Into the Muck and Mire
The Rev. Dr. John Judson
January 9, 2011
It made no sense. It made no sense what so ever and John knew it. John the Baptist knew that it made no sense for him to be baptizing Jesus. To the uninitiated, and to those around John, it would have made perfect sense. After all John the Baptist was a rock star. He had followers. He had fame. He was the talk of the town and even the power brokers had come to him to be baptized. Yet the moment Jesus arrives to get dunked John understood that this was just wrong. Jesus was greater than he was and it is the greater who baptizes the lesser. Jesus was the one who was sinless and not in need of baptism. So John tries to prevent Jesus from being baptized and in fact requests that Jesus baptize him. Yet Jesus not only refuses to turn the tables but insists on being baptized by John. And in so doing explains his desire with a cryptic response of, “So that all righteousness could be fulfilled.” So what’s the deal? Why should Jesus insist on going through with this charade of baptism by sin as if John is the greater and he the lesser. It made no sense then and it has made no sense for the church over the last 2,000 years for the same reasons that it made no sense to John; Jesus was sinless and greater.
So what do we do with this snapshot of Jesus’ baptism? Well we could basically ignore the baptism issues and focus on the outcome, God’s claiming Jesus as God’s chosen son, and leave it at that which is what the church has traditionally done. But to do so misses what I believe to be the heart of the baptism…which in fact fuels God’s response. So here is what I propose. First I want to begin by offering a different way of reading Jesus’ explanation to John as to why he needs to be baptized. This comes from N.T. Wright. “This is how it’s got to be right now,” says Jesus, “This is the right way for us to complete God’s saving plan.” The key word here is plan. God has had a plan for saving creation. God has carried out this plan over more than a thousand years through Abraham, Moses, kings, priests and prophets. All of that work is chronicled in the Hebrew scriptures. But now the age of the prophets has come to an end. God is doing something new in Jesus, but there must be a passing of the baton, if you will, from one part of the saving plan to the next. So when John baptizes Jesus he is not doing so to remove Jesus’ sins…he is literally passing the mantle of saving work from himself to Jesus. Just as the Nancy Pelosi passed the gavel of Speaker of the House to Boenner, John is passing the work of God to Jesus. But that is only half of what is taking place here.
The second vital aspect of the baptism is that the very act of Jesus submitting to being baptized tells us how he is going to carry out his part of the saving mission. Remember if you will John the Baptist has been describing for the people a messiah who will come with unlimited power and might; who will sweep God’s enemies before him. You can imagine the hopes that this image has created. People are looking for a combination of Alexander the Great and Clint Eastwood. They are looking for someone who will be above the fray dominating all who oppose him. By submitting to baptism however Jesus changes the expectations. He is in essence saying that he will be savior who will get down into the muck and mire of life right along with the people. He will not be slaying savior who sits on a throne. He will be a savior who associates with the people who are facing judgment and need to repent. There will be nothing that they experience that he does not experience with them. This is the savior who will understand us better than we understand ourselves. This is the savior who will go to the cross for us; dying for us that we might find life. Jesus submitting to baptism says this is the kind of savior he will be.
This morning is our opportunity to allow Jesus’ baptism to remind ourselves of who we are to be both as Christ followers and as leaders of God’s people. This morning we ordain and install leaders in the life of our church. And in so doing we are ordaining and installing men and women not to positions of power but to positions of service. Our elders and deacons are charged not with standing above the fray as if they are to direct our spiritual lives from above, but they are ordained and installed in order to get down into the muck and more of life; not only here in this church but in the messy world in which we live. They are charged to pay particular attention to the needs of our people and God’s world in order that we play our part in God’s saving story. For as we will discover in Chapter 28 of Matthew, Jesus has passed the baton to us, just as John passed it to him. So as we come to this moment of ordination and installation, and as we come to the table in a few minutes, I challenge all of us to consider this question, “How am I imitating Christ by getting down into the muck and mire of life and acting out my part of God’s saving plan?”
