Drowning In The Grace Of God
Matthew 3:1-17
January 6, 2008
As I have imagined these verses in my mind. I see the Jordan River, running not fast but slow - smooth and calm with not a rapid in sight. I see this 156-mile river near the end of its journey of connecting the Sea of Galilee to the Dead or Salt Sea. And I see people - lots of people on its banks. I see common people in their common clothes and I see a second grouping of people, important looking folk in heir fine almost royalty-like garb.
As I have tried to play this text over and over in my mind, I make a mental note to myself that this River - the Jordan River - this place that had attracted all these people was not a River that was near to where they were living. This river didn’t run through town. This river was outside of town to the east.
And so in our text when Matthew tells us in verse 5 that, "People went out to John the Baptist from Jerusalem and all Judea and the whole region of the Jordan" and when Matthew tells us in verse 7 that "many of the Pharisees and Sadducees came to where John was baptizing." I make a note to myself that these people made a point, put forth some effort, had chosen to make this journey to the Jordan River.
Their reason for going? John - John the Baptist, this camel’s hair and leather belt wearing - locust and honey eating prophet. He was their reason.
Hundreds of years earlier the writer, Isaiah prophesied there would be a voice of one calling in the desert, "Prepare the way for the Lord make straight paths for him." And now that voice had come, had appeared. That voice was calling out. His message v. 2, "Repent, for the Kingdom of heaven is near."
And the result was that "people went out to him from Jerusalem" (v. 5) and "many of the Pharisees and Sadducees came out to where he was baptizing." (v. 7) As I imagine this text - I see the Jordan River with these people along its banks.
Within you and me - within us is an instinctive response to listen for and respond to messages, announcements teachings, words that can bring or give hope.
Direction
Relief
Peace
Or a new beginning to our lives.
Within you and me - within myself is this need, this desire to respond to that which will help me, assist me, lead me into the life I’ve always wanted.
People - you and me created in the very image of God-are very often searching for answers, hope, healing, help to health issues.
Financial concerns
Marital
Parenting
Business matters.
This trait about you and me is the reason why every bookstore has a self-help section, filled with books by various authors who promise you and me remedies and methodologies to fix the shattered pieces of our lives.
Many buy those books.
Or watch the TV shows
Or read the magazines
Or listen to the radio program to these voices crying out. We like the folk in our text - come out to see, come out to hear, come out of our broken selves and decide whether this voice is one we want to respond to. We like the people in the text stand along the banks or at least sit on our couches listening to or reading the words of those who claim they can help us.
Though we do this - when we do this we most often do this at home, or in our car - we listen to these voices in private or with a select few.
It is rare for us to broadcast our brokenness, our pain, our disappointments, our yearnings, instead we put on masks - which disguise to the world the truth about ourselves, our condition, our needs. We want to project something we claim to be or aspire to be while internally we are melting away, burdened by God only knows what.
And so when I read Matthew’s words that the people went out to him from Jerusalem and all Judea and the whole region of the Jordan a side of me isn’t surprised - not at all. John was the voice - the latest voice offering hope. Yet when I read in verse 6 that those people "confessed their sins and were baptized by John" I take notice.
These people weren’t just taking a field trip.
These folk were not taking an afternoon stroll.
Most of these people were not simply bystanders.
Mere observers
Tourists watching this spectacle in the Jordan River.
No - these people came clean.
These people named, identified, and spoke out their brokenness and surrendered themselves - their true selves to the waters of the Jordan River.
They repented because God’s Kingdom was coming near.
In front of their friends and neighbors
In front of their business associates and children.
In front of the people that had been doing their best to fool, they left the dry and dusty riverbanks for the water. They told John their sins - they spoke them out - ridding themselves of those things. John the Baptizer drowned that past, drowned that person who was and then brought them up out of the waters.
Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, each of the 4 people who write on the life of Jesus our Lord begin their historical accounts with people journeying out to the river Jordan to be baptized.
In doing so the writers seem to be saying we can’t begin to follow Jesus-
We can’t claim to a follower of the Christ-child while standing along the Riverbanks.
We can’t be observers.
We can’t stay dry.
We can’t be a people looking on in judgment on those people in the water.
We aren’t to be critiques.
No - Matthew
Mark
Luke and John want their readers to know that to be a follower of Jesus begins in these waters.
Getting in.
Getting wet.
Getting rid of the masks.
Drowning out the past and being brought out of them new.
This is how the journey with our God begins.
This act - baptism - is an act, an event of accepting God’s grace and immersing ourselves in it.
This event - this scene that happened 2000 years ago reminds us that we don’t have to
Waste our time.
Waste our energy.
Waste our emotional reserves.
Trying to fix
Strategize
Or try to earn the very favor of God.
Our God doesn’t ask for lives to be perfect - this text indicates that he desires lives that are surrendered to him.
"Confessing their sins," Matthew writes - not confessing their good deeds - not confessing how they are seeking to honor their spouse. Not confessing how they are getting better and not swearing, or cheating or drinking.
No - Matthew, Mark, Luke and John tell us that the first people prepared themselves for a life with Jesus by confessing their sins. When we do this we enter into the grace of our God.
When Deb and I were getting to know each other one day I found myself confessing to her or revealing to her the pain of my heart. The mess I had made of a certain relationship. In Prince Albert, SK - in the dorm room where I was living for that year - I shed tears confessing to her the hurt that was burdening me. She listened - cried with me.
Looking back - I believe it was one of the foundation stones of our eventual relationship. I revealed to her my heart - my true self. Others hadn’t seen it. Others didn’t know of it. Had she not been Deb but some girl I was trying to impress, I would have tried to look good, sound good, appear good and put together. But that wasn’t the real me at the time. Looking back at that afternoon when I came clean, had the opportunity to confess the junk in my life to her and to our God the burden, the pain lifted.
And amazingly enough it didn’t run her off. But seemed to set the standard for the honesty we have with each other to this very day.
Not all who came to the river that day got in. Not all who came to the River bank confessed their sins and got in.
Along the river on dry ground stood the Pharisees and Sadducees. In their religious robes, their religious attire they put on they stood and gazed. Observing from the margins. Watching from the rivers edge, I see them murmuring among themselves, "Yes, he really needed this."
"It’s about time she realized how messed she was."
I imagine these professional religious leaders standing with arms crossed critiquing the people who were being baptized.
Would they consider entering the waters?
Would they consider listening to John?
Would they know of their need admit being broken?
No - No way.
John’s response to them, "You brood of vipers."
"Produce fruit that demonstrates your supposed religious life."
"Your ancestry doesn’t earn you a pass."
"The ax is already at the root of tree."
This didn’t help John any - infact it led to his beheading - yet it was the truth. The Truth being that each of us.
Each person has need to come into the waters.
To confess their sins.
Each of us would do well to put aside the fancy attire.
Or the fancy image.
Or the façade that we carry around, "I’m fine - Really - I’m fine" and to come clean - become honest and be immersed in God’s grace.
For those that do - there is hope for life
Restoration
Healing
For those that don’t - there is no such hope.
When Jesus makes his appearance. When Jesus learned from his Father that it was the time to begin his ministry - Jesus heads to the Jordan River.
If ever there was a person who deserved to stay and stand on the dry bank.
If ever there was a person who didn’t have anything to confess - He was the man.
Yet he entered the waters - He left the solid ground for the cool waters.
This wasn’t a recruiting endeavor.
He wasn’t looking for a bunch of wetbacks to become his disciples - not yet.
No - He entered.
He himself walked into the very waters that the others had.
He took upon himself, he humbled himself to the same actions that the broken and yearning people of Jerusalem had been doing.
Jesus identifies with the brokenness of those wetbacks - John the Baptist immerses Jesus in those waters. And as he did the heavens opened. A dove descended. A voice spoke. A voice for the people to hear,
"This is my Son whom I love with him I am well pleased."
Had Jesus healed anyone yet?
Had Jesus taught anything yet?
Had he confronted injustice or brought release to the captive - No - nothing.
His baptism and God’s favor wasn’t earned or deserved but all grace. Jesus was loved for who he was, not for anything he did, had done or would do. "This is my Son whom I love, with him I am well pleased."
It is God’s grace, all in God’s grace that we receive and surrender to when we begin this Christian life.
Brothers and Sisters we must remember this.
Making it through day 6 or your New Year’s Resolution won’t earn you more of God’s favor.
Becoming a better parent
Spouse
Child won’t earn you more of God’s love.
The folks, who entered the waters, stopped trying harder and simply surrendered.
They took off their masks and entered into the grace of God.
On this first Sunday of the New Year, hear this good news from our God.
"You my children
You my Sons.
You my Daughters are my beloved.
I love you.
I am well pleased with you."
In your bulletin is a piece of paper. I’d like for you to take it out.
I’d like for you to write on this piece of paper a confession.
I’d like for you to write on this paper a prayer of repentance.
I’d like for you to write on this paper a mask you’ve been wearing.
I’d like for you to admit to God your fallenness and then drowned it.
Immerse it in the baptismal font.
And then hear these words
You are God’s beloved daughter.
You are God’s beloved son
He is well pleased with you. Amen
