January 13, 2008
I did a funeral yesterday, for a Bowie man who was killed in a motorcycle accident on Monday. It was one of those deals where I didn’t know the family, but the person who died had been baptized and raised in the Episcopal Church – Episcopal school, acolyte, confirmed, the whole thing, so the family wanted him to have an Episcopal funeral. Now, you’d think these type of things would be kind of tricky, when the priest doesn’t know the person who died. But in fact, it’s not as hard as you might think. And the reason it isn’t has to do with the theme of the service this morning: baptism. Knowing that the deceased had been baptized makes a big difference in my approach in those circumstances, because of what our church teaches about baptism. Because of what we believe about baptism.
When we are baptized, remember that one of the things that happens is that with the chrism, the blessed oil, each of us is ‘sealed by the Holy Spirit in baptism, and marked as Christ’s own forever.’ As someone gets to say those words to the newly baptized, I have long considered those particular words my favorite. Sealed and marked. It’s official: Jesus considers us his own, his chosen, his beloved. And no matter what we do, we can’t change that: Jesus will always consider us his own forever. Even if we take a different path, choose a different faith, or practice no faith at all . . . we are still considered Christ’s own forever.
And herein lies a paradox: we are supposed to do our best to live out those baptismal vows and promises that we make at our baptism. Or are made on our behalf by our parents and godparents, if we were infants or small children when we were baptized. But either way, we do make promises. We promise that we will get to know and love and follow Jesus. We promise to develop a relationship to God in God’s various forms, God the Source and Creator, God the Word and the Son, God the Holy Spirit. We promise that we will continue in the breaking of bread and the prayers, that we will seek and serve Christ in all persons, that we will proclaim the Good News of God in Christ by word and example. And that is one of the reasons that even when we don’t have a person to be baptized on one of the four baptismal Sundays of our liturgical year, we still renew our baptismal covenant: to remind us what we have promised to do. To remind us of the promises we have made to God.
But here’s the other part of the paradox: whether we live into those vows or not, whether we do a good job or a poor job of following through on those promises. . . we are still Christ’s own forever. That’s just how it works. And you know what? We can see that this is the way it works, if we take a big picture look at the gospel lesson we hear this morning. It is, of course, the story of Jesus’ baptism. God says to Jesus, “You are my Chosen. You are my Beloved. With you I am well pleased.” It has been said that this is Jesus’ commissioning, his call – this is the moment which equips him to serve God and starts his ministry. Makes sense, right? But here’s the thing: God says these things to Jesus before Jesus does anything. Think about it: at this point in Jesus’ life, he has preached not one sermon, healed not one person, called not one disciple to follow him and become fishers of people. And yet, God has already called Jesus God’s beloved, and told him that God is well pleased with him. This is a key point, it seems to me. Because Jesus doesn’t earn God’s love; he is just given it. Just like you and I can’t earn God’s love, or God’s being pleased with us. It is just a freely given gift, unasked for, undeserved: it is grace. Many of us were probably baptized as infants, which highlights the point here more clearly – we don’t earn God’s love or God’s grace. But it’s true even if we were baptized older, as Jesus was.
And maybe that’s the challenge, to live somewhere in the middle of that paradox. To balance the grace, the gift, the being chosen and beloved by God without earning it in any way, with the responsibility to do our best to make good on the promises we make in our baptism, and are reminded of whenever we renew our baptismal covenant. How do we do that, anyway? What’s the balance, between the grace and the responsibility? How do we figure that out?
To tease this out a bit I want to think about what some have said about this moment of baptism for Jesus. It is in a very real way Jesus’ commissioning, his being called by God to be who he was most fully called to be. There are a number of what are considered ‘call’ stories throughout our holy scriptures. In the Hebrew Bible, we hear how Moses, and Samuel, Isaiah and Jeremiah are called by God to be God’s prophets to the people. In the New Testament, we hear how various disciples, and even the Apostle Paul are called to follow Jesus. In these stories, the one called is commissioned, given the authority, inspiration, and support by God and from God to go and be God’s chosen in their various communities. They find their true calling, what we may even call their vocation, in being who God has created them to be. And the same can be said for Jesus; this baptismal story is Jesus’ calling and commissioning. You are the One, God tells him. Go and be my beloved in the world.
So too are each of us called and commissioned at our baptism for the very same vocation: to go and be God’s beloved in the world. Now, in the case of Jesus, this vocation was as the Messiah, the Christ. For us, it’s to be followers of Christ. That is our job, our vocation – our ministry, even. How we live that ministry out varies person to person. For some of us, it may be teaching Sunday school, or working with youth. For others of us, it may be leading or participating in EFM, or adult formation; for still others, it might be choosing to go through the confirmation process – which itself is centered around the baptismal covenant. It might be supporting Martha’s Closet or Equality Maryland, advocating for social justice, working for political change. There are as many ways of living out one’s vocation as God’s chosen as there are Christians. But every single one of us is called and commissioned by God to go and be God’s chosen in our communities and in the world.
If we want to hear what the church has said specifically about this, I would point us to the ‘Outline of the Faith,’ which is found in the back of the Book of Common Prayer. This outline is in question-and-answer format. So, the question: Q. What is the ministry of the laity?
The answer? “ The ministry of lay persons is to represent Christ and his Church; to bear witness to him wherever they may be and, according to the gifts given them, to carry on Christ’s work of reconciliation in the world; and to take their place in the life, worship, and governance of the Church.” That would by your-all’s job: to represent Christ and the church. To carry on Christ’s work of reconciliation in the world, according to the particular gifts you were given. To take your place in the worship and life and work and running of the church. I know I’m not a lay person any more – I have a whole set of things that I’m supposed to do as a priest in Christ’s church, so don’t think that I get off the hook – but I still find this job description of laity to be both enormously freeing and even inspiring. Because here’s what one could argue that this means: that when you are a greeter, or a reader, or a host of hospitality; when you bring in your food for Martha’s Closet and donate items for Mardi Gras; when you make a financial pledge to the church or decide to run for vestry; when you come to a Buildings and Grounds work day or join the St. George’s Players in their next production; when you play the guitar or piano or sing with the music group; when you attend Sunday School and then come up here and acolyte, you are taking your place in the life, worship, and governance of the church. You are fulfilling your vocation as lay leaders in the Church of Christ; you are following through on your commission and call to do Christ’s work in the world.
And it seems to me that sometimes we miss that. Sometimes we don’t put what we do with the church in the context of our faith, and remember that the frame around all of this is that we are doing the work that God has given us to do. I found something related to this that writer Kathleen Norris said that I wanted to share with you this morning. She says, “All Christians are considered to have a call to what is commonly termed ‘the priesthood of all believers’; all are expected to use their lives so as to reveal the grace of the Holy Spirit working through them. It’s a tall order,” she says, “to literally be a sacrament, and it helps to remember Jesus’ statement in the fifteenth chapter of John’s gospel: You did not choose me; I chose you.”
And that brings us back to where we started, how we were chosen at our baptism, sealed by the Holy Spirit and marked as Christ’s own forever. How God spoke to each one of us and said, you are my chosen. With you I am well pleased. That is our inspiration and our call to go and be Christ’s hands and heart in our communities and our church, as we receive this gift of grace and then go and live out the promises and vows of our baptism.
Amen.