Sermon for 12 January 2025, Baptism of the Lord Year C, Luke 3.15-17, 21-22

Let us pray:  Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of our hearts be acceptable in your sight, O Lord, our rock and our redeemer. Amen

Do you recall the moment in the myth of King Arthur when a youth walked out of the assembled crowd and was the only one able to pull a magical sword out of a stone? The spectacular act was the sign that here was the next King and leader of his people in a time of desperate need. He, King Arthur, must have already possessed the specific personal qualities to make him a great war leader, but in that special moment, he moved from being an ordinary young man, just a member of the crowd, to an extraordinary King.

The crowd who had come to see the drama and baptisms in the River Jordan by John the Baptist would have experienced a similar shift in perception when one of their own, who had probably travelled with them into the wilderness, revealed that he too was extraordinary.

At that moment, all the rumours and conjecture about whether or not John the Baptist was the Messiah just vapourised. Poof! The Messiah was clearly among them, still dripping from his baptism, and his name was Jesus.

So, what happened? Well, just like everyone else, Jesus lined up along the muddy bank of the Jordan and waited his turn to be dunked in the murky green water. So far, so ordinary.

To outward appearances, he was nothing special, just an ordinary bloke. There were remarkable signs to be found, though, for those who cared to look. It had started with his miraculous birth, for we are told that he was conceived by the Holy Spirit, and angels filled the skies to proclaim his arrival to shepherds. That’s not quite so ordinary.

Jesus was one of the people, one of the crowd queuing to be baptised. We don’t believe that he needed baptism to be washed clean of his sins so why did he do it? Perhaps he wanted to share the experience like everyone else, and so submitted to the process. You could say that he was still waiting for his time.

“Do you repent? Do you turn to God?” This quality of being like us, right down to following the crowd to the Jordan, gives Jesus the insight to intercede for us when we pray and seek mercy from God. He knows what makes us tick; this is truly God with us, not a remote or aloof God looking down from heaven at us, looking like wee ant-like humans from such a distance.

Having made the commitment to turn to God, Jesus was inspired to pray to his Father in Heaven. This was the moment when everything changed for Jesus and us. The clouds rolled back, revealing a bright shaft of sun, and the Holy Spirit descended on him. The crowds saw a dove hover and rest on him; Jesus heard the voice of God: ‘You are my son, the Beloved. With you, I am well pleased.”

Wow! He was 30 when he received his life-affirming, life-changing confirmation of what he had always known: he was the Son of God. He could not return to his ordinary life, so he embarked on his mission and ministry, heading first for 40 days in the wilderness. What a sudden change! This, this was his time!

From then on, his extraordinary purpose was to spread God’s Good News. He was by no means the first to bring this message. Even John had told people to change their lives, to find forgiveness through baptism and to prepare themselves for the imminent arrival of the Messiah. There was a difference; Jesus offered a message of God’s love and forgiveness, healing those who suffered.

However, this baptism is not like the baptisms in our own time. I am sure you have seen many over the years. How many times has a beam of light suddenly shone on the baby’s head, a voice boomed out, and a bird descended from the rafters? Never? No, I haven’t seen it either. Mind you, we are not baptising the Son of God, so we should not expect such drama every time we welcome a child or an adult into the Body of Christ. So that’s fair.

But the other reading this morning from Luke’s sequel, the Act of the Apostles, is also about baptism. It describes an early movement of Jesus believers trying to understand what to do next for people who were joyfully accepting the Gospel of hope and love. The most natural next step was to baptise the new believers.

But I feel a bit nervous about their expectations. They anticipated that the person would be filled with the Holy Spirit immediately after baptism and begin speaking in tongues. There would be a mini-Pentecost at each Baptism, and if that didn’t happen, then somehow the Baptism was… almost faulty.

I have only seen a person talking in tongues once, and it wasn’t after a baptism. Are we doing IT wrong? We baptise in the name of the Father, the Son AND the Holy Spirit and, as per the Creed, we acknowledge one baptism for the forgiveness of sins. After 2000 years of thinking and reflecting, we would no longer do what those early Apostles did. We would not send someone to repeat or add to the baptismal process until we finally witness proof of the presence of the Holy Spirit.

The difference is a matter of faith and understanding. In some denominations, you cannot be considered to have been saved or come to true faith until you have spoken in tongues. I fear that in the wrong hands, there could be a risk of spiritual abuse, for speaking in tongues is not the only gift that the Holy Spirit has to share.

St Paul was not completely impressed with speaking in tongues, either. He felt that without someone else present who was blessed with the gift of interpretation, it was somewhat wasted. Those early groups discovered that the effect of the Holy Spirit living within us after baptism results in various talents. The variety is as mixed as the members in each local church or Body of Christ.

It is not as simple as you might think to find a definitive list of those gifts of the Holy Spirit; the shortest list includes seven gifts as described by the Prophet Isaiah, and the longest includes about twenty-seven!

The most commonly occurring ones include hospitality, kindness, generosity, wisdom, knowledge, healing, faith, an ability to do miracles, prophesy, spiritual discernment, speaking in tongues and lastly, interpretation of the same. St. Paul explains it clearly in his 1st letter to the church at Corinth, which was busy forming an unhealthy hierarchy based on those gifts. Here’s what he said:

‘There are different kinds of gifts. But they are all given to believers by the same Spirit. There are different ways to serve. But they all come from the same Lord. There are different ways the Spirit works. But the same God is working in all these ways and in all people. The Holy Spirit is given to each of us in a special way for the good of all.’

How do baptism and the gifts of the Holy Spirit help us in our search for the extraordinary in the ordinary? It is all about our attitude as we turn to Christ.

Consider what we do in the second half of our worship each week. The time when we gather to talk, encourage and have a cuppa. Did you ever consider that seated amongst us, with the people, is Christ? Every single thing we do in that time reflects the gifts given to this community by the Holy Spirit.

Unlike Arthur pulling Excalibur from the stone, not all gifts arrive spectacularly or dramatically. Most tiptoe in quietly and become part of our Christian identity. Later, we will gather around the long brown tables with our mugs in hand. Can you please pause and notice how that action echoes how we share communion in this church when we move to gather around a different table?

Can you then take a chance to reflect on what you do, what you give, what you receive and also, how you feel. Serving morning tea, laughing or commiserating with others, passing the biscuits, sharing news, and including each other in conversations. This is the practical outpouring of God’s love in action. You don’t need to wait for someone to speak in tongues – you are seeing the presence of God’s Spirit amongst us! And that, my friends, is extraordinary!                                   The Lord be with you.