Sermon: Baptism of our Lord - 2021

10 January 2021

Text: Matt 3:13-17

In the name of + Jesus.  Amen.

Today, we celebrate the Baptism of our Lord Jesus Christ. 

Baptism is a washing.  And you wash because you are dirty.  We are baptized because we are sinners.  So why is Jesus being baptized, dear friends? 

In fact, being God, why does Jesus incarnate Himself into the flesh of a single cell in His mother’s womb, being born and becoming helpless as a newborn?  Why must He be circumcised to make Him a member of God’s chosen people?  Why was He presented at the temple?  And once again, why is He who has no sin being washed in John’s baptism of repentance?

All of these things are a paradox – for Jesus is the eternal God, who has no beginning, and yet He was conceived and born.  He is the Creator of everyone and the one who wrestled with Jacob nineteen hundred years before His own birth – and yet He is circumcised as part of a ritual to receive Him into God’s people.  Although He is the Lord and He is holy, He was brought to the temple in His infancy to be symbolically sacrificed as the firstborn male, to be officially recognized as “holy to the Lord.”

And again, though He is the only person who ever lived who was without sin, yet He is washed in the waters of repentance by His cousin who admits that he is unworthy even to untie our Lord’s sandal. 

All of these things teach us about Jesus.  Not that He is a sinner who needs to fulfill the Law, but rather He fulfills the Law for our sake, for we are sinners.  He is the righteous one, and we, dear friends, lack righteousness. And so He gives His to us.

And so this is why Jesus is born, circumcised, presented, and baptized.  He says it Himself. 

And His cousin, John the Baptist, doesn’t understand either at first.  He wanted to prevent Jesus from being baptized!  Can you just imagine?  Not because our Lord was unworthy, but because He is truly the only worthy person.  John says, “I need to be baptized by You, and do You come to me?”  This is an awkward moment, but it is also a teaching moment – for our Lord begins His teaching ministry as a rabbi right here, at His baptism.  He teaches John the Baptist why He has come, and what the meaning is of His baptism: “Let it be so now, for thus it is fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness.”

This word that we translate as “fulfilled” literally means to make full, like topping off a glass with water.  And the word “all” means just what it says: “all righteousness.” 

All of the righteousness that we lack, dear friends, all of our sins and the sins of the whole world, that is, the lack of righteousness, the emptiness of our cup – is brought to its fullness in Christ, in His fulfillment of the Law, in His baptism, in His ministry, by His Word, by His death, by His resurrection, by His grace given to us at our own baptism! 

John’s hesitancy is overcome by the Word of Jesus, by the promise that in obeying the will of the Father, John is serving Jesus so that Jesus may serve us: fulfilling all righteousness for us, and repairing the damaged and destroyed communion with God that we have suffered from the first sin in Eden.

For we poor, miserable sinners have no righteousness of our own.  We are broken.  We have abandoned God’s image in us – both because of Adam’s sin, and because of our own.  We are so broken that we aren’t even capable of a little righteous.  We are helpless.

And so to save us, Jesus comes to where we are, in a broken world.  He redeems us who are helpless by becoming helpless.  He fulfills the Law in every aspect, while we are unable to do so.  And His baptism is the beginning of His ministry, where He gathers His redeemed brothers and sisters in the Church of every age, from the first disciples to the very last baptized Christians before His return and the end of the world. 

And the work of baptism is God’s work, dear friends.  For “when Jesus was baptized, immediately He went up from the water, and behold, the heavens were opened to Him.”  And we see the action of the Most Holy Trinity, as the Son fulfills the Law, as the Holy Spirit descends upon our Lord “like a dove,” and the voice of the Father is heard: “This is My beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased.”

For the Son is perfect.  He has no sin.  He fulfills the Father’s will in perfect obedience.  The Holy Spirit descends upon Him.  And for the first time since the Garden of Eden, a man is publicly declared to be perfect, to be the Son of God in the flesh, confirmed to be beloved of the Father – and yet He will, in three years, receive the wrath of the Father for all of the sins ever committed. 

For this is what it means, dear friends, that Jesus fulfills “all righteousness.”  Apart from the ministry, death, and resurrection of Jesus, we have no hope of being rescued.  We deserve hell and death.  But by His fulfillment of righteousness, we too become adopted children of God, well-pleasing for the sake of Him who is the only-begotten of the Father.

And this righteousness is given to us as a free gift, dear friends.  For that is the meaning of the word “grace.”  Our Lord will receive God’s wrath upon Himself, as the one true sacrificial Lamb, without blemish, whose blood is sprinkled on us at our own baptisms, when the mystical action of the Trinity is called again to mind – for we are baptized with water, and we are baptized “in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.”  Righteousness is fulfilled.  We are rescued.  We are renewed.  We are made disciples.

This is how we poor miserable sinners have salvation, dear friends.  We deserve hell, but instead, we are raised to heaven.  We deserve death, but we are resurrected bodily from the dead.  We have earned separation from God and from each other, but we are gathered together and promised an eternal heavenly reunion and bodily resurrection with our deceased loved ones, and with our Lord Jesus Himself, our Savior and Redeemer, who fulfills all righteousness on our behalf.

And so we Christians are liberated from striving to keep the Law out of fear.  For we do not have to fear death and hell.  We are baptized.  We are redeemed.  We are beloved children of God in whom the Father is well-pleased.  And though we continue to struggle with sin in this life, we who have been graced with faith are also given the desire to repent, the call to strive to keep the Law, not out of fear, but out of gratitude to God and out of love for our neighbor.

When we are baptized, we are born again, and we do indeed grow in the love of God.  We grow by encountering Jesus in the Word of God and in the sacraments.  When we are absolved, we return anew to the baptismal font, where we are indeed again forgiven and declared to be His children with whom He is well-pleased.  And when we receive the Lord’s Supper, we participate in the sacrifice of our Lord at the cross, eating His flesh and drinking His blood, “for the forgiveness of sins.” 

We are here, dear friends, like John the Baptist, doing what Jesus invites us to do, what pleases the Father, what the Holy Spirit guides us into – as His beloved baptized.  Our sins are forgiven, and we are day by day being renewed into the image and likeness of God.  We are called to daily repentance.  And His fulfillment of all righteousness was given to you in your own Baptism.  It is a treasure. 

You are baptized.  You are forgiven.  You are saved by grace.  Jesus has fulfilled all righteousness. 

Amen.

In the name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.