Water and spirit
Readings: Mark 1. 4-11, Genesis 1. 1-5, Acts 19. 1-7
You’ve probably noticed that we seem to get a lot of John the Baptist around this time of year. This is the third time we’ve heard of his appearing that we’ve had in the space of a month, but actually that’s a good thing because there is so much going on here. As I said back on Advent 2 there’s this sense that everything has been leading here, to this moment as John is appears on the banks of the Jordan baptising people, preparing for what, or rather who, is to come.
And then he arrives, the one who is greater than John, he steps out of the crowd and is revealed for all to see. And what is revealed? Not just the Saviour, but the beginning of something new.
Our Old Testament reading makes that really clear to us this morning, helps us to spot the parallels that are happening here. As Jesus comes up out of the water what do we see? The Spirit hovering over the waters and God speaking that he is takes pleasure in what is before him.
Just as the Spirit hovers over the waters of creation, so now the Spirit hovers over Jesus. Just as God spoke over each day of his creation declaring it good until at last it was completed and he declared it very good, so now he declares that he is well pleased with Jesus.
Because Jesus isn’t just as Saviour, come to rescue and redeem, he is also the beginning of the new, the new creation where at last all will be declared good eternally. And this new creation will appear in a similar way to the old, it will come from the waters through the working of the Spirit. Nothing God does is an accident, it’s all either pointing back to something before or pointing ahead to something to come.
And as Jesus appears on the edge of the Jordan and wades into the waters something becomes really clear about this new creation, it will be birthed out of the old creation. God isn’t coming to rip it all up and start again. He could, the universe could cease to exist at the blink of an eye should he wish, just as it came into being in an instant so too it could vanish in an instant. But God is invested in his creation, it’s not arbitrary to him, he loves his creation, and he loves us. So whilst it may be simpler to wipe the slate clean and start again, he chooses to go the long way round, to rescue and redeem this creation so that it will become the new.
Where do we see that in our passage today? It’s the fact that Jesus wades into the waters with the sinners. He hasn’t appeared in some distant spot, atop a mountain somewhere. He hasn’t appeared where people are waiting expectantly by a river for someone to come to enter the waters alone. He has appeared amidst the crowds who are being washed clean of their sins, who have acknowledged their failure to keep God’s ways, and with them he steps into the water, he steps into our pollution. He is the one who is completely without sin, who has kept God’s ways perfectly without fault or misstep, and yet here he is stood with us. He won’t save and rescue us from afar, he won’t come almost to us but keep the barrier up a little bit to keep us at arms length, he’s there with us in the water, even though he doesn’t need to be. And it’s at precisely this point that God declares he is well pleased with him, when he is surrounded by our mess and failure. As he gazes up to heaven surrounded by our mess and brokenness, God declares he is well pleased.
The baptism of Jesus is a picture of the rest of his ministry. For where do we find him as he goes about for the next 3 years, surrounded by the mess and brokenness of humanity but crucially surrounded by those who are aware of their mess and brokenness, who know their need for God. As Christ hangs upon the cross surrounded by our mess and brokenness, bearing our sin and mess and brokenness, as he gazes into heaven even there, he is doing so for those who know the depths of their sin and mess and brokenness, who know their need for God. And he does all of this so that those who are all too aware of their sin, and mess, and brokenness, can become part of the new creation, can have all that washed away, carried away from them by him as he plunges it all down into death. And he does so, so that as we descend beneath the waters into his death, and are raised up from them into his everlasting life, we too will hear the voice of the Father speak words of love and care for us. We too will experience the descent of the Spirit upon us.
We see it in Acts today. The outworking of the cross of Jesus, the growing of that new creation. Those 12 who are baptised into Christ and as they are they receive the Holy Spirit to renew their lives. By water and the Spirit we are made part of the new creation. The water for washing away our guilt and sin, the Spirit to renew our lives, to renew and remake us in Christ’s image, the first of this new creation.
And we need both, water and Spirit. If we had simply received the Spirit but not been cleansed from our sins (if that were even possible, but let’s imagine it is) we would grow in holiness but our sinfulness would not be paid for, our mess and brokenness would still be marked on our chart, each misstep and failure count against us. We may be being renewed, but in being brought to life by the Spirit our sins would scream condemnation over us, we’d know of our wickedness and failure but have nothing to remedy it. We would never make it to eternal life.
Or if we had simply been washed of our sins but remained without the Spirit, as these who had been baptised at an earlier time had, then whilst our guilt and shame and sin had been washed away we would find ourselves still lifeless, dead because of them. We’d find ourselves working, trying to earn our place in eternity, to prove ourselves worthy of a place there, prove that Christ’s death for us had been worth it as we sought to prove ourselves, prove that God had chosen correctly for fear he might change his mind. We would not have been brought alive again.
What a gift God gives us in baptism. For there he both washes away our sins, and he gives us his Spirit to enable us to grow in holiness by his strength and power.
The new creation isn’t ours to earn, nor is it ours to create. Instead as Christ rises from the Jordan river he reveals it as a gift, a gift to all who would believe, to all who know that they are far from God yet long to come home.
Just as this creation, in which we now live, came from the waters, as the Spirit worked, so too the new creation begins at the waters as the spirit hovers over Christ. So now, in our day, all who long to know God, who come in sorrow for their sins find renewal in the waters and the working of the Spirit.
My brothers and sisters, God will not start again, instead he is committed to us. God will not abandon us for he has chosen us. God will not stand far off from us or save us from afar, instead he is found in our midst. God will not make us earn our place by his side, instead he has done all that is necessary so that he can bring us to his side himself, bring us to that new creation which comes as a gift. In Christ, God has both provided for the cleansing of our sins and the renewal of our lives. So let us hear the call of God, hear the call of our baptism and not squander this gift, but live it out in praise and thanksgiving.
Amen.