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sepiph105
My
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Text:
Matthew 3:13-17
Date: The Baptism of Our Lord / Epiphany I 
1/9/05
When
he was about thirty years old, our Lord Jesus Christ came to a reluctant
John the Baptist at the Jordan River to be baptized by him. John
knew who Jesus was. He identified him as the Lamb of God who takes
away the sin of the world. “I need to be baptized by you,” John
objected. Why did Jesus need to be baptized? He is the sinless Son
of God, after all. Jesus explained that it would be for the purpose
of fulfilling “all righteousness.” Unlike his circumcision as an
eight-day-old infant, however, water-baptism wasn't even on the
To Do list of Messianic fulfillments. Jesus wasn't baptized for
himself. Jesus was baptized for you—not in the sense, of course,
of being baptized “in your place,” but in the sense of there and
in this way taking his place right along side of you and me and
the world of sinners in order to take away our sin. As Martin Luther
said it in his famous “flood prayer,” God, “through the baptism
of thy dear Child, our Lord Jesus Christ, hast consecrated and set
apart the Jordan and all water as a salutary flood and a rich and
full washing away of sins.”
When
Jesus says “all righteousness,” he points us forward to his entire
ministry and work, all the way to his vicarious, atoning, bloody
sacrifice on the cross. Baptism, you see, includes the blood of
Christ. This is what St. John says in his First Epistle, “This is
he who came by water and blood—Jesus Christ; not by the water only
but by the water and the blood” [1 John 5:6a (ESV)]. So Luther comments,
“Thus he is always wanting to mingle the blood in the baptism in
order that we may see in it the innocent, rosy-red blood of Christ.
For human eyes, it is true, there appears to be nothing there but
pure white water, but St. John wants us to open the inward and spiritual
eyes of faith in order that we may see, not only water, but also
the blood of our Lord Jesus Christ.
“Why?
Because this holy baptism was purchased for us through this same
blood, which he shed for us and with which he paid for sin. This
blood and its merit and power he put into baptism, in order that
in baptism we might receive it. For whenever a person receives baptism
in faith this is the same as if he were visibly washed and cleansed
of sin with the blood of Christ. For we do not attain the forgiveness
of sins through our work, but rather through the death and the shedding
of the blood of the Son of God. But he takes this forgiveness of
sin and tucks it into baptism.
“This
is what St. John was looking to when he mingled water and blood
together, for, after all, it has in it that which was gained through
the blood. And thus St. John deems the person who is baptized as
having been washed in the blood of Christ…innocent, just, and holy,
it is a blood of life. Therefore it also contains such strong salt
and soap that, wherever it touches sin and uncleanness, it bites
and washes it all away, eats and destroys both sin and death in
an instant.”
Jesus
stood along side of us and the whole world in the water of the Jordan
River that day. He took his place along side of us in order that
in him we might be enabled to repent of our sins, for he came to
take them away. Having filled baptism with new meaning and new power
he extended John's baptism telling us that this is the way he would
come and touch everyone throughout the world from now on, telling
us to make disciples of all nations, “baptizing them in the name
of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them
to observe all that I have commanded you” [Matthew 28:19-20 (ESV)].
And so, following our Lord's command, the Holy Church has always
baptized infants and then, in the years that follow, taught them
what their baptism means. On the other hand the Church teaches adults
of God's command and promise in baptism first, and then brings them
to the sacrament.
Today
we gather, as we do every Lord's day, remembering our baptism. The
very first thing that is said in the Divine Service are those baptismal
words, “In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy
Spirit.” This day we are privileged to carry out our Lord's command
by bringing his touch and blessing, his death and resurrection,
his salvation to our three little baptismal candidates. It may have
looked simple enough but, with the application of water in connection
with the Word and command of Christ, what we actually witnessed
was a matter of life and death, the drowning of the old sinful nature
with which we are all born into this world, and the rising of the
new nature full of the life of Christ himself.
“Behold
how glorious a thing Baptism is,” Luther wrote, “also how sublime
a spectacle Christ's Baptism presented. The heavens opened, the
Father's voice was heard, and the Holy Spirit descended, not as
a phantom but in the form and figure of a natural dove. Nor was
the Father's voice an illusion when He pronounced these words from
heaven: ‘This is My beloved Son; with Him I am well pleased.' …All
this was done in honor and praise of the Sacrament of Holy Baptism;
for this is not a human institution but something sublime and holy.
…The celestial choir of all the angels is present; these skip and
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