Stephen Waller
First Sunday after Epiphany
Isaiah 43: 1-7
Psalm 29
Acts 8: 14 -17
Luke 3: 15-17, 21-22
THE FEAST OF THE BAPTISM OF OUR LORD:
This morning you and I will be renewing our vows made by us at our Baptism or by our parents and Godparents for us. The Renewal of Baptismal Vows happens every time there is a baptism in the Church. The rubrics suggest that we do this only on certain days in the Church Year when it is especially appropriate: The Easter Vigil, The Day of Pentecost, All Saints’ Day or the Sunday after All Saints’ Day, on the Feast of the Baptism of our Lord…today. The other suggested day for Baptisms is any day when a Bishop is present. “Holy Baptism is appropriately administered within The Eucharist,” the rubric tells us, never privately.
Some of you among us today may remember your own baptism…if you were an adult or an older child. Most Episcopal people were baptized as infants and would not remember…but, as we know, here there are many who have made their way to the Episcopal Faith from elsewhere in Christianity and many of them may recall their baptisms.
Let me dispel a pervasive idea: The thrust of Baptism is not about the removal of sin, but rather our initiation into the Body of Christ. We get hung up on the Sin issue because we understand the lustration as a washing away of our sinfulness…I have yet to meet many infants who are major sinners…we are not washing away their sin nor are we washing away the sins of the adults who approach the Waters of New Life in Christ…though some Adults probably done some serious sinning! If you read my piece in the Doubter this week…as the Rector says, some do read the Doubter…you already know that I have issues with the emphasis the Church in its liturgy places on the matter of Sin. If you have not read it, please do and let me know you thoughts. I would welcome them.
What happens to us when we are baptized is that we are grafted into the Body of Christ…into His Life, Death and Resurrection. We “put on” Christ as a garment meant to be worn for the rest of our lives. We are given, or our God parents are given, a candle which takes light from the Paschal Candle standing near the Font. We are washed three times with Holy Water in the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.
It is that Holy Spirit which Jesus brings to Baptism that his cousin John did not. When our Lord was baptized, the Heavens opened and a Dove (The Spirit) descended upon Him and He was proclaimed as God’s Beloved Son.
In our initiation into the Church, the Body of Christ, we too receive The Holy Spirit….in addition to the lustration…as John had stated He will baptize you with Spirit and with Fire. What happens to us is more than a washing, people! We become Spirit-filled people bearing the Fire of the Light of Christ from that moment on in our lives…
I suspect many of you may not realize that you are Spirit filled and on Fire with the Light of Christ. When one looks at the Body of Christ these days, as a movie I once saw says: “The Holy Spirit has been trying to get into that Church without any luck for years, it seems.” Let this not be said of the parish of Saint Thomas the Apostle. We want the World to know that we are “on Fire” with the Spirit and clothed with Christ busy doing Christ’s work in the World and in the Church around us.
People manifest their Spirit-filled nature in a variety of ways…all of us may have seen these manifestations on TV or when visiting a type of evangelical expression of Christianity that has members waving their hands in the air and swaying to the rhythm of the music…and even falling down-slain in the Spirit…
Most Episcopalians tend to avoid these dramatic manifestations of being filled with the Spirit. We (and I) have a more subdued way of revealing the fact that we are Spirit-filled, more subtle, more reserved. However we manifest our Spirit-filled Life in Christ, that we manifest it is essential . You have been baptized in Jesus Christ who baptizes us not only with Water, but with Spirit and Fire.
Once you come forth from the three lustrations of Water, the Bishop or Priest places a hand on your head, marking on your forehead the sign of the Cross with Holy Oil and saying to you:
“You are sealed by the Holy Spirit in Baptism and marked as Christ’s own for ever. Amen.”
And the Bishop of Priest prays: “…Sustain them, O Lord, in your Holy Spirit. Give them an inquiring and discerning heart, the courage to will and to persevere, a spirit to know and to love you, and the gift of joy and wonder in all your works. AMEN”
“Grant, O Lord, that all who are baptized into the death of Jesus Christ your Son may live in the power of his resurrection and look for him to come again in glory; who lives and reigns now and for ever. Amen”
When we renew our vows this morning, this is what we are renewing: We are part of the Body of Christ on Fire with the Spirit of God.
Amen. Amen. Amen.
