Homily for the Baptism of the Lord, A

This Epiphany at the Jordan River is deep water; you can't stand on the shore and dip your toes in.  You must take a breath and plunge.  

I have Mass on Sunday, January 11 at St. Isidore @ 9:30/11:30 am.

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Transcript

A reading from the Holy Gospel according to Matthew. 

Jesus came from Galilee to John at the Jordan to be baptized by him. John tried to prevent him, saying, I need to be baptized by you, and yet you are coming to me. Jesus said to him in reply, Allow it now, for thus it is fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness. Then he allowed him. 

After Jesus was baptized, he came up from the water, and behold, the heavens were opened for him, and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and coming upon him. And a voice came from the heavens, saying, "This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased." 

The Gospel of the Lord. 

This year we are reading from the Gospel of Matthew. Only Matthew tells the story of Mary and Joseph fleeing with the child Jesus to Egypt. Matthew also told us that the child would be called Emmanuel. God is with us. In part. This is Matthew's way of showing us that God is still with us. Matthew quotes from the prophet Hosea "out of Egypt I called my son." God is the one who leads us out and brings us in.

Moses was the great leader who led the children of Israel out of Egypt. Moses stood at the Red Sea and parted the waters, as the waters of the Jordan parted for Joshua. But for this one, greater than Moses and greater than Joshua, the very heavens are parted!

Moses came to the Jordan. Jesus actually enters it. One of Jordan's holiest sites is Mount Nebo, where the Lord showed Moses the promised land. Most pilgrims travel to the Jordan River from Israel on the west bank, but the Israelites would have crossed into Israel from the east bank. John the Baptist is likely to have stood on the east bank of the river. 

The path down from Mount Nebo to the Jordan Valley is winding and difficult. If you were walking, you might have to bend low, a physical reminder that we can only meet the Lord if we come bending low in humility. The Jordan Valley is the lowest spot on the face of the earth. Jesus came to the Jordan River, and it was here in the lowest place on earth that the heavens opened and the Spirit descended. The lowest spot on the earth becomes the closest to heaven. 

In Matthew's Gospel, the voice speaks not to Jesus, but to us. "This is my chosen one. Listen to him." The prophet Isaiah paints a detailed image of God's chosen one, "a bruised reed he shall not break, and a smoldering wick he shall not quench." Matthew will apply these words to Jesus' ministry in chapter 12 of the Gospel. Justice unfolds, through faithfulness, through gentleness that refuses to give up, through love that keeps showing up. God's chosen one will guard the fragile flame until it remembers how to burn. 

The one more powerful assumes the position of weakness. It is precisely in this that he is beloved. Jesus enters into radical solidarity with all men and women, taking upon himself even the conditions of our sinfulness, himself having not sinned. Christ has come not only to reveal the divinity to us, he has come to reveal us to ourselves. Not only is he truly God, he is truly human, and he is truly human precisely because he does not sin. 

All of our sin is nothing other than the rejection of the truth of our humanity. Jesus' utter acceptance of our humanity, his drinking of our cup fully, his sharing of our wounded condition, reverses our sinful rejection of our creatureliness. Jesus' baptism, then, is at the heart of his mission to heal us. He enters even the wounds of our self-rejection without having made the rejection himself. He accepts full solidarity with us, even if it means being seen as a sinner. 

We see this unfolding in the Acts of the Apostles when Peter entered the house of Cornelius, a Gentile. Peter was trying to be faithful and obedient, trying to stay within the boundaries he had inherited and trusted. And then God interrupted him, not with an argument, but with an experience he could not explain away. Standing in a Gentile household, the wrong place with the wrong people, Peter watches the spirit fall. Not after they convert, not after they learn the right language, not after they cross the right threshold, but "while he was still speaking." And suddenly, Peter realizes something that rearranges everything. God has already decided. I truly understand, Peter said, that God shows no partiality. This isn't a new doctrine. It's a confession. A man catching up to what God has already done. 

The Spirit does not wait for Peter's approval. The Spirit does not ask whether the people in the room belong. The Spirit simply moves. Which means the real question was never, who is allowed in? The question was always, will we recognize where God is already at work? 

This epiphany at the Jordan River is deep water. You can't stand on the shore and dip your toes in. you must take a breath and plunge. Yes, baptism promises new life, but you must die before you will rise. 

What reason for hope, then? What shall we hang on to in this uncertain season of light and shadow? Jesus himself is our thin place. He's the one who opens the barrier and shows us the God we long for. He's the one who stands in line with us at the water's edge, willing to immerse himself in shame, scandal, repentance, and pain, all so that we might hear the only voice that can tell us who we are and whose we are in this sacred season. 

Listen, we are God's own, God's children, God's pleasure. Even in the deepest water, we are beloved.