ANOINTED
AND APPOINTED
Mount Hope
UMC
Sunday,
January 12, 2020
Matthew 3:13-17 New
Living Translation (NLT)
The Baptism of Jesus
13 Then Jesus went from
Galilee to the Jordan River to be baptized by John. 14 But John tried to talk him out of it. “I am the one who needs to
be baptized by you,” he said, “so why are you coming to me?”
15 But Jesus said, “It
should be done, for we must carry out all that God requires.[a]” So John agreed to baptize him.
16 After his baptism, as Jesus
came up out of the water, the heavens were opened[b] and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and
settling on him. 17 And a voice from heaven
said, “This is my dearly loved Son, who brings me great joy.”
We
just concluded the season of Advent this past Monday with the feast of the
Epiphany. Epiphany is when the wise men
visited Jesus bearing gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh. But I want to dispel the folklore you’ve been
led to believe all the years. The Jesus
that the wisemen encountered was not a baby in a manger, but a two year old
child. I mean, come on folks, do you
really believe the wise men who were from the Persian Empire that we know as Balthasar of Arabia,
Melchior of Persia, and Gaspar of India, just happened to be riding along, saw
a star and galloped first to Herod to tell him they were going to see this new
king and then galloped out to the stable?
I intend to dispel this myth right now.
These men
traveled from afar the song says of the three wise men. Arabia, Persia (which is the present day
Iran) and India are literally worlds away from Bethlehem. The trip from Persia is over 9,000
miles? But first they went to Jerusalem
to ask Herod where the king who had been promised was.
If we research Levitical law, we
discover that a woman who gives birth has to go through purification
process. Jesus would have been
circumcised on the 8th day and Mary’s purification period would have
ended 40 days after the birth of Jesus.
Then they would have gone to the Temple to have Jesus dedicated. Leviticus 12:6 outlines the requirements for
the offering at the dedication – a spotless one year old lamb and a turtle
dove. Jesus is the spotless lamb of God
and the Holy Spirit is represented as a dove.
I thought this was interesting.
But according to Luke 2:24, Mary
made an offering of doves (plural), which meant they did not have enough money
to purchase a lamb. I’m explaining this
because I want you to understand that if the wise men had come when Jesus was
an infant in the stable, Mary and Joseph would have had enough to purchase the
lamb with their gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh.
Matthew 2:1-11 describes the wise
men coming to visit the child at a house in Bethlehem when he was about 2 years
of age, which makes sense and we can then understand why Herod decreed that all
males 2 years and younger be killed.
So it is widely believed that the wise men arrived after Mary and Joseph
had returned to Nazareth because in Matthew 2:13 it says “when the wise men had
departed an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph and told him to take Mary and
the child and flee to Egypt.” There are
those who have said that when the wise men came to visit the child Jesus, that
the child spoke. We know that infants
cannot speak, but a child of 2 years of age begins to develop their vocabulary.
I wanted to get that out of the way
before we move on to today’s text in Matthew about the Baptism of Jesus.
Jesus is about to begin his public
ministry and he needs to dot his “I’s” and cross his “Ts” so that he can
validate his ministry before the people he is to offer salvation to. His cousin John the Baptist has grown a large
following of disciples who are mostly devout Jews. He has been anointed and appointed by God to
bring the message that salvation is close at hand so repent, be baptized and be
saved. He sets the environment for
people to receive the message that Jesus will bring. As strange as some think John is, he has
great respect from the people. So Jesus
knows he needs to start with John acknowledging or validating him as the one
who is the fulfillment of the scriptures and the one whom the Jews have been
waiting for.
But even John wasn’t prepared for
Jesus asking to be baptized by John. In
coming to John for baptism, Jesus is validating and affirming John’s ministry
and his obedience to answer his calling.
John tried to get out of baptizing Jesus because he knew who he was, but
Jesus told him he had to do this because it was proper and do to it was to
fulfill all righteousness. In allowing
John to baptize him, he was saying that he appreciated John and his ministry.
Secondly, in being baptized, Jesus
is validating his ministry. John
proclaims loudly to people of Jesus, “Look, the Lamb of God who takes away the
sins of the world.” He tells his
following when they attempted to elevate him as their savior to “Prepare the
way for the Lord for there is one coming who is great than I, whose sandals I
am unfit to tie.”
See, Tod thought it was important to
put his stamp of approval on Jesus, so that is why in verse 16 and 17 we read
that when Jesus comes up out of the water, heaven opened and he saw the Spirit
of God descending like a dove and lit on him and a voice from heaven
proclaimed, “This is my Son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased.” Now, that’s anointing straight from the
Anointer.
This year is an election year and
candidates are looking for endorsements from various newspapers and
organizations. and organizations. We all
seek affirmation of our works from somebody.
But the affirmation of Jesus’s ministry is straight from God. I wonder how John the Baptist reacted when he
heard the voice of God claiming Jesus as his Son whom he loved and how pleased
he was with him. Momma can tell us how
great we are, Daddy can say “job well done”, our supervisors can tell us how
well skilled we are at our jobs, our friends can pat us on the back. We can win promotions, certificates of
appreciation and trophies for being outstanding at what we did or do. But none of that means anything to those of
us who love the Lord and are called according to his purpose. It is that approval of God, that knowing that
if we succeeded with him, he will elevate us to a new level of ministry and
that ministry will be just as rewarding or more rewarding than what we did
before.
Jesus didn’t need our
endorsement. He had the Father’s and
that was good enough for Jesus. It
should be good enough for us, too.
Jesus’s baptism teaches us some
lessons.
1.
Baptism is important. When we
come up to the altar and profess Jesus as our Lord and Savior, we want to be
dipped in the water. We want the
experience of washing away the filth of our sins and anticipate coming up
filled with the Holy Spirit with a renewed mind and heart. Some people do experience that do experience
that do experience that ethereal type of euphoria. Most of us go down and come up the same way
we went down. The infilling of the
Spirit may come before we go down or it may come at some point afterward. For me, it was many years before I went down
to reaffirm my baptismal covenant. See,
as I told you before, I was a Catholic and I was christened as an infant and
then I was confirmed at 12, which is considered the age of consent for
religious institutions. And in the
Catholic church, confirmation is that age of accepting Jesus into your life and
asking him to come live within you. But
Jesus didn’t come an live in me until I was in my 40’s and after I had been
born again in the living room of my choir director. I didn’t feel that euphoria until one day, I
was praying in the shower and I began to pour out my heart to God asking for
forgiveness of all my sins. Before I was
asked to Pastor Mt. Hope, I reaffirmed my baptismal by being immersed to
prepare myself for the ministry God was calling me into. And, church, I can tell you I am so glad I
did.
For some folks, baptism is seen as a
legalistic ritual of belonging to a denomination. But Jesus’s baptism affirmed his anointing
and appointment. But is also showed
that, even though he was God in the flesh, he did not hold himself above Jewish
tradition. In order for his ministry to
succeed, he had to be accepted by this community. He didn’t need to be baptized as a sign of
repentance because he was sinless.
Unlike for us, there was nothing for him to repent of.
In his final instructions to his
disciples in Matthew, Jesus says to “Go, therefore, and make disciples of the
world, baptizing them in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, teaching
them to obey everything I have commanded.
Finally, baptism is a
testimony. It is an outward expression
of an inward grace. Baptism is a public testimony
that you have covenanted to make a change in your walk and in your talk. Faith may be persona, but we aren’t allowed
to keep it private. We’re told to go out
and tell everybody about somebody who can help anybody.
God expects us in His word to make
our faith public and we begin that journey when we are baptized. Even in countries where Christians are
persecuted, they baptize. Many times in
secret and hidden, but there are witnesses to the baptism.
I remember a woman who came to the
Catholic church I attended who shard her testimony of living in a socialistic
society where any form of religion was abolished and, if people are found to be
practicing a religion, are persecuted horribly.
She shared how when communism was over and people were free to practice
their religion, they came up out of basements and other hiding places and for
the first time were able to shout “hallelujah” out loud. We have so many privileges in this country,
can you imagine being persecuted for your belief? Afraid that if you were caught practicing
your faith or acknowledging your love of God, you would be threatened with
death? Can you imagine entire
generations of people who were repressed from worshipping publicly and hiding
in fear in the shadows of practicing their belief in Jesus? My God!
Not being able to orally call on the name of Jesus for fear someone
would hear and report you to the authorities and having to face the
consequences? Yet, some of us are afraid
to express our praise publicly. I used
to be. We were pretty quiet in the
Catholic church. But when I became a
United Methodist I began to praise God in the worship service. My older sister, who had been a United
Methodist for many years before me, would tell me to “shhhhh, be quiet” –
trying to suppress my praise. But you
know what Shirely Ceasar said in the story of Shoutin’ John right? Shoutin’ John said “Hold my mule!” I told the story of Shoutin’ John to
Dr. Iannicelli in a staff meeting one day and she has been say “hold my
mule” now for years!
John the Baptist was not just a
footnote in gospel history. Jesus could
have by-passed John and still be the Messiah, but Jesus was determined to
affirm John and to support his ministry.
Baptism gives us some
directions. There are a few things we
can apply to our own lives through this scripture.
Remember John’s words when he said
he needed to be baptized by Jesus, why do you come to me?” Jesus was sinless. If he was sinless he could not have paid the
price for our sins. So we have to always
recall the sinless of Jesus.
Secondly, we come to Christ in
baptism. The water is just a symbol of
the cleansing baptism represents. When
we come to Christ we are saying we want him to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. We are putting our trust in him. We are trusting the blood Jesus shed for us
on Calvary. We are trusting that our
sins are forgiven past, present and future.
That “there is therefore, now, no condemnation to those of us who are in
Christ Jesus.”
We acknowledge that we all have
sinned and fallen short of God’s gory, but God is faithful to forgive. He is close to the broken hearted. And we acknowledge that when we sin, we break
not only our hearts by God’s. God knows
we are not perfect, but he made provision for us to strive toward
perfection.
John Wesley said there are 5
benefits of Baptism:
1.
Guilt Cleared
For Wesley,
baptism clears the guilt of original sin, a doctrine Wesley believed wholeheartedly and which
asserts that every person comes into the world in a state of brokenness and
guilt.
2.
New Covenant Status
Baptism brings us
into covenant with God. Whether infant
or adult, baptism marks a person’s entrance into the new covenant. It is God’s
everlasting commitment, Wesley says, “to be their God, as he promised to
Abraham, in the evangelical covenant which he made with him and all his
spiritual offspring”. Baptism establishes
our relationship with God as sons and daughters of the Most High and,
therefore, heirs.
3.
Church Entrance
Baptism also
marks a person’s entrance into the Church. For Wesley, the sacrament incorporates a
person into the body of Christ, who is the head of the Church. He points here
to Galatians 3:27, “As many of you as were baptized into Christ have clothed
yourself with Christ.” This is one of the keyways that Wesley understands
baptism as a means of grace.
4.
Made a Child of God
Wesley believed
that “By baptism, we who were ‘by nature children of wrath’ are made children
of God”. Wesley was apparently quite comfortable using the language of baptism
alongside the language of regeneration: “By water then, as a means, the water
of baptism, we are regenerated or born again”. He was comfortable with this
because he found it in the Bible. Check out Titus 3:5 which reads in the NLT, “he saved us, not
because of the righteous things we had done, but because of his mercy. He
washed away our sins, giving us a new birth and new life through the Holy
Spirit.”
5.
Heirs of the Kingdom
If baptism makes
us children of God, then it also makes us heirs of the kingdom of God. Wesley turns to Romans 8:17 to make this
point: “if children, then heirs, heirs of God and joint heirs with
Christ.”
Jesus said to count the cost of
following him because he doesn’t want blind followers. He wants disciples that are willing to
following in the good times as well as in the bad times. I have found that I can hold on much better during
the bad times now that I trust in, believe in, rely on and trust in Jesus. It doesn’t mean I don’t have trials, but the
trials don’t take me out. Jesus wants us
to deny ourselves, take up our cross daily, and follow him. He said his yoke is easy and his burden is
light. And not when it’s convenient, but
24/7 in season and out of season.
Jesus commanded those who follow Him
to be baptized. If you have received
Jesus as your Savior and want to testify publicly about your faith in him, you
need to be baptized. And, if you would
like to be baptized or reaffirm your baptismal vows by immersion or sprinkling,
let me know. We will coordinate a
baptism class where we can go much more into depth as to what baptism means and
signifies. I’ll keep you posted about
that so you can take advantage of it when the time comes, probably Easter or
shortly thereafter.
In the meantime, let’s turn to page
50 in the United Methodist Hymnal and recall our baptismal covenant.
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