When You Pass Through These Waters…

Isaiah 43:1-7 and Luke 3:15-17, 21-22

Sometimes we must step out of our culture and into another in order to understand ourselves better.  There is a wonderful story told around the world about an East African tribe.  When a mother from this tribe discovers she is pregnant, she goes into the wilderness with a few friends and they meditate and pray until they are blessed to hear the song of the child.  They believe that every person, every soul has a special vibration and that song of the soul is unique to the individual.  When the women have discovered the child’s song, they then go back teach it to the entire village.  Later, when the child is born, the village welcomes the child into the community by gathering together and singing his or her song.[1]

As the child grows, the child will hear his or her special song on other occasions as well.  When the child first goes to school, when he is initiated into adulthood, when she marries, and even at a person’s death, the villagers will gather to sing the child’s song.  It is a thread throughout the person’s life that serves to connect the person to a larger story, a community, and to his or her Creator. Whenever one is feeling lost or misguided, the song will call one back to remembrance.  It is a kind of anchor, an assurance, and an affirmation of the person all wrapped up in one special melody. 

But there is another time when the child’s song is sung.  If ever the person commits an aberrant act, if ever the grown adult commits a crime, the people call the person to the center of the village and they form a circle around him or her.  Then they begin to sing to the individual; together, they sing that person’s special song.  The villagers recognize that social crimes and antisocial behavior originate in the person’s loss of identity.  Rather than punishment, they believe that the remedy for such a loss is the remembrance of that identity, the giving of love, and the community gathered to remind the person of the special song given to him or her at birth. 

Recently, there have been several articles in the Hampshire Gazette about the arson fires that plagued Northampton in two days following Christmas.  One article described the unsettling feeling in the possibility that “one of Northampton’s own” could commit such an act.  Many unanswered questions linger regarding the possible psychological motivations of the arsonist.  Likewise, many of us have unanswered questions that linger regarding our own psychological motivations in any given circumstance.  What causes some people to commit such acts without regard for the welfare of others?  What helps some of us to hold in check our own potential for evil or harmful behavior?

These are both religious and spiritual questions. 

When Jesus steps into the baptismal waters under the tutelage and ministering of John, he is also stepping into his God given identity.  A Voice from the heavens speaks and his ears hear the affirmation, “You are my child, the Beloved, with you I am well-pleased.”  This is Jesus’ song; it is his identity.  But it is also our song, and our identity. 

When Jesus steps into the baptismal waters, he steps into a tradition, as well as a collective identity that goes all the way back to Isaiah, to Sarah, to Abraham, to Noah, and to Adam.  We all pass through waters in our lifetime—some of those waters can feel dangerous, forbidding, and overwhelming.  But the God who created us, the God who formed us and put within us a warm and beating heart, promises to make a path through the waters, through the danger, and through the toil.  Just as Jesus was plunged into this promise at his baptism, so are we.  The God of Isaiah declares, “Because you are precious in my sight, and honoured, and I love you…” the fire will not consume you and the rivers of chaos will not overwhelm your soul.  

Friends, this is our song.  And sometimes it takes a lifetime of hearing such an affirmation to trust fully in its power.  This affirmation is sung to us at our baptism, and it is the intention of our church village to gather and sing these words on a regular basis, just in case one of us should forget or become distracted by other ideas.  Today we remind one another through the renewal of our baptismal promises. This is how we collectively and individually remember who we are, what we are, and whose we are.  This is how we fragile, human creatures remember that we are made for creation, not destruction.  This is how we remember that we are created in love and for love, not the promulgation of hate.  This is how we claim our God-given identity—above and beyond and before any other identity that the world will thrust upon us.  We pray that this small ritual act will, in combination with prayer, perseverance, and forgiveness, help to keep our souls from lashing out, our more harmful impulses from growing unabated, and our souls from being consumed by the heat of our passions and predilections.

Today, when you pass through this water, remember that you are God’s child.  Remember that you are beloved, and remember to act out of this nature, and this core, whenever you are lost or confused or broken.

Come, brothers and sisters, come and renew yourselves for the living of these days.