Wade in the Water (Matthew 3:13-17)

A SERMON I PREACHED AT THE PARISH-- 1/9/11

I have always loved the song “Wade in the Water.” I loved the alliteration of the title and the sound of the song....it always hit me in the chest. It sounded different from all those clean, bright, major key songs in the hymnal. It stopped me in my tracks because it sounded scary, sinister….and the one who was up to something is….not the bad guy, but God. God’s gonna trouble the water. Like a hurricane. And here I thought God was supposed to lead me by still waters and restoreth my soul. What's all this business about troubling the water? I mean if God’s gonna trouble the water, I don’t want to be anywhere near it, thanks. I want to be in landlocked Kansas, if God’s gonna trouble the water!

And then I got a little older and I discovered this song is a spiritual, a song that slaves composed and sang about ways for their brothers and sisters to seek their freedom. I learned wