Sermon Sunday July 12 2009

Ephesians 1:3-14

The author of Ephesians was writing about being claimed by Christ and of belonging to Christ’s church. This is language we usually find around baptisms. For this author, who we don’t think was Paul, but was likely one of his followers who used Paul’s name as a means of showing which tradition they followed. For the author this language is over the top, abounding with superlatives: blessed be God by ALL THINGS that can bless God, we are adopted by God according to the GOOD PLEASURE of God’s will; by God’s GLORIOUS grace, the RICHNESS of God’s grace, grace that was LAVISHED on us. The author goes on and on about this grace that’s given to us through Christ.

The author obviously felt very blest to belong to the family of God. My question is how do we feel about it? Do we feel equally blessed by our baptism and belief in God’s love? Or are we kind of blasé about it?

Ralph Milton tells a story of baptism from the first time he took a trip to the Holy Land. He says:

“I was baptized twice last summer.

The first time was in the Sea of Galilee. It was our first night beside that historic lake, and because it was hot and because I was utterly thrilled by the sheer idea of being there, I couldn’t wait to get to that water, half expecting to be able to walk on it.

Something better happened. I stood there, up to my neck in water and looked around and imagined Jesus and Peter and Mary of Magadala and all the world-changing events that happened around and on that lake. And I felt a profound sense of awe and joy that I had received that heritage. And so I soaked in the warm waters and soaked in the history of the hills of Galilee. And I came out an hour later feeling, yes, baptized.

A week later we were up near Dan, and there in that source of the Jordan, where the water is still clean and cold, I filled some bottles of that “holy” water to bring home for the baptism of an expected grandchild.

Standing up to my knees in the rushing water, I wanted to be baptized again. I was baptized when I was just over 20, but I knew so little then, had lived so little. It didn’t mean that much then, but it would mean so much now. Why not do it now, again?

It was not for want of clergy. Here were at least a dozen ordained Roman Catholic priests in my group, but I knew full well none of them could, or should, baptize me there and then.

So I cupped some water in my hands and poured the Jordan over my head and face, and said a small prayer of gratitude, and felt a deep and fundamental peace.

Perhaps it wasn’t baptism. Perhaps it was a confirmation of the half-understood words I uttered 35 years ago. Perhaps it was fulfillment of a promise made by God to me when Dave Stone poured that water on my head.

 That’s interesting. Baptism is just once. The confirmation, the fulfillment happens over and over and over. God’s gift is limitless.”

 Ralph doesn’t use the flowery language of Ephesians, but, you know, in some ways I prefer his story. It feels more realistic to me. It’s something I can connect to. He speaks of a journey with God to discover where those baptismal promises have led, and looks forward to where they might still lead, since as he hinted at – we often don’t know where those promises will take us, and even seem to make those promises before we have any sense of what our relationship with God will really mean.

 Baptism is an outward sign of an inward grace. We do not require it to know that God loves us, but it’s a type of coming together between God and us. It’s a time when we say “God, we have heard you call us by name, we know that you love us, that you knit us together in our mother’s womb and that you know every hair on our head, and we want to respond.” So we respond in a way that is similar to what Jesus did in the Jordan. We respond with water: it’s something SO familiar and so ordinary, but it’s something we cannot live without – something like our relationship with God.

 Baptism is a beginning. It’s something we do once, and for that, it feels sometimes like it is an end, a hoop we have to jump through, or something we do because it is what is expected of us. It is a big day in our lives, but truly, baptism is a beginning. It is something we can count on as we continue on the journey of our lives – that journey through times of trial, of times of joy and of those every day, ordinary times. Our baptism reminds us that we care claimed by Christ and that we can always count on that relationship with God for strength, support and love. We might move away or forget those promises that we made or that were made for us on the day of our baptism, but God never does. God is always there and has never forgotten that God has claimed us as one of God’s own. Thanks be to God for that source of continual blessing.