The River of Life 1-7-24
The River of Life
Acts 19:1-7; Mark 1:4-11
Acts 19:1-7
While Apollos was in Corinth, Paul passed through the interior regions and came to Ephesus, where he found some disciples. He said to them, “Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you became believers?” They replied, “No, we have not even heard that there is a Holy Spirit.” Then he said, “Into what then were you baptized?” They answered, “Into John’s baptism.” Paul said, “John baptized with the baptism of repentance, telling the people to believe in the one who was to come after him, that is, in Jesus.” On hearing this, they were baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus. When Paul had laid his hands on them, the Holy Spirit came upon them, and they spoke in tongues and prophesied— altogether there were about twelve of them.
Mark 1:4-11
John the baptizer appeared in the wilderness, proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. And people from the whole Judean countryside and all the people of Jerusalem were going out to him, and were baptized by him in the river Jordan, confessing their sins. Now John was clothed with camel’s hair, with a leather belt around his waist, and he ate locusts and wild honey. 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. I have baptized you with water; but he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit.” In those days Jesus came from Nazareth of Galilee and was baptized by John in the Jordan. And just as he was coming up out of the water, he saw the heavens torn apart and the Spirit descending like a dove on him. And a voice came from heaven, “You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased.”
Prayer –
There is a book entitled The Patron Saint of Liars by a young author named Ann Patchett. It is a story of Rose Clinton and her daughter Cecilia, who live at St Elizabeth’s Home for Unwed Mothers in Habit, KY. Rose is the cook and Cecilia is the darling of the place, petted and mothered by all the young women who will give up their own babies for adoption. One day another young girl shows up about Cecilia’s age and her name is Lorraine – skinny with a head of red curls who is scared to death as she waits to be interviewed by Mother Corinne, the head nun in charge of the home. Cecilia decides to help Lorraine out with some words of advice.
“The guy who got you pregnant,” she tells Lorraine. “Don’t say he’s dead. Everybody does that and it makes Mother Corrine crazy.” Lorraine sits on her hands and is quiet for a moment, “I was going to try that,” she says. “So what do I tell her?” “I don’t know,” Cecilia replies, “Tell her the truth. Or tell her you don’t remember.” “What did you tell her?” Lorraine asks and Cecilia is speechless, frozen as a new realization hits her. It was because one of them thought she was pregnant mother waiting to give up her child for adoption as well. Lorraine thought Cecilia was one of those weak people who had made bad decisions that had derailed their lives, who had done something so shameful that their families had packed them up to live with strangers until the evidence could be put up for adoption. Cecilia thought for a moment, theologically speaking, that she was one of those sinners, when she had done absolutely nothing wrong.
It wasn’t that she disliked sinners. She had grown up with them. She was friendly and helpful and gave them good advice. She just never expected to be mistaken for one of them, because in her own mind she was of another order of being. She was a virgin, and she thought it was something that everyone could see.
An opposite kind of thing happened that day when Jesus showed up at the Jordan to be baptized by John. The place was teeming with sinners – faulty, sorry, guilty human beings – who hoped against hope that John could clean them up and turn their lives around. If you have ever read the arrest record in the newspaper, then you know the kinds of things most of them were guilty of – drunk driving, bad checks, petty larceny, assault. Some were notorious sinners, and some were for crimes of the heart known only to themselves, but none of them had illusions of their own innocence. They had come to be cleaned. They knew the were unclean.
Then Jesus showed up and got in line with them. No one knew anything about him yet. In Mark’s gospel, there are no accounts of Jesus’ birth. His life began with his baptism, sort of ironic if you think about for a moment as our lives begin anew with baptism as well. Jesus simply took his place in line and waited his turn, but later, after the heavens were torn apart and the voice from heaven made clear who he was, there was a lot of chattering going on. What was he doing in that crowd of sinners, looking and acting like one of them? What did he have to be sorry about, and why was God’s Beloved submitting himself to a scruffy character like John?
The Christian church has never been comfortable with the baptism of Jesus. Compare the accounts across the four gospels and you can’t miss the dis-ease of the authors. Matthew elaborates on Mark’s story by adding that John tried to talk Jesus out of being baptized; Luke will not even come out and say that John was the baptizer. The fourth gospel is even more ticklish in that John bears witness to seeing the Spirit descend live a dove upon Jesus, but didn’t mention a word about a baptism at all. Scholars say all this embarrassment is our surest proof that Jesus really was baptized by John, because when someone tells you something that isn’t in their best interest, then you can be reasonably sure it is true.
If Jesus would have been listening to modern day PR people for the Christian church, he would have been more like Cecilia wanted to be – a friend to sinners, a kind and loving helper, but never mistaken for one of them. His handlers would have never let him be baptized. He could have stood on the shore and said yes to those climbing down into the river of life to be cleaned. He could have held out his hand to help those struggling out of the water, given them a towel to dry off, a pat on the back of affirmation, but under no circumstances should he have gone down into that dirty water to himself, unless it was to tap John on the should and say, “I’ve got this, go chill out and have some locusts and honey.”
Even if he were Beloved as the voice proclaimed, even if he was innocent, even if his intentions were good, it was ruinous to his reputation to plunge into be baptized. Who was going to believe that he was just because he cared about those people and refused to separate himself from them? Who was not going to think that perhaps he had a few teeny-weeny things to get off his chest before he went public in his ministry?
We spend an awful lot of time in the Christian church talking about God’s love for sinners while at the same time we do everything we can to separate ourselves from those people who are sinners. Guilt by association and all that. Only Jesus – our leader and our Lord – didn’t seem to concerned about that. In him, God’s being with us included God being in the dirty river of life with us, in the flesh with us, in the sorrow of repentance and the joy of new life with us. So what if he didn’t have anything of his own to be sorry about?
When we confess our sins, our brokenness, we do not simply confess our own personal sins. We kneel and talk to God about the sins of humankind – all the things we, as people, have done and failed to do, all the ways we have fled from the love of God because we are afraid of being seen, known, and changed. And when we celebrate the gift of new life here, we don’t do it simply for ourselves but for all of humankind. We say our alleluias on behalf of all those who have discovered hope in the midst of despair, light in the midst of darkness, life in the midst of death. Nothing we do here is a private matter between us and God. Like Jesus in the river, this is something we do in union – in communion – with all of humankind.
One of baptismal questions is ‘will you seek and serve Christ in all persons, loving your neighbor as yourself?’ Another is, ‘will you strive for justice and peace among all people, and respect the dignity of every human being?’ Whenever we welcome new members into the household of God through baptism, in covenant, we say to them this is who we are; we believe in God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit; we take our place at a table that is always open and welcoming and grow strong on God’s nourishing grace; we never give up on ourselves in what we say or do as we proclaim the good news that God has come among us in the flesh. As we do, we invite every person to step into the river with Jesus, so that their beings are wrapped up with all other human beings, the well ones and the hurt ones, the brave ones and the weak ones, the successful ones and the ones who can’t seem to get anything right.
All of us who have gone before them have done the same thing. Whether we were carried in our mother’s arms or arrived on our own steam, we have entered into the river of life with Jesus and all of his flawed kin. There is not a chance we will be mistaken for one of them. Because we are them, thanks be to God, as they are us – Christ’s own forever – amen.
Adapted Barbara Brown Taylor – River of Life