Kick Off
Jesus is about to start his ministry with a kick off event, his baptism.
Then Jesus came from Galilee to John at the Jordan, to be baptized by him. John would have prevented him, saying, ‘I need to be baptized by you, and do you come to me?’ But Jesus answered him, ‘Let it be so now; for it is proper for us in this way to fulfill all righteousness.’ Then he consented. And when Jesus had been baptized, just as he came up from the water, suddenly the heavens were opened to him and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and alighting on him. And a voice from heaven said, ‘This is my Son, the Beloved, with whom I am well pleased.’ - Matthew 3:13-17
Most of us have a hard time remembering our baptism. Unless we were baptized older in life, we have lost that event in the recesses of our infant minds, never to resurface.
It is a shame, because it is such an important event in our lives, and for that reason, we do it early, having our parents and others stand in for us, making sure we don't die before receiving the Holy Spirit.
For Jesus, it validated his position as God's son, and the burden of that designation was great enough to send him into the desert for forty days to pray and fast.
Because our baptism is lost to ancient memories, we may fail to see how momentous it was. We don't remember feeling different, because we don't remember any before time.
So, maybe we all need a restart, a new kick-off event, something to remind us of the significance of being one with God, receiving the Holy Spirit and coming to know Jesus.
This is a good time for that, while we are in our isolated deserts, thinking about the virus and praying for the world to come back together.
We know what our lives were like before. As we are contemplating what they will be like afterwards, we might just want to make some changes. Now is the time to think about that.
It is the time of coming up out of the water and hearing God's voice telling us who we really are.
We all have a chance to make ourselves new again.
More to come...