Year B: First Sunday After Epiphany
Baptized With Water, Baptized With Spirit
This is the special grace of Epiphany. In view of his divine dignity and power, the Son of God gathers into himself the entire human family past, present and future. The moment that the Eternal Word is uttered outside the bosom of the Trinity and steps forth into the human condition, the Word gives himself to all creatures. - Thomas Keating1
Over the next few weeks, we will be contemplating the revelation of Jesus to several groups of people: the apostles, those afflicted with demons, and many who were sick and in need of a Savior. As we celebrate the Epiphany of Jesus to these blessed few, may Jesus appear in our lives in new ways and with a new intensity.
Year B, First Sunday After Epiphany, January 7, 2023
First Reading: Genesis 1:1-5
Psalm: Psalm 29
Second Reading: Acts 19:1-7
Gospel: Mark 1:4-11
Sermon - Baptized With Water, Baptized With Spirit
What better way to begin our new year than with the beginning of Jesus’s ministry. Since this year focuses on the gospel of Mark, we will follow suit with the baptism of Jesus in Mark 1:4-11. This text could be broken into two sections: the first concern the ministry of John and his own confession about his personal ministry, and the second is an account of Jesus’s baptism.
In Mark 1:7-8, John says, “The one who is more powerful than I is coming after me; I am not worthy to stoop down and untie the strap of his sandals. I have baptized you with water, but he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit” (Mark 1:7–8).
The baptism John practiced was immersion in water for the forgiveness of sins (Mark 1:4). Jesus, on the other hand, would baptize the house of Israel with (or in) the Holy Spirit, which is a callback to several Old Testament prophecies (Ezekiel 37; Joel 2). Even though Jesus had this more excellent ministry, he still submitted to John’s baptism.
Following his baptism, Jesus saw and heard two accompanying signs: the Spirit descending from heaven and God’s declaration of his sonship. While in Matthew and Luke, this declaration is made in the third person, here in Mark, in keeping with the theme of the “Messianic secret”, the signs are witnessed by and addressed to Jesus.2
You and I, as readers of Mark’s gospel account, are let in on the secret. From the beginning, we know who Jesus is before anyone else, even John the Baptist as portrayed in the synoptics (Matthew 11:3). But the question is, “What do we do with this information?”
Do we keep it a secret like Jesus told so many to do? Do we hold it in our hearts like Mary? Or do we proclaim the good news to all creation like some endings of Mark command?
When Jesus was baptized, the heavens were torn apart (Isaiah 61:1). Perhaps this is descriptive but it is also instructive. That is, this tells us that the veil between heaven and earth was torn when Jesus was baptized, his ministry had begun. But perhaps it also tells us that heaven is closer than we might think. Perhaps this encourages us to pay attention to the world around us at the different ways that heaven has already broken through: the love between neighbors, worship, service, and the beauty of our world.
These “thin places” may be more numerous than we might realize. In fact, since Jesus’s baptism and eventual resurrection, perhaps these thin places could be anywhere if we have eyes to see.
But how do we “see” the kingdom of God? As Jesus told Nicodemus, one must be born from above, born of water and Spirit.
As John the Baptist said, he only baptized with water but Jesus baptizes with the Holy Spirit.
There is a curious story in Acts 19 about Paul encountering some disciples of John who had apparently not heard of the Way of Jesus. They had been instructed by a charismatic teacher named Apollos who had only recently learned of Jesus by way of Priscilla and her husband Aquila.
Here is the account:
While Apollos was in Corinth, Paul passed through the interior regions and came to Ephesus, where he found some disciples. He said to them, “Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you became believers?” They replied, “No, we have not even heard that there is a Holy Spirit.” Then he said, “Into what, then, were you baptized?” They answered, “Into John’s baptism.” Paul said, “John baptized with the baptism of repentance, telling the people to believe in the one who was to come after him, that is, in Jesus.” On hearing this, they were baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus. When Paul had laid his hands on them, the Holy Spirit came upon them, and they spoke in tongues and prophesied, altogether there were about twelve of them. Acts 19:1–7
Had Paul been instructed like I was, he would have verified their baptism with two questions: (1) was it immersion and (2) was it for the remission of sins? If you recall the description of John’s baptism in Mark 1, then you can imagine their answers. I would have left Corinth without baptizing these disciples in the name of Jesus.
However, Paul’s question was about the work of the Holy Spirit in their life, a question I would have never asked.
Why is it that preachers within the Church of Christ and similar traditions, including myself, have emphasized baptism in water but completely erased the baptism of the Holy Spirit? It is through this baptism that we are able to see the kingdom of God (John 3:3-5). It is through this baptism that we are made part of one body (1 Corinthians 12:13). And it was this baptism that the house of Cornelius received as a testimony to their faith and their clean hearts (Acts 15:-9).
Just as Jesus began his ministry after submitting to baptism, we follow Christ into the waters of baptism as a sign which points to the greater baptism, the one baptism of Ephesians 4, the baptism of the Holy Spirit. The Spirit descends upon us and God calls us his children.
First Reading - A New Creation Story
When God began to create the heavens and the earth, the earth was complete chaos, and darkness covered the face of the deep, while a wind from God swept over the face of the waters. Then God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light. And God saw that the light was good, and God separated the light from the darkness. God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And there was evening and there was morning, the first day. Genesis 1:1–5
In my very first sermon at North Broad, in the summer of 2021, I talked about the relationship between Mark 1 and Genesis 1. In both passages there is a beginning, water, a pronouncement of God, and the Spirit hovers over the water like a dove.
Mark’s gospel account, then, is a kind of new creation story with Jesus as the new Adam. Jesus calls us into becoming a new creation through the Holy Spirit, and he makes us children of God through the gospel. As children of God, we become part of the Light of God. Through us, God says, “Let there be light” once more.
As we live, as we work, as we pray, and as we play, we cooperate with God in the ministry of reconciliation and recreation. In this new world, we as the body of Christ are the temple, our steps our worship, and our thoughts are praise. But outside of the kingdom of God, there is darkness. It is this darkness that destroys and corrupts. It brings loss and pain to people in the world.
But darkness is the absence of light. The more you and I spread hope and peace through a loving, authentic faith, the more light there is in the world. May you and I be agents of the new creation in 2024. And may the beauty of Jesus be seen in us and our church.
Keating, Thomas. The Mystery of Christ: The Liturgy as Spiritual Experience. New York: Continuum, 2008. Print.
Boring, M. Eugene. The New Interpreter’s Bible: The Gospel of Matthew. Nashville, TN: Abingdon Press, 1995. Print.