Baptism of the Lord.

IS.42:1-7; Acts 10:34-38; Mt.3:13-17

The Christmas season, comes to an end with the feast of the Baptism of Our Lord. Christmas is the feast of God’s self-revelation to the Jews and Epiphany celebrates God’s self-revelation to the Gentiles. At his baptism in the Jordan, Christ reveals himself to repentant sinners. The liturgical season of Christmas comes to conclusion this Sunday with the celebration of the Baptism of the Lord.
Baptism had been practiced for centuries among the Jews as a ritual equivalent to our confession. Converts were also expected to take this bath before entering Judaism. The Orthodox Jews still retain the rite. John preached that such a bath was a necessary preparation for the cataclysm that would be wrought by the coming Messiah.

John’s baptism was a baptism of repentance: people who were moved by his preaching to change their ways went out to the river to be baptized by him. Thus they symbolized their need to finish with their old ways and turn over a new leaf. Jesus joined the crowd to show complete solidarity with sinners; he sat and ate with sinners, shared his life with them, defended them against heartless religious authorities who would call them unclean and cast them out. He did not come like a firebrand yelling God’s vengeance on sinners, but preaching mercy of God to repentant sinners, though did not mince words with the arrogant hypocrites. As Isaiah said he will not break a bruised reed, or quench the dimly burning wick. Or he will not enforce ‘the eye for an eye or a tooth for a tooth’ principle. On the contrary as the Baptist said: he will baptize with the holy spirit leading people on the way of transformation. In his baptism when he identified himself with humanity, he included us in his righteousness.

When we were baptized we experienced God’s love and forgiveness. It was a time of beginning of change, inviting us to figure out what that involves. Baptism saves, but it is only a beginning of God’s saving activity; not the end of saving activity of God, like many other denominations believe, calling themselves fully saved. Baptism is only the gateway to  God’s saving activity.

Most of us dipped the fingers of our right hands into the holy water font and blessed ourselves when we came into Church today. Why ? This blessing is supposed to remind us of our Baptism. And so when I bless myself with the Holy water, I should be thinking of the fact that I am a child of God; that I have been redeemed by the Cross of Christ; that I have been made a member of God’s family and that I have been washed, forgiven, cleansed and purified by the blood of the Lamb.

The 13th century King of France,S t.Louise IX, insisted that the grand celebration of his birthday should be held on the day of his baptism, and not on his birthday proper. His argument was that Baptism was the beginning of a life that would continue for eternity in the everlasting glory of heaven.
There is a folk tale from India that summarizes our thoughts on baptism’s power. There was a good king who ruled wisely and 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 a field. And it became a seed giving life beyond itself, eventually turning into a vast field of hope and nourishment to others.  When the father returned years later, he asked his daughters what they had done with their grains of rice. Though he was polite with 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 the 3rd daughter’s wisdom that he responded with delight. Taking the crown off his head, he placed it on hers, saying, Beloved, you alone has learned the meaning of power. From that day onward that daughter ruled the kingdom. Our baptism helps us to be one with Christ and to grow in Christ. Like that 3rd daughter who developed the gift manifold, we need also to increase the power of baptism in our life by fulfilling the promises we made to God.

Let us ask Our Lord today to make us faithful to our baptismal promises, helping us to put on the mind of Christ and grow to the stature of Christ.