russia.")
The accelerated pace of life has spawned new attitudes and new behaviors. I'll mention only three.
(1) Child psychologists now talk and write about "The Hurried Child": the accelerated offspring who is prodded by well-meaning, well-intending parents to hurry up, grow up, move on to the next stage of development and excel all the while (and anything less than the 90th percentile is an embarrassment). The consequence: children are robbed of one of God's most precious gifts -- the unique and irreplaceable gift of their own childhood. The message the child receives: "What I am is no good. They'll love me when I make them proud."
(2) The idea of a life-long commitment has become almost unfathomable. The "now" -- the present moment -- is all that counts, and instant gratification is the name of the game. Two months from now is the distant future, so how can anyone seriously promise, "till death us do part" or "forsaking all others, keep me only unto thee"?
(3) This quote from the book Time Wars by Jeremy Rifkin:
Many people have so accommodated themselves to the new sped-up time frame of the computer that they have become impatient with the slower durations they must contend with in the everyday clock culture. In clinical case studies, psychologists have observed that computer compulsives are much more intolerant of behavior that is ambiguous, digressive or tangential.
In their interaction with spouses, family and acquaintances, they are often terse, preferring simple yes-no responses. They are impatient with individuals who are reflective or meditative. (Try preaching to a roomful of them!)
Mark WM Radecke, God in Flesh Made Manifest, CSS Publishing
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The Majesty of God
Roy L. Smith tells about an aged and scholarly minister with a flair for astronomy who spent the night on a California mountaintop with a group of young men from his church. It so happened that a little after midnight two great stars came into conjunction, and the dear old man went from sleeping bag to sleeping bag, shaking them and shouting, “Get up! Get up! Don’t miss it! Don’t let God Almighty put on such a show as this for just this old mule and me!”
Anyone who is sensitive to the beauty of nature sees God daily. When was it that you first realized the majesty of God? Perhaps it was at the birth of your first child. What greater miracle in all of creation is there than this--the birth of a new human being? As we watch that child learn to smile and to make sounds--then to talk and to walk and finally to grow into a mature person, we are led to the dramatic realization that there is more to life than mere physics and chemistry. Behind creation stands a Creator. When was it that you first realized the majesty of God?
King Duncan, Collected Sermons, www.Sermons.com