The Gospels all tell the story of Jesus’ baptism by John the Baptist. John’s baptism, particularly in Luke, is a sign of forgiveness and renewal, the encouragement to a new way of life, a determination to live out more radically the holy law of God. And lots of people respond to the challenge and come forward for baptism, wanting to embrace a reformed life, a more authentic way of living that includes integrity and care of others as its core.
The New Testament makes it very clear that Jesus is without sin or, to put it more positively, there’s a total wholeness to his humanity, a perfect consistency in his love of God and love of others, an utterly faithful adherence to the covenant. Indeed, for the Gospels, Jesus remakes our humanity on our behalf. So, to speak of the wholeness of Jesus’ humanity and his sinlessness is to raise an acute question: Why does Jesus need to be baptised with a ‘baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins’ as Luke puts it? And what does baptism mean for Jesus himself?
Perhaps the most important reason is that Jesus, through his baptism, enters into identification with our frail and sinful humanity. He shares our life. The baptism is an act of divine solidarity with us. Jesus doesn’t hold himself aloof from our humanity, even at its worst, even in its weakness, its sinfulness, its mortality. Though without sin he identifies with us in our sin, our frailty. And he does so precisely in order to redeem it, to share the beauty of a fully integrated humanity, a wholeness, a singleness of heart, with us.
Jesus in Luke’s Gospel may be one in the crowd of people who come to be baptised by John, but at his baptism something extraordinary happens. It becomes a moment of epiphany. It happens, significantly, while Jesus is at prayer. It reveals that what is happening is a divine act, an act of God, ordained by God.
God is present in this moment of epiphany. We hear the voice of the Father commending Jesus and revealing the intimacy that lies between them. We see the descent of the Holy Spirit, in bodily form, says Luke - a dove fluttering down from the sky. And in the middle stands Jesus himself now revealed, in his full humanity, as the beloved Son of God, about to commence his ministry in the power of the Spirit.
John says that Jesus, unlike John himself, will baptize with the Holy Spirit. And in the Acts of the Apostles (Luke’s second volume) that is precisely what happens. In another moment of epiphany, the Holy Spirit descends, once again in bodily form, on the gathered community who are, significantly, at prayer: on the apostles, on Mary and the Galilean women disciples, on other disciples. And that has extraordinary implications for us.
Baptism is about entry into the people of God. But even more importantly it’s about entry into the divine life, into the life and love of the Trinity. And that means entry into the worship and mission of the church, founded and empowered by the Spirit.
At our baptism and confirmation, each one of us has received the same Spirit into our hearts and lives. Each one of us has heard the Father say, You are my beloved child. And if we have not yet received this sacrament, the good news today invites us to enter in, to discover for ourselves God’s grace and God’s love. That love gives us our identity. We are the baptised, the beloved, those who are precious in God’s sight, drawn into the life of God in and through the baptism of Jesus and the descent of the Holy Spirit.
Because of this, we’re called to be a people of prayer, gathered together in Jesus’s name, upheld by his prayer. And the worship of God who is Father, Son and Holy Spirit is the centre of our life together. We’re called to share the good news of God’s epiphany, God’s love, with others in our evangelism and our service, in our acts of mercy and justice.
The baptism of Jesus is not just important. It’s definitive for us. Along with the Eucharist, it defines our identity, who and what we are, as church, as honoured disciples of Jesus Christ. We’re cleansed in the sanctified waters of Christ’s baptism, nourished with Christ’s body and blood to become the people we’re meant to be: beloved children of God, gathered in prayer, able to articulate our faith by sharing the epiphany of God’s love, enlivened by the winds and fire of the Holy Spirit.
