Sermon for Baptism of our Lord
January 10, 2010
Texts:  Isaiah 43:1-7; Psalm 29; Acts 8:14-17; Luke 3:15-17, 21-22

Who are you?

Who am I?

Questions of identity plague us at various stages of our lives.

As young children we identify with our parents
And are uneasy when we are separated from them.

As teens, we wonder who we are;
As we seek identity in peer groups,
Trying out various forms of dress, language, and music,
As we try to carve out an identity separate from our parents.

As young adults,
We seek our identity within our careers
And possibly with another person
With whom we try to establish a life on our own.

As middle-aged adults,
We struggle with balancing
The work associated with a career,
Being a parent to teen-aged or young adult children,
Often being a care givers to our own aging parents,
Not to mention being a spouse,
And sometimes we wonder
If we have lost our own identity in the midst of these various roles.

As we become elderly,
Sometimes we wonder what has happened
To the person we knew,
As various mind or body functions deteriorate.

There is a new movie
That I am hoping to see,
“Up in the Air,”
Whose main character, Ryan,
Is a poster child
For someone with an uncertain identity.

Ryan is a prototypical business traveler,
Waking up in a new city every couple of days or weeks.
As a business consultant who specializes
In helping companies downsize,
Every time he shows up at a new location,
Everyone there asks
“Who are you?”

His symbol is an empty backpack
Which reflects his life without commitments and responsibilities.

As someone, who is constantly on the move,
With millions of frequent flyer miles
And no permanent relationships
Ryan finds he has no purpose in life,
Little if any identity,
And no connectedness.

Does this theme of this movie make you twitch,
Just a little?
Does it cause the question “Who are you?”
To reverberate in your head?

Your own identity is forged in the midst
Of your communities
Your relationships and
Yes, even your responsibilities.

The Israelites to whom Isaiah was speaking
Were also having an identity crisis.
They had been exiled to Babylon.
They had been yanked out of familiar territory,
Marched to Babylon,
Often losing family members along the way.

Their homes and communities had been destroyed,
And even their familiar traditions
Such as the annual pilgrimage to the temple in Jerusalem
Had been disrupted.
They were in many ways a people not only without a country,
But also without an identity.

God, speaking to these people through the prophet Isaiah,
Reminds them that they do have an identity.

God has called them by name,
They are God’s.
They are indeed children of God.
In the midst of a strange land,
God assures them that God is with them
When they pass through the waters,
God will be with them,
Just as God was with their ancestors
When they crossed the Red Sea.

When God uses fire to purify them
They will not be burned
Just as their ancestors were not burned
When God accompanied them in the desert
As a cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night.

The Israelites are not alone,
They have nothing to fear,
God is with them
And their identity as a child of God is intact,
Despite their dislocation to a new land.

The Gospel lesson also has questions about identity,
But a few answers, too!

Everyone wonders who John the Baptist is,
And virtually no on knows who Jesus is, YET!

John, however, has no such questions about himself.
His identity has been sure since birth.
At his naming, Luke reports that his father Zechariah prophesied,
That John was to go before the Lord
To prepare the way.

When the people come to question John,
As to whether he is the Messiah,
John, himself, tells the people,
That there is one more powerful than he who is coming.

John knows his identity as the preparer,
And is not afraid to demonstrate it to the people.

When Jesus shows up on the scene,
Very few people yet know who he is.

According to Luke’s report,
The angels, the shepherds, the prophets in the temple
And the rabbis who met with the 12 year old Jesus,
All had some idea of the marks upon the child.
But the people out there in the wilderness
Have not yet been exposed to Jesus,
The prophecies about him,
Or any of his deeds of power

All that is in the future.

Jesus is out in the wilderness to be baptized,
To be claimed by God.

According to Luke,
God uses the occasion of Jesus’ baptism
To reveal Jesus’ identity.

“You are my Son,
The Beloved;
With you I am well pleased.

Luke leaves us, the later readers,
With no questions about Jesus’ identity.
God singles out Jesus and marks him.

The people out in the wilderness for their own baptisms
See that dove descending,
And hear those words from heaven,
Identifying Jesus as the Son of God.

In Luke, God’s voice is audible.
Just as there are no commands
Given after Jesus heals people
To tell no one.

In Luke’s Gospel,
Jesus’ identity is clear.
Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God.
This is unlike the story line in Mark’s Gospel,
Where the crowds have to wait to hear the centurion,
At the foot of the cross identify Jesus as God’s son.

So what message is there for you,
You who struggle with the question of who you are,
In the midst of communities and relationships
That are often in flux.

You are a baptized Christian,
Or perhaps you are longing to become a baptized Christian.
In baptism, God claims you,
Marks you with the sign of the cross,
Calls you by name,
And identifies you as a child of God.

You are placed within the context of a community in Christ,
And prepared for the work in God’s kingdom.

You will physically age after baptism,
Your responsibilities will change.
You may evolve from junior member to elder
Or even to senior statesperson in the community.

You may change geographic communities.
Some or all of the people around you may change, die or move away,
But one aspect of your identity is constant and certain.

Child of God,
You have been sealed by the Holy Spirit
And marked with the cross of Christ forever.

When you were baptized,
The Christian community present said these or similar words:

“We welcome you into the body of Christ and into the mission we share.”

Your life will always be in flux.
You will age from dependent infant, called by God in baptism,
To independent teen, affirming the baptismal promises
That were spoken earlier for you,
And finally back to a dependent older person,
Called by God to a final home.

Where you live will change.
Maybe only the street address will change,
And the town will remain the same.
But perhaps you will move across the country,
And maybe you will move across the globe.

The people around you will change,
Best friends move away.
Families sometimes change and/or grow apart.

You will make new relationships,
And new members may join your family by birth or marriage.

The cross made on your forehead will not change.
You will remain a child of God
Regardless of your age, your geographic location,
Or the situation of your family.

You will also always have an identity as part of the Christian community.

Even if you move across the world,
Wherever you find another Christian,
You know that you will share something cherished in common.

I have walked into Christian churches
From a suburban congregation outside of Philadelphia,
To an Anglican congregation in Singapore on Ash Wednesday,
To a mission start-up meeting in a stable in Florida,
To an American congregation in Frankfurt Germany,
And have always felt that I shared a bond
In our collective unity in Christ.

As a baptized Christian,
Marked with the sign of the cross,
You have an identity
And you belong.

You are a child of God; you belong to Christ,
And you belong to the community
That finds its identity at the foot of the cross of Christ.

Life is uncertain. Homes come and go.
Employment is often unstable.
Our physical bodies age.
Our families grow and change.
Even our church communities change
As people come and go, needs change, and gifts to be shared change.

The certainty is found in Christ
In your identity as a child of God,
And in your belonging among God’s faithful people.

You know who you are.
There are no empty knapsacks for you.
You have been sealed by the Holy Spirit
And marked with the cross of Christ forever.