Sermon: "Jesus Also Had Been Baptized," Baptism of Our Lord, January 12, 2025

The Baptism of Christ Giotto di Bondone, 1303-1305

Scripture: Luke 3:1-22

Preacher: Rev. Ryan Slifka

A friend of mine, a fellow Minister, was once telling me about a time he had coffee with a respected elder of the church who had since passed. This elder told him all about his baptism in the tropical waters of the Gulf of Mexico. My friend thought it was weird that he wasn’t baptized as a baby, considering most Canadians his age were. But then he told him he was baptized as a baby. This baptism was actually his third baptism. He was baptized as a baby, but couldn’t remember it or make the decision for himself. So he was baptized again as a teenager at a revival. Problem is, he didn’t really mean it the second time. All his friends were doing it, so he just said the words. And since he didn’t repent, he drank, he gambled, had pre-marital relations, and didn’t attend church, he figured that that one didn’t count either. God would always know the difference. So he had himself dunked again in tropical blue when they were on vacation.

When my friend asked him his reasoning, he cited John in this text, be forgiven, repent and be baptized. On that day he sincerely decided to turn his life around, he told my friend. On that day he truly had his sins washed away. And, turning away from his old life. He committed himself to God for good. From that point onward he was a new man. It took three tries. But this time, he said, his baptism finally stuck.

Today we celebrate the Baptism of Jesus in the Christian calendar. Remembering when Jesus himself was baptized by John. Which makes episodes like this one important to think about.

Many of us here were baptized as children—did it stick?

Some of us were baptized as young adults or full adults, but had no idea what they were getting into. Which is the category I happen to fall into. Did my baptism stick?

Or some of us have yet to be baptized, and may be considering baptism for ourselves, or for our children. We might wonder whether we should go through with it. And if we do, will it stick? What kind of difference will it make.

To answer these questions, let’s take a look at the text from today.

Last time we heard from John in Luke’s gospel is way back in December. When the angel Gabriel visited his dad, Zechariah and told him John would set the stage for the coming of the Messiah by turning people back to God. Now he’s all grown up, out in the wilderness, doing exactly that. He convenes his class in the desert, calling people to come out, repent, and be forgiven. Getting baptized, getting dunked in the river Jordan as a sign of their starting over. Baptism features heavily in John’s ministry.

What, according to John is baptism?

Well, at its core, John says, is a need to start over. Why? Because wrath is on the horizon. The Messiah John’s prepping God’s people for is descending like a divine lumberjack, traipsing through the forest of humanity to knock down any tree that doesn’t produce fruit. Meaning that they need to repent, they need to turn away from their old ways and start living right. If they don’t wanna get chopped.

And, you might not have expected it, but he attracts huge crowds, of all kinds, for a dose of his strong medicine:

The children of pious parents are told to stop resting on the laurels of their inheritance, and to get their lives in line.

Those with two coats are told to give one away.

Tax collectors are prohibited from squeezing the poor, to quit lining their pockets with human misery.

And dirty cops are barred from squeezing citizens. To be satisfied with the wages they’ve already got instead.

John is so adamant about avoiding the coming judgment, in fact, that he even calls out Herod—the son of the famous King Herod we heard about last week—for marrying Herodias, his niece. Which is, yes, gross to begin with. But it also violates the law of God, found in Leviticus 18:16 and 20:21. To which Herod responds by locking him up.

No one, not even the most powerful, is exempt from John’s call to repent. Everyone must change. Unless they wanna get hit with the Lord’s wrath.

So, according to John, baptism is the opportunity for anyone and everyone to receive forgiveness for what they’ve done, to have their past washed away. So they can start over and finally do right. And stay right. If you want it to stick.

Now, in a lot of ways this makes sense. We have a deep need for change. For radical change, even. Whether we’re Christians or not, most of us have some sense that our lives need some kind of turnaround. Some of us are caught in cycles of destructive habits, some of have failed greatly and continue to fail greatly. Some of us have wounded others or have been wounded and can’t seem to recover. We all have something. And, of course, it’s more than just us. Society and our planet seem to be off the rails at times. If it’s not headed to hell, it can seem like it’s headed off a cliff. It’s equally obvious that our world needs repentance, some kind of great turnaround, too. This kind of baptism takes seriously our urgent need for change. For us to be reborn. Lest we face dire consequences. In a lot of ways it makes sense.

It makes sense. And yet… And yet, I wonder if it’s rather naive. Not naive about our need for change, but naive our human ability to change ourselves.

