Baptism Of Christ - A Short Sunday Sermon

 

Today we celebrate the Baptism of Christ in the Jordan, an epiphany in which God reveals himself to us as Father, Son and Holy Ghost, as a Trinity of divine persons. All well and good, more than that, a miraculous revelation of divine truth. But why, we have to ask, did Christ allow himself to be baptized by John?

After all, John's baptism was a matter of repentance; the Jews went down into the Jordan confessing their sins and arose, cleansed in the living waters of the river to a new life of righteousness. Death and rebirth, aptly summed up in the water itself, water which kills and gives life.

Excellent, but why did Jesus, who knew no sin, get baptized by John; he had nothing to repent of. The Baptizer says as much, "I should be baptized by you," to which our Lord replies, "So be it for now, to fulfill all righteousness."

To fulfill all righteousness, that being obedience to the Father's will. And what was the Father asking of Jewry? To be baptized, and Christ, representing the people as King of the Jews must be baptized too. But perhaps "represent" is too weak a word.  

Jesus, the Word made Flesh, though sinless, assumes fallen human nature and it's this which he takes down into the depths of the Jordon. To death, if you like, only to rise up again from the waters, Spirit anointed. He does the very same thing at the Cross and Resurrection. His baptism, then, is a prefigurement of his redemptive action. Benedict XVI puts it well:

"Jesus loaded the burden of mankind's guilt upon his shoulders; he bore it into the depths of the Jordan. He inaugurated his public activity by stepping into the place of sinners. His inaugural gesture is an anticipation of the Cross."

And, we can add, the Resurrection. Right there on the Jordan, a place pf Exodus, God reveals his redemptive work in Christ, who in loving obedience to the Father will offer sinful humanity sinlessly upon the Cross as a perfect, atoning sacrifice. 

All this, unveiled and prefigured at the outset of Jesus' public ministry, at the beginning of the road which will take him to Calvary and from there to resurrection, to new life in the power of that same Spirit which descended upon him in the waters of the Jordan.

That same Spirit who rests upon us who believe and are baptized in the name of the God who revealed himself to us in the Jordan as the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost.

Amen,

LSP

Sunday Sermon - Moneychangers

 

If you follow the newfangled lectionary, you'll have heard St. John's account of Christ driving the money changers and associated cattle out of the Temple. Picture the scene. 

There's the forecourt of the Temple turned into a cattle market, replete with FX grifters exchanging secular currency for Temple coin, and making a nice profit to boot.  Why? Because the Jews had to buy animals to sacrifice and the Temple didn't accept secular money. Enter Christ.

Zeal for his Father's house consumed him as he drove the beasts out with a whip, overturning the cattle market casino which had turned the Temple, the holiest place on earth, the focus of atonement as it then was, into a "den of thieves." 

The Temple was defiled and Christ couldn't stand for it, hungering and thirsting for righteousness he drove it out, and the message, on the face of it, is clear. No corruption, grift, skulduggery and malfeasance in the Holy Church of God. But there's more.

Sensing something deeper, bystanders ask for a sign, they want to know what our Lord's actions signify, and he tells them, "Destroy this temple and in three days I will raise it up." Of course they're confused, but we're not. 

Jesus' cleansing of the Temple is a prophetic act which points to his death and resurrection, to his atoning sacrifice and its attendant victory. He will be the new Temple and its Sacrifice, as one. So Christ drives the animals and the moneylenders out of the Temple. Their time is done.

We're the beneficiaries of this, the blood of the Paschal Lamb is on the lintel of our souls, such that the Angel of Death passes over us. As living stones in the spiritual temple of Christ's Body, the Church, his sacrifice is operative within us, which brings us back to the wicked money changers.

For sure, the Church writ large must cleanse herself of corruption, but what about us, as persons, the Church writ small? Surely the same applies. We're Temples of the Spirit, says the Apostle, and so we are. Message to market?

Repent. Drive those knavish thieves, the world, the flesh and the Devil out of the temple of our souls so that we, clean, may find union with the Cross and the life which flows from it. Therein lies sanctification and beatitude, and herein endeth the Lesson.

Your Old Friend,

LSP

Jesus Isn't Your Imaginary Friend

Here's a helpful message for Advent. Maybe you think Jesus is some kind of imaginary buddy, in your mind. Well He's not.

At some point in our history, we began to attribute a merely mental reality to anything that was not an object and reduced the importance of objects to what they could contribute to our mental reality. We live in a sea of psychology. Things, we believe, are only what we think they are. My “relationship” with you means nothing more than the set of inner experiences and dispositions I have towards you. In many ways, a very good version of “virtual reality” is just as good as “reality” itself.

You can read the whole thing here. And while we're at it, let's have Hagia Sophia back.

Maybe you think I'm kidding about that last bit.

LSP