BAPTISM, WATER AND THE RENEWAL OF THE EARTH
The Rev. Harold Shepherd, CD, M.A., S.T.M., LL.B., LL.M., Ph.D.
Sermon from January 12, 2003

[John the Baptist] proclaimed, “The one who is more powerful than I is coming after me; I am not worthy to stoop down and unite the thong of his sandals. I have baptized you with water; but he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit.” Mark 1:7-8

As we are all aware, the Church likes rituals. We have one for all of the major transitions in life-baptism, confirmation, ordination, marriage and funerals. Ritual is not reserved for religious institutions, however. We find them everywhere we look in the secular world. The most notable examples are graduation ceremonies, birthday celebrations and various forms of initiation rites. New students at university are often passed through some sort of hazing ritual, although this sort of thing has been discouraged over the past few years. Initiation rites are also found in the military. Press reports of inappropriate conduct led to restrictions on this in the Canadian military. When I was in Ecuador a year ago last summer, there was newspaper coverage of the death of a young soldier during a hazing ritual. For better or for worse, we human beings like to publicly celebrate important and transitional events in our lives. The general point of them is mark a point in time at which one passes from one status to another. It is done publicly both for purposes of social recognition of the new status and to celebrate with family and friends.

Today we commemorate the baptism of Jesus. The obvious question is why did Jesus need to be baptized for the forgiveness of sins if he had never sinned? The answer is that this marked an important transitional phase in his life. In a sense, it represented his ordination to ministry. As he emerged from the waters of baptism, the Holy Spirit descended on him in the form of a dove and God publicly acknowledged Jesus as his son. This may evoke Psalm 2:7 in which God declares the newly anointed king to be his son. The idea behind it is messianic. Jesus is the newly anointed king of Israel as heir to the throne of David. By way of royal authority, God has invested him with the full power of the Holy Spirit. He can now speak and act on behalf of God to the Jewish community and the world.

This transitional phase in Jesus’ life took place at the baptism of John. Through use of water, a symbolic change of direction in one’s life was observed. John the Baptist was not satisfied at the religious life of the nation. Some responded to Roman occupation with sentiments of nationalism and recourse to violence to attempt to inspire the colonial power to leave. Others were quite comfortable with Greco-Roman culture and values. Many of them were Sadducees and members of the ruling council- the Sanhedrin. There children even attended Hellenistic schools (gymnasia). Religious conservatism flourished in the countryside, leading to the popularity of the Pharisees among many people. Others rejected the whole system and set up an independent community at Qumran with its own solar calendar and religious texts. Still others were rather indifferent to the fine points of the theological debates. The discord between the various factions within the Jewish community and the growing opposition to the Roman occupation caused John the Baptist great concern. His response was to begin preaching at the Jordan river, warning people that God was about to do something important in the near future. Israel had two options- the first was to continue as they had been going. The result of this would be destruction. The second was to decide to join God in the renewal of the nation. To a certain extent, John the Baptist has some similarities with the prophet Jeremiah. When the Babylonian army was approaching Jerusalem, the false prophets were telling the king that all was well- carry on with business as usual, because God will always protect his chosen city. Jeremiah was of the opposite view- serve God faithfully and refrain from taking up arms against the Babylonians and all will be well. Fight, and disaster will follow. Refusing to listen to Jeremiah, they sent an army to meet the Babylonians, leading to the destruction of the Temple and the Babylonian exile. Similarly, John preached peace with the Romans. If a soldier asks you to carry something one mile, carry it two. Serve God faithfully and put down your arms, and all will be well. The nation failed to heed John’s call, and rebelled against the Romans in A.D. 70, leading to the destruction of the Temple and the exile of the Jewish community. By accepting John’s baptism, Jesus was committing himself to a peaceful renewal of Israel. By sending the Holy Spirit, God anointed Jesus as the new David who would renew the nation- not by force of arms or religious legalism, but through universalizing Judaism to truly become the light of the nations. This was achieved by going beyond the letter of the law to proclaim its spirit in all relationships.