I don’t know about you, but I know myself. I’ve always identified with the Apostle Paul, who says in his letter to the Romans “I can will what is right, but I cannot do it. For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I do.”[i] I don’t have the power within myself to elicit that kind of change, no matter how sincerely I may want it. It reminds me of a story told about the great Swiss theologian Karl Barth. Barth entertained a group of very pious evangelical students who were both shocked and abhorred by the fact that he smoked a pipe, and regularly drank beer at the pub. One exhorted him “drown the Old Adam,” meaning to repent, and give up such habits. “Drown the old Adam.” To which he replied, “I’ve tried… but the rascal can swim.”

While John’s baptism takes our need for change seriously, it seems to me it’s rather naive. It’s like being at the bottom of a hole, and promising to God to claw our own way out. And if that’s the case, I—at least—have failed to hold up my end of the bargain. Rather miserably. Even though I’ve been baptized, the Old Adam… the rascal in me can still swim. What’s the use of baptism—or Christianity for that matter—if that’s all it is? If that’s the case I don’t know if baptism ever sticks.

Luckily, however, my strength and willingness, your strength and willingness, aren’t all there is to it. Let’s look at the text again.

We’re told that when all the people were baptized, Jesus was too. Why? If Jesus is the Messiah, the only Son of God. The one who, in the words of the letter to the Hebrews, is like us in all ways except sin,[ii] why’s he getting baptized with sinners for the forgiveness of sin? Seems to me that’s the last thing Jesus needs.

Well, the answer is an act of divine solidarity. Solidarity. Jesus didn’t come only to give us directions on the good and the bad. And he didn’t come just to evaluate us when we succeed or fail. But he came to give us himself. He came to be with us, to join us in our humanity, knowing our weakness.

Jesus is baptized, not for himself, but for us. To join the crowd, us, in the troubled water that is human existence. To do for us what we couldn’t do for ourselves. In him, the Creator of heaven and earth became immersed in our entire lives, from birth, and especially to death. To forgive us, to strengthen us, and to save us. In dying on the cross, Jesus died our death with us, was baptized with fire on the cross to purge the world of its sin, in order to raise us with him out of the sea of death.[iii] To the joy of everlasting life. He came to take what’s rotten in our lives, and to give us what’s pure and beautiful and good in his. In baptism he claims you and me as his own, and gives us his Spirit. In baptism God says that we are what Jesus is—beloved sons and daughters, children, with whom God is well pleased.

Baptism is not about our strength, but our lack thereof. It’s for us when we realize that we can’t help ourselves, or fix ourselves, or save ourselves. We have our children baptized, because we know we don’t have the strength to make their lives turn out either. You ever heard that phrase, “God helps those who help themselves”? The gospel is the opposite: The God we’ve got is one who helps only those who can’t. We are baptized because we need all the help we can get, and it means God is there to give it. In our inability to stick with God, Baptism is God’s pledge to stick with us, and stand by us, to be God with us and for us forever. Baptism is God saying to you, and to me, you’re mine. And all you have to for it to be yours is believe. 

John was right, of course. We all need to change. We need to repent, to turn our lives around. Our world needs to be turned around. If you can do it yourself, if you can claw your way into the kind of life you should lead, into goodness and God’s graces—first of all, I’d like to see that—but if you can do it, then Baptism, well, forget baptism. It won’t do anything for you. But if you know yourself. If you long for life to be different, you long not only for forgiveness, but strength you can’t muster yourself, then baptism… it’s for you.

Because it means this: it means that the Lord of heaven and earth has made you, along with this countless multitude we call the church, his own forever.

It means he is with you through your joys, your trials and tribulations by his Holy Spirit, and his strength and comfort are yours. Right here, right now. Meaning not that you must repent. But you can repent, your life can be turned around. No matter how deep you’ve sunk, he has thrown you a perpetual lifeline.

And finally, it means you are forgiven, that anything you have every done has been washed away. And any condemnation you’re owed has been washed away with it.

If you’ve been baptized, then remember your baptism—and be grateful. No need for a second or third. It stuck the first time.

If you haven’t yet been baptized, then maybe it’s time to finally get wet. And claim what’s already yours. And when you do, know it’ll stick.

In the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit. AMEN. 

[i]  Romans 7:18b-19, NRSV.

[ii] Hebrews 4:15.

[iii] “For Jesus the Baptism in the Jordan is a baptism ‘with the Holy Spirit’, the baptism of the cross is a baptism ‘with fire.’ The first means solidarity with sinners who need cleansing, the second burns away the sin of the whole world.” Hans Urs Von Balthasar, “Luke 3:15, 21-22,” in The Light of the Word: Brief Reflections on the Sunday Readings (San Francisco: Ignatius, 1992), 268.