Sunday Jan 10th, thoughts going in

21 When all the people were being baptized, Jesus was baptized too. And as he was praying, heaven was opened 22 and the Holy Spirit descended on him in bodily form like a dove. And a voice came from heaven: "You are my Son, whom I love; with you I am well pleased." (TNIV)

Epiphany emphases continue this Sunday with the Baptism of our Lord. The three traditional themes of Epiphany, as mentioned in last week’s sermon, are: The manifestation of Christ to the magi via the guiding star; The Baptism of the Lord with its Trinitarian theme (the Son is present along with the descent of the Spirit & the voice of the Father); and Christ’s first public miracle/sign of the turning of water into wine at the wedding feast of Cana.

The Baptism of Christ is an incredibly interesting topic to explore in the Gospels, given that all four say SOMETHING about it, yet all four present substantially different accounts. It should never be our goal to try to figure out “which one is correct”…as each in their way are correct. Likewise, however, it should also not be our goal to attempt to “harmonize” the accounts. We need always remember that the Gospel writers themselves were inspired by God to write what they wrote—whereas, attempts at harmonization are decidedly uninspired human endeavors.

With that in mind, I think that St. Luke the evangelist would have us note some fairly interesting things about the Baptism of Jesus. First, the wording of vs 21a is interesting:

When all the people were being baptized, Jesus was baptized too…

Some commentators are of the opinion that Luke really doesn’t want to talk much or linger on Jesus’ baptism—that what he really wants is to get past it as quickly as possible and talk about praying and heaven being opened, etc. They want also to see the END of the ministry of John the Baptist, and Jesus as the clear endorser/successor to that ministry (Culpepper, Nolland, etc). These thoughts are supported by the text. However, I think they’re missing something else that’s supported by the text, and that is the baptism of Jesus occurring WITH and at the same time as that of the people (“laon” in the Greek—it’s where our word “laity” comes from). In other words, Luke is perhaps sacrificing some detail or emphasis on Jesus’ own baptismal experience in order to highlight the fact that it is in full solidarity with that of EVERYONE ELSE’S. This is “Emmanuel” in action; God with us, in the flesh; standing in the same baptismal river as us; not being afraid to be seen with or linger with the “riff-raff.” Luke may INDEED be presenting Jesus in solidarity with John the Baptist’s ethical preaching, but he is just as much presenting Jesus in solidarity with the plight of sinful humanity.

The next interesting thing in Luke’s account is that the descent of the Holy Spirit as a dove happens “bodily.” In other words, the BODILY descent of the Spirit is unique to Luke’s account. This is also noteworthy because, as Luke reports, it happens to Jesus while he’s at prayer. Wide-eyed ecstatic “religious experiences” are nothing new to our age. They supposedly happened back then too. In emphasizing the bodily descent of the Spirit, my hunch is that Luke is doing his best to ground the experience of Jesus in REALITY. This has meaning for us in terms of salvation history: It is a REAL Holy Spirit that REALLY descends; on a REAL person of Jesus of Nazareth; who would REALLY suffer & die on a REAL cross…etc. etc. As Luke’s gospel was likely the latest of the synoptics (written 2 generations or more after the public ministry of Jesus) there is something to be said for stressing the REALITY of all of the Jesus events.

Finally, we have the voice from heaven and the words: "You are my Son, whom I love; with you I am well pleased." Luke’s version is identical to Mark’s, and both are nearly identical to Matthew’s. The interesting point here is that one is tempted to think that the Father is “well pleased” with the Son before he’s even “done anything.” Perhaps a better way to see it is that the Father is so well-pleased with the Son because He knows exactly what this baptism signifies: the Son’s willingness to go through with it all; his willingness to be the Messiah and all that entails.


Cheers,

TM