Baptism of Jesus

Baptism of Jesus The people were filled with expectation, and all were asking in their hearts whether John might be the Christ. John answered them all, saying, “I am baptizing you with water, but one mightier than I is coming. I am not worthy to loosen the thongs of his sandals. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire.” After all the people had been baptized and Jesus also had been baptized and was praying, heaven was opened and the Holy Spirit descended upon him in bodily form like a dove. And a voice came from heaven, “You are my beloved Son; with you I am well pleased.” Today we come to the end of the Christmas season. Usually we celebrate the the feast of the baptism on the Monday after the feast of the 3 Kings but this year we have a whole extra week of Christmas. More importantly, we are able to celebrate Jesus baptism on Sunday when more of us are in Church.

The Gospel is from Luke’s gospel and we will be reading mostly the Gospel of Luke during this coming year and there are two things that are distinct in Luke’s baptism of Jesus that I would like to point out to you. In Matthew and Mark when John baptizes Jesus Jesus is all alone in the Jordan river. In Luke, Jesus is baptized in the midst of all the people. This expresses an important theme in Luke’s Gospel, Jesus is in solidarity with everyone. He doesn’t want a private baptism in the Church with just his parents and godparents present. No, Jesus wants to be baptized with us, in the midst of everyone. He wants to share our baptism, so today we are invited to think about not just Jesus’ baptism but our baptism as well. As I said today in the last day of Christmas, tomorrow we will begin ordinary time in the Church. Ordinary time is the beginning of Jesus’ ministry, the call of the first disciples. It makes sense to end Christmas considering Jesus’ baptism. One leads to another. Baptism is the beginning of ministry in the Church. As Pope Francis says, “through baptism we are missionary disciples.” So today as we celebrate Jesus’ baptism and remember our own baptism the key question for us is, “how do we live out our baptism?” How is that we are missionary disciples today? What does it mean to be a missionary disciple. A disciple is a a follower of Jesus, so the first part of our baptismal calling is to deepen our relationship with Jesus. Hows do we do that? Through our life of prayer. As I said there are two things that are distinct in Luke’s account of the Baptism of Jesus, first that Jesus is baptized with everyone else, the second is the Spirit comes down upon Jesus when he was praying. Why would Jesus pray? Obviously it was to deepen his relationship, his union with God the Father. We too are called to be people of prayer. Not so much that we are asking God for what we need, but through prayer we deepen our relationship with the Trinity. It is in this moment of prayer that the voice of God affirms who Jesus is: God’s beloved Son. It is in prayer that we hear that say voice affirming who we are: God’s beloved Sons and Daughters. God’s beloved Children. Which prepares us for the second part of our baptismal calling. To be missionaries! Because we know who we are we can go forth and begin to share the Gospel with others.