Grace, mercy and peace be to you from God our Father, and from our Lord Jesus Christ.
Text: (Matthew 3:14-17)
John would have prevented him, saying, “I need to be baptised by you, and do you come to me?” But Jesus answered him, “Let it be so now, for thus it is fitting for us to fulfil all righteousness.” Then he consented.
Prayer: Let the words of my mouth, and the meditations of our hearts be acceptable in your sight, O Lord, our Rock and our Redeemer. Amen.
In our reading today, Jesus is baptised. And we read that the Holy Spirit came upon him in the form of a dove, and the voice of God the Father spoke from heaven: “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased.” The event is described for us in the gospels in a very simple way.
But before John the Baptist baptises Jesus, there’s a little conversation that they have. This is what we read in the Gospel of Matthew:
John would have prevented him, saying, “I need to be baptised by you, and do you come to me?” But Jesus answered him, “Let it be so now, for thus it is fitting for us to fulfil all righteousness.” Then he consented.
If we understand baptism, we have understood everything about the Christian faith. If we get baptism wrong, we get everything wrong. And there’s only two ways to think about baptism: either you get it completely and totally right, or you get it completely and totally wrong. There’s no half-way or saying: “This person almost has a correct understanding of holy baptism.” If they are almost there, then they simply haven’t got it.
Jesus says: “Let it be so now, for thus it is fitting for us to fulfil all righteousness.” Jesus says to John, I’m going to be baptised by you, and this is the way it should be done. This is how it ought to be done. There is no other way it should be done. And then he gives the reason why he should be baptised by John like this: He says: “For thus it is fitting for us to fulfil all righteousness.” It is fitting, it is proper, it’s the right thing to do – to fulfil all righteousness, to make everything right, to set everything in the right way.
So you see, when Jesus is baptised, and when we are baptised, all righteousness is fulfilled. Everything is made perfect. Everything is right. Everything is as it should be. That’s why it’s so important for us to make sure we understand what baptism is and what it does. When we understand baptism in the wrong way, then we haven’t understood what Jesus said: “Let is be so now, for thus it is fitting for us to fulfil all righteousness.”
Now here’s the funny thing: in our reading today, John the Baptist has absolutely no idea, and he get’s the whole thing totally, totally wrong. He completely misses the target, he completely messes the whole thing up.
We read: John would have prevented [Jesus], saying, “I need to be baptised by you, and do you come to me?”
He gets baptism completely the wrong way around. He not only that, he wants to stop Jesus being baptised by him. He protests. And when he holds Jesus back, he stops all righteousness from being fulfilled, he stops everything happening in the right way.
So Jesus turns John’s opinion on its head. He says to John: “No, you’ve completely missed the point. You’ve messed up the whole thing. This is the right way. You have to baptise me.”
And so what happens? Jesus is baptised. And the heavens were opened, and the Holy Spirit comes upon him like a dove to rest on him; and the voice of God the Father says: “This is beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased.”
The funny thing is that Jesus doesn’t need to be baptised. He is completely and totally without sin. John realises this: John knows that he himself is a sinner, but he knows Jesus is not one. That’s why he wants to be baptised by Jesus. But Jesus wants to baptised, not because he has to, not because he needs to be forgiven of his sins, but because he wants to, and he wants to say to all believers in the future: I went there first, and when you are baptised, you will be in the same place where I am, and will receive everything that I received.
And so when we are baptised, we receive the Holy Spirit. And we don’t receive the Holy Spirit 10%, or 20%, but 100%. “All righteousness is fulfilled.” Every gift of the Holy Spirit is given to us: We are made part of the Holy Christian Church. We are grafted onto Christ like branches on a vine and become one communion of saints with all Christians of all places and all times. We receive the forgiveness of sins, past, present and future. We receive the promise of the resurrection of the body, that on the last day, our mortal bodies will be raised up from the dust, and changed to be like Christ’s glorious body. And we receive the gift of eternal life.
And so we say in the Apostles’ Creed: I believe in the Holy Spirit, the Holy Christian church, the communion of saints, the forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of the body and the life everlasting. Amen. These are all the gifts of the Holy Spirit that we receive in Holy Baptism. And all these things are possible because Jesus was baptised, because he was conceived by the Holy Spirit, and was born of the Virgin Mary, and because he suffered, died, was buried and rose again on the third day. He did all the work then: and now in the church today we receive everything that he won for us in Holy Baptism.
And not only do we receive the Holy Spirit, but also God the Father speaks his words to us: This is beloved Son, This is my beloved daughter, with whom I am well pleased.
When we are baptised, God looks at us, and he sees us there together with Jesus and he says: “This person is my beloved child. I am pleased with them.”
God the Father knows that we are sinners: he’s not blind. There are plenty of people who don’t know that they are sinners themselves: they are blind, but God’s not. But because in baptism, we are with Jesus, together with Jesus, and because Jesus has died for us, shed his holy precious blood for us, and risen again from the dead for us, God says: “You are my child. I love you. And I am pleased with you. I am happy with you.”
God doesn’t say this because you have earnt it or deserved it. Jesus has paid the price for you with his blood. His death is perfect, his resurrection is perfect, his life is perfect. And if you are baptised, if you baptised into Jesus, and joined onto Jesus like a branch on a vine, which is exactly what happens in baptism, then God speaks to you and treats you just like he treats Jesus. He treats you just like you were perfect. This is what is called the forgiveness of sins. God forgives you, not because of anything that you have done, or because you’ve done so well, or because you got everything right yourself, but completely totally free of charge, and without any contribution from you. You did nothing for it, Jesus did everything for it.
And then we might say: “But how do I know that I have a genuine faith?” And God says: “Forget about whether you think you are genuine. I don’t want you to trust in the fact that you are sincere and genuine. But I give you something more sincere and more genuine than your faith, your sincerity, your genuineness. I give you water and my words. And if my words say that you are a child of God and that you are forgiven, then that’s that. And if you know that on a certain time in your life, that the waters of baptism were applied to you, then that’s that. You can be certain that all of my gifts are in your hands.”
Jesus is perfect, we are imperfect. Jesus is incorrupt, we are corrupt. Jesus is risen from the dead, we are dying. Now in baptism, Jesus does us a swap: He takes everything that is imperfect in us, everything that is corrupt, all our filth and sin, all our death, and gives us his forgiveness, his perfection, his life, his resurrection. It’s all ours. And it’s all given to us in holy baptism.
Now when we get baptism right, when we understand what it is and what it gives us, then we’ve got the whole Christian faith right. If we get it wrong, then we get everything wrong.
Most Australians today don’t understand baptism at all. And because of this, most Australians have no idea what Christianity is, and have never heard the gospel.
In baptism, God does everything, we do nothing. He sends the Holy Spirit, he speaks his clear, holy and perfect words. Baptism is completely messed up when we add something of our contribution to it. If we want to add our works, our contributions, our efforts to baptism, then we make it our work, and not God’s. All we need to do is add the tiniest bit of our own works and our own contributions and we’ve completely misunderstood baptism.
So, sometimes people say: “God helps those who help themselves.” This is completely wrong. Nobody helps themselves. Nobody can help themselves. God saves, and nobody else. People say, “We do our bit, and God does his bit. We reach up half way, God reaches down the other half.” Australians love hearing this stuff! That’s complete and total rubbish. And this is what most Australians believe about religion. And it’s no wonder that Australians don’t want to come to church, because Christianity does not depend on you doing your bit. You’re “bit” isn’t worth two cents! God has to do everything. And if you don’t want him to do everything, then you’re adding your own contribution into it, which isn’t worth anything. Think about the holy precious blood of Christ, the blood of man and God in one person, who won everything for us. Do you think that you have something more to give God than that? So, the whole thing about God helping those who help themselves is wrong. God does everything. He gives you everything: He gives you faith, life, salvation, everything in holy baptism.
The other thing which people get totally wrong is that they think that baptism is just another work. They don’t think that it’s God’s work at all. They think: “My kid’s got done. We got the kid done.” God’s completely taken out of the picture. Baptism saves, because Jesus saves, and Jesus saves through baptism. If you take the Father, Son and Holy Spirit out of baptism, then you’ve completely messed it up again. This is 100% God’s work: and God wants people to be reminded of baptism throughout their entire life, through the hearing of the word of God in the church and the receiving of the Lord’s Supper, the body and blood of Christ. God wants to continue to give people his gifts all through their life. And so, it’s no wonder that people don’t see any connection between baptism and the continual life of the church, because they think they “did their bit”: “They got the kid done.” And God’s got absolutely nothing to do with it. People make baptism into 100% their work, the parents’ work, and nothing to do with Jesus.
But one of the most deceptive misunderstandings of baptism is when people say: It’s not just baptism that saves, it’s baptism plus faith. It’s true: we’re saved by faith. But faith is not something that you do. It’s something that receives the gifts of God and doesn’t reject them. If we say, “I know I’m saved, because I’m baptised and I believe”, then we’ve added something to baptism again. We’ve put our contribution on top of it. We think God’s work isn’t good enough – we need to put some icing and a cherry on top of it. I’ve heard an old prayer that says: “God, look not on our sins, but on the faith of your church.” This is so wrong: We shouldn’t ask God to look on our faith, as if it’s another work, and our contribution, because our faith is tainted and corrupt like everything else in us. We should say instead, “God, look on Jesus’ death, look at his blood. He died for me. He is pure, I am not.” Or some churches will refuse to baptise babies because they don’t have faith. Babies are the perfect recipients of baptism, because they don’t make any contribution to it. They don’t even walk to the font themselves. The problem with adults is we want to contribute something. We want to contribute all our false promises, our failures, our self-righteousness, our feelings, our choices, our decisions, call it “faith”, and stick it in front of God’s nose as if it’s worth something. This sort of false “faith” is rife in Australia and it’s not the gospel of Jesus Christ.
With respect to baptism, we should say: “I am baptised, God says that whoever is baptised and believes will be saved, he says Baptism now saves me, and God does not lie.” I trust in him, I trust in his work, I trust that he did his work in baptism. That’s what faith is. It’s not another work, it’s not a contribution. It’s simply the empty hands that receive the gift. When we get a Christmas present, we just thank the person who gave it to us: we don’t thank ourselves for having hands to receive it. Of course, “no faith” means we don’t want baptism, we don’t want God, we reject his gifts. Then baptism’s no use to us.
So let’s remind ourselves of our baptism. If we’re not baptised, it’s time to receive this powerful gift. Let’s remind ourselves that God has done everything, we have done nothing. And that’s exactly what happens everytime we are in church. God speaks to us, he forgives us, he purifies us, he puts his body and blood into our hands, and we do nothing. We just sit on our backsides and simply absorb. We trust it. We put out empty hands, not full hands. That’s Christianity. If we get baptism right, we get everything right.
Jesus says: Let it be so now, for thus it is fitting to fulfil all righteousness.
Amen.
Lord Jesus Christ, we thank you for your baptism by John in the river Jordan. Bless us continually with your Holy Spirit, and speak into our ears those precious words from your Father, that we are in actual fact his children, and that he is pleased with us, and showers his blessing on us, and on everything we are and do. Amen.
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