When we read the New Testament scriptures it is important that we read them with ears that are listening to what God is saying. We need to read the Word with care, knowing that it is not just any text we are taking in, but a living Word. As such, we need to pay attention with all that we are, so that we might hear the voice of God. We need to read, paying attention to the context, the historical situation, and the grammar and choice of words. We need to follow closely the reasoning of what is being said. As close as we can, we need to uncover what the original meaning and understanding the scriptures had for its first audience. Only then can we begin to hear the voice of God in the Words of the scriptures. With the help of the Holy Spirit who guide and teaches us through the Word, we can hear God speaking to us now, even as he did 2000 years ago. For this reason, prayer and the scriptures are inextricably intertwined. The Church prays the Word as the expressed will of God. The Church listens to the Word, and let’s itself be addressed by that Word today. It is the Bible that forms the prayers of the Church, and it is by that same Word that the Church hears the voice of God.
When we read the passage we have read for today about the baptism of our Lord, and as we look at its context, we understand that this event was the beginning of Jesus public ministry. It was their Jesus confirmed his call to self-identify himself with human beings in their sinfulness. John rightly said to Jesus that he had no need to be baptized, with the inference that he was without sin. Jesus does not argue this point but rather affirms it, yet he tells John that it is right to do this in order to please the Father, or to “fulfill all righteousness.” It is true that in the incarnation itself that the Son of God identifies with us in our humanity. He became weak, vulnerable, and dependent on others, which is how all humans start. But it is at his baptism, and later at the cross, that Jesus identifies himself with us in our sin. With his life, he is saying, “I am one with you, even in your selfishness and sins.” Paul says it like this in 2 Corinthians 5:21…
“For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.”
It should not be in any way in dispute, but that Jesus from the start knew where he was headed, and he chose to take that part, for our sake. From his baptism, it was clear that Christ understood that the cross was his future because he identified himself with us, sinners. He took upon himself what we deserved, because the plan of God in the incarnation was to identify with us and assume our place.
Upon his being baptized, a voice came from heaven and proclaimed something fundamental for Jesus: “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased.”
Now there is much here to examine, especially about the nature of the triune God, and His incarnation, yet for our purposes today I want us to consider this passage from the perspective of our praying. What does it say to us about our relationship with God and our daily ongoing conversation with him?
It’s easy to see that a core moment of Jesus public life was his baptism by John, when he heard the affirmation, “You are my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased,” or as some translations say, “…on whom my favor rests.” This is the beginning of Jesus coming out to the people of the Jews. Here he is reminded in a deep part of his soul of who he is. Shortly after this he is led into the desert to be tempted. These temptations are tests designed to move him away from that identity he now carried in his heart. He was tempted to believe he was someone else: You are the one who can turn stones into bread; you are the one jump safely from the temple; you are the one who can make all others bow to your power and authority. To each and everyone of these Jesus says “No! I am the beloved of God.” From this time in his ministry he was claiming that identity, regardless of what the crowds, his enemies, or his disciples would say. There were times he was rejected, and times he was despised. Yet in his heart he knows that if others desert him, betray him, even plan to kill him, his Father is always with him, because he is the beloved of God, the Son of God.
Prayer then is listening to that voice. If we are in Him, as Paul says over and over again, then for us prayer is listening to that same voice that spoke to Jesus. If we now identify with Christ in his righteousness and by his grace, then when the Father speaks to Christ and proclaims that he is the beloved, might he not be speaking to us as well? At the Jordan, Jesus was putting himself in our place, so did not the Father say to Him and us, “You are my beloved, and my favor rests on you?” In prayer we are the ones who must listen, and assert the truth of who we are in Christ. We are not what we do, or what people say about us. We are not what we possess. For certain, there is no sin in being successful; there is nothing wrong about being popular, or being widely appreciated by others. There is also nothing wrong with having in a position of power, but our spiritual identities not rooted in any of these things. Life cannot determine who we are, rather God does. That’s why we pray, to hear him proclaim to us who we are. We are the beloved of God.
There are many places in scripture where we can see this born out. Let me cite just one, from 1 John 3.1,
See what great love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are!
Did you hear it? Again we see the Father as the one who establishes our identity, and what is it? We are the lavishly loved children of God. God calls Jesus Christ the Beloved Son, and he calls us His beloved children. It is only as we begin to believe and see this that we can begin to pray without fear, without trepidation. It is only as awe see this that we can truly begin to live the whole Christian life.
Jesus goes to the desert to pray, to listen to the voice as the Beloved.While there he hears another voice, the voice of the tempter. In one sense the devil is saying to Jesus you must prove you are the Beloved, so he devil said to him, “change the stone to bread…jump from the temple…get some power and influence from men.” But in the response of Jesus we hear the LORD say “I don’t need to prove anything. I am. I am the Beloved.”
Late in the ministry of Jesus, we see him and three disciples going up mountain to pray (probably), the Lord is transfigured. We do not really know what that exactly means, but it is described as a change of appearance, and a meeting with Elijah and Moses. Again there is a lot we can dig up from this passage, but lets us focus on what it has to say about our praying.
One of the disciples are dumbstruck, so he says what ever comes first into his mind, and he is cut off by the voice of God. It is not as time for speaking, but a time for listening. And what do they hear, but an affirmation from the Father of the identity of the Son, and their need to listen to what he says.
“This is my Son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased. Listen to him!”
This was spoken to those three who were first with Jesus, but it is also spoken to all disciples. It is spoken to you if you follow Jesus. Our praying is a listening to Christ, the Son of Man, the Son of God, for we are in Him, and he is in us.
A life of prayer is born out of a knowing of who you are. Your identity, truthfully held in the heart, is the gate to that intimate place where we tell God all that is going on with us, and where he tells us who we are again and again: “You are my beloved, and I am very pleased to be your Father.”
Let us pray.
Prayer
Our Father,
We pray to you as your children,
Called and accepted, loved and protected.
Be with us this day as we begin to live out in the details of our life, the truth,
That we are no longer orphans, but yours forever.
Tune our ears as we pray
that we would listen to the voice of our LORD,
that as he would speak, we would say His Word,
as he would move, we would follow,
and as he would stoop, we would serve those he has given us.
We ask this according to the love you have shown us in the Son,
in his name alone do we pray.
Amen.