January 15, 2023
Hope Lutheran Church
Rev. Mary Erickson
Matthew 3:13-17
Our New Birthright
Friends, may grace and peace be yours in abundance in the knowledge of God and Christ Jesus our Lord.
Wong Kim Ark was born in San Francisco in 1873. His parents were from China but had permanently relocated in the United States. Wong Kim Ark became a cook when he grew up and he worked in several restaurants.
When he was 21 years old he decided to make a trip to China so he could visit relatives. Before he set sail, he got a copy made of his birth certificate. This was to facilitate his reentry through customs. He wanted this documentation in place because in 1882, when he was 9 years old, the United States had passed the Chinese Exclusion Act. This act barred citizens of China entering the US.
Wong Kim Ark visited his family and returned to the US a few months later. His ship docked in the San Francisco harbor and he went through the customs point. He presented his US birth certificate to the customs agent. The agent took one look at him and declared the birth certificate a phony. He had Wong Kim Ark imprisoned.
While in prison, Wong Kim Ark sued for his release under the protection of our constitution’s 14th amendment. His case went all the way up to the Supreme Court. The court’s decision became the groundbreaking precedent for the power of our birthright as US citizens. The 14th amendment states: “All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the state wherein they reside.”
We have a birthright. Every person on this planet has a birthright – to their country, to their family lineage.
And biblically, we have received a birthright. We have a birthright through God’s actions at creation, and we have a new birthright through the sacrament of baptism. Both of these birthrights permanently anchor us within our holy and God-given identity.
Let’s consider creation first. Genesis 1 tells us that humanity was created in the image and likeness of God:
“So God created humankind in his image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them.” (Genesis 1:27)
God looked at all that God had made and deemed it very good. As created beings, we have been made with an inherent value that cannot be denied. And somehow, we bear the image and likeness of God. What that means exactly we don’t know, but there was nothing else in the created order which received this creative intent, according to the biblical writer of this chapter.
Humanity alone bears this divine image and likeness. And moreover, we see that this likeness carries with all of us throughout the diversity of our individual selves. Both genders receive this mark. It’s not just certain somebodies who have been bestowed with this characteristic. It’s ALL of us.
Now we know that there are an infinite number of ways that we can categorize and downgrade people. In 1787, slaves were given the value of three-fifths of a person for counting a state’s population. Slavery was justified and Native Americans were denied their land by judging that people of color were somehow less human than people of European decent. In another area, the pay scale for women has long lagged behind that of men, even to this day.
And these are just a few examples. We can label and degrade the humanity of ourselves and others in so very many ways. Intelligence, financial value, accent, physique, gender identity, disabilities – there are so many ways we measure value.
But our birthright as God’s creatures tells us differently! Which view is right? Which voice will you listen to?
Friends, do not deny your birthright! And do not overlook the birthright of your neighbor. Each and every one of us was created in the image and likeness of God. When God our creator looks at us, God deems us to be very good. This is our true identity.
We have our God-given birthright through creation. And secondly, through baptism we have received our new birthright.
Today we lift up the baptism of our Lord. Before he began his public ministry, Jesus went to the Jordan River and received John’s baptism. As he rose from the waters, the Holy Spirit descended in the form of a dove and landed on him. Then a voice declared from the heavens: This is My Son, The Beloved, with whom I am well pleased.”
This moment and this voice pronounced Jesus’ identity. He is the Son of God; he is beloved; he is pleasing to God.
As Jesus progressed through his ministry, all that he does and says emerge from this moment. He is loved; God delights in him; he bears the divine stamp. This moment in the Jordan River and his awareness of his divinely pronounced identity empowers and directs all that will come.
Many other voices will send a starkly different message. Many well-regarded people will not be pleased in him. Jesus will be criticized. He’ll be called the Devil’s offspring. The people of his hometown will try to push him over a cliff. Others will judge him by the company he keeps. And at the end of his life, they’ll arrest him and condemn him to death. His own disciples will abandon him. Even while he’s dying, they’ll hurl insults at him and mock him.
Despite these contrary voices, Jesus remains tuned into the voice that informed him at his baptism. This voice was the truth. And to the very end, in his last breath he commended himself to the Father who delighted in him.
With Jesus’ baptism, we reflect upon our own. Many of us have no memory of that event. We were just babies. But we know that God reached out to us in this sacrament. And through each baptism we witness, we return to our own. We hear the words: Baptized in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. These words were pronounced over us. The water washed upon us.
Through that action, God claimed us wholly. Despite our flaws, in spite of our brokenness in sin, we have been adopted. And somehow, we don’t understand it, but we accept it, the new life that is to come has already been melded into our being. We are made new and healed even in our current fractures and wounds.
In this sacrament, we have become divine sons and daughters, we have been adopted into God’s holy family. Baptism is God’s “I love you” to us. And in it, we have received our holy and heavenly identity. This is our new birthright. It can never be taken from us. We have been born anew in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit.
This is the voice of the divine eternal who calls you into your true identity. This is the birthright given to you from God. This is the true you! Listen to this voice. Let it sink down to the center of your being. Live in its light. Dwell in its grace, and BELIEVE IT.
And when we do, we become beacons of its light. We carry it into the world. We bear it to those we encounter. We speak and act in the world in the same life affirming way as Jesus did.
There are so many voices out there that cut down and degrade. How good to be a voice of affirmation, to be that voice living within the goodness and abundance of our divine birthright!
Do you know people who have been affirming presences in your life? There are those people who are just welcoming, warm and encouraging. They build you up and confirm your personal legitimacy and value. We can join them.
As we come to claim our own birthright in God, it fills us more and more. And the more we live within the goodness of our birthright, we also see it in our neighbor. And we can’t help but speak and affirm that true birthright to our neighbor, too.
We can be the voice that builds up, we can speak God’s affirming presence to our neighbor. In a world that prefers to tear down and segregate, we can announce the reality of our true identity, for this is how God sees us.
