St. Michaels Catholic Church at Corner of W. High St. and Antwerp Dr., Hicksville, OH 43526 US - Baptism of the Lord [2004]

Fr. Charlie's Book - Entering The Heart of God | Other Materials from Fr. Charlie

Isaiah 42-1-4,6-7; Titus 2:11-14, 3:4-7; Luke 3:15-16,21-22 To understand baptism, particularly Christ’s baptism by John in the River Jordan, we need to look at the big picture. We need to go all the way back to the beginning, to Genesis, to God’s actions in creating the world. In the Book of Genesis we read: “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. Now the earth was a formless void, there was darkness over the deep, and God’s spirit hovered over the water.” (Genesis 1:1-2) “Yahweh God fashioned man of dust from the soil. Then he breathed into his nostrils a breath of life, and thus man became a living being.” (Genesis 2:7) I want you to note three things here. 1) The primal element was water – “the deep” as we just heard; 2) God’s spirit working over the water and upon it; 3) God’s spirit, His breath, was breathed into the man making him a living being. Let’s consider water for a moment. Our bodies are 95% water. Most of the earth is filled with water. Without water everything living dies, while with water life springs into being. When you were shaped in your mother’s womb you lived because of the water in her womb. It was through her water that your little body received oxygen, another element without which you would die. When you were born all that water flowed out and the doctor spanked you on your little behind and you gasped for breath. It was then that you took your first breath. If you don’t breathe, well, you don’t live. Water and breath – they were the elements in which God made the world and they were the elements that gave you life. Let’s fast-forward now to Pentecost and the apostles huddled together in that Upper Room in Jerusalem. Christ had risen but they were still “in the womb”, so to speak. They were hiding, fearful, and immobilized. Then all of a sudden the breath of God came swooping down upon them in the form of a mighty wind, and the Church was born. God’s life filled them and they went bursting out into the world to proclaim all that God was doing in His risen Christ. With all of that noted we can begin now to take all of these images and paint a picture of what God is doing in baptism, beginning with Christ’s baptism by John in the River Jordan. Here we find the primal element, water; here we find the breath of God, God’s Holy Spirit, descending upon Jesus of Nazareth and giving Him a new life, namely His life as the Christ, God’s Chosen One, God’s Anointed One. It’s another Genesis, isn’t it?! And so it is with Pentecost. And so it is with your own baptism. Let’s look now at your baptism. Water again. The Holy Spirit again. Another womb again. This time it is the baptismal font, the womb of our Holy Mother the Church. In the waters of her womb we are refashioned from being a natural human being into being a person chosen by God to be His son, to be His daughter. It’s Genesis all over again. It’s Easter all over again. It’s Pentecost all over again. God is at work fashioning a new human being, one in which He himself lives, one who will receive the Body and Blood of His Son, one who will be filled anew with His Holy Spirit to make the Church, the Body of Christ, real in the world around you. Baptism, you see, is not something we do. No. It’s something God does. In it He starts out afresh to make a new Adam and a new Eve, a new son and a new daughter with whom He can refashion and reshape the world. In baptism God gives you a name; He calls you by name; He gives you a special life to live with Him, a life in which He lives and works in you. The word “baptism” comes from a Greek word that means immersion. John the Baptist, in a rite that denoted death and rebirth, immersed Jesus of Nazareth in the waters of the River Jordan. Death was signified by His inability to breathe while immersed. Rebirth was signified by drawing in breath upon the rebirth of coming up out of the waters of death and destruction. Jesus was signaling a rebirth in God’s new creation. His humanity, under the action of the Holy Spirit, was born from the waters of Mother Earth into a new life. His old humanity, descended from Adam and Eve, was humanity suffering under sin’s death and destruction. His new humanity resulted from God’s Spirit brooding over the waters breathing new life into Him in His resurrection. John the Baptist’s rite signaled what would happen when Jesus became the Christ of the Resurrection on Easter Sunday morning. Jesus was immersed – buried -- in our sinful humanity only to emerge victorious in a new Spirit-filled humanity in His resurrection. It is into all of this that we are immersed when we are baptized for baptism incorporates us into the Spirit-filled resurrected humanity of Jesus Christ. Joined and incorporated into Him He takes us back home to our Father in heaven. We are confirmed in the Holy Spirit that raised Him from the dead. In Holy Communion we are joined into His Spirit-filled resurrected humanity to be nourished, fed and strengthened. Baptized, confirmed and joined in Holy Communion to Christ Jesus, we are initiated into the life of the Holy Trinity. Baptism, then, is not simply a pretty ceremony we do in church. Baptism is God acting upon us and within us. Baptism is God making us over into His new creation, making us over into being His sons and daughters in His only begotten Son Jesus, the Christ. The waters of baptism that make us holy were waters that He made holy by His baptism - and not only by His baptism, but by His passion, suffering, death and resurrection. For we do not make ourselves holy, God does. It is God who justifies us, we don’t. It is God who sanctifies us. We don’t make ourselves holy. It is God who saves us, we don’t. It is God who puts His life into us. It is God who is re-creating us. We are reborn into His life. Live, then, in the glorious freedom of the sons and daughters of God. Live the life God has given us and join us in revealing God’s kingdom here on earth as it is in heaven, for God has given your life infinite meaning and purpose. You are His sons and daughters in whom He is well pleased. In you His Christ enters into and redeems our world.

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