First Reading: Genesis 1:1-5
Psalm: Psalm 29
Second Reading: Act 19:1-7
Gospel: Mark 1:4-11
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In case I haven’t been able to share the greeting with you yet, Happy New Year! Welcome to 2012!
With a new year come new beginnings. A new budget of finances, a year of new goals, new resolutions, new hopes and dreams for the year ahead all come with the month of January.
Beginnings are exciting and uncertain times. Most certainly 2012 will end with life changes from how 2012 began and then again some things might not change all that much.
Beginnings come as a change but those are subtle, allowing life to unfold, to flower and bloom to take shape and form.
The Scripture lessons today talk about beginnings. From Genesis, “In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.” And the beginning of the good news for Mark’s Gospel is John the baptizer in the wilderness baptizing Jesus in the River Jordan. And the beginning in the reading from Acts, for the early church was a baptism of repentance of turning one’s life around toward God, of this new life in Christ Jesus.
Today, we remember our baptism as well. Like John, we too, can give thanks in our own baptisms of drowning the sin around us, of being united with Christ’s death and in His resurrection! Baptism is the beginning of the Christian life; it is entrance into the Christian community. And like all new beginnings, baptism for Jesus and us brings new hopes, new resolutions and exciting uncertain times. Jesus’ baptism is said to be the start of his ministry. If Jesus had an ordination this was most certainly the time, when the heavens are ripped open and God’s voice announces: “You are my son, the beloved, with you I am well pleased.”
There are some common themes I notice among the various beginnings of creation, of baptism, of John in the wilderness, of a new year, of our own baptism of repentance.
Beyond the obvious notion of a fresh start and a new creation at work, one similar thread of the beginning is the voice.
At the beginning of a new year, the shouts ring out from Times Square in New York across the country, if not snoring there are at least few “woo hoo” hollers and “welcome to a new year!” greetings.
The beginning of the new life of a baby is marked by a voice. Doctors and parents rejoice at the screaming cry of a baby as they are delivered, to know that they are indeed alive and breathing!
At the beginning of creation in Genesis, is marked by the voice of God saying, “Let there be light”.
At the baptism, Christians are named individually and into the family of God.
As Paul baptized early Christians, they began to prophesy with their voices.
At Jesus’ baptism there is this voice from God coming through the heaven to mark the beginning of Jesus ministry.
The voice is familiar and unique. The voice is the Spirit of God taking flesh and moving to speak, to announce and declare the workings of God. The voice is God’s Word. The voice of proclamation is working. The Spirit of God is always tied to the material world. The breath of God is not just wind moving but tied to real water, real bread, Two Buck Chuck, and baptismal gowns – to flesh and blood!
Beginnings are announced and takes unfold. God’s salvation is never just taking a pill and finding **insanities justification. Rather, God’s work is an unfolding. Creation takes place over the course of time – six full days of God’s voice.
And the creation still continues. Just this week scientists discovered octopus and yeti crab over a mile and a half below the surface, never seen before and thrive at sea temperatures over 700 degrees Farenheit and buried so deep that they survive their entire life without any sunlight. Present for likely centuries, we are still discovering the awesomeness of creation.
And the salvation of God is not just in the nine months in Mary’s womb, but throughout Jesus ministry, life, death, and resurrection.
The beginning is an unfolding story of God at work in the world and in our lives. And the beginnings always have a reflectionof the end. In the Gospel writer, Mark uses the Greek word “schizo” which means “torn apart” twice. At the beginning of Mark’s gospel, the clouds of heaven are torn apart, to announce Jesus baptism by the voice of God. And at the ending of Mark’s gospel the word “schizo” reflects back to the beginning by ripping apart the curtain of the temple when Jesus dies on the cross.
Even at Jesus’ birth, the end is certain. The three kings that come to worship the baby Jesus at Epiphany bring burial tomb anointments of gold, frankincense and myrrh. The end of the cross is foreshadowed at beginning of Jesus ministry.
The same is true for us at our baptism. We are marked with the full promises of God, united with those promises that will come at our ending of this physical life – right at the beginning of our life in Christ – even as a young baby is marked with those promises at baptism. And then we spend the rest of our life trying to figure out what those full promises and assurances of God will mean for our lives. The awesomeness of what will unfold from the our baptism is yet to be discovered, realized and known. Baptism is always a beginning.
And as we begin a new year, we do not know what all will come of the year. As we don’t fully know of the lives of all those New Year’s babies born on January 1, of what their life will bring. But we can be certain that we will know where we will all end. The end will come much like the beginning, where we are united in Christ’s death and we most certainly are united with Christ in his resurrection. In the creation account of Genesis, there are no endings, only beginnings. In Mark’s Gospel, there are no set endings, only the beginning of the good news. In Jesus death and in our baptism, there are only beginnings of the adventure of faith. Splash up the water and let’s begin!
The Rev. Jason Bense
Baptism of Our Lord Sunday
Lutheran Church of Our Redeemer
Sacramento, California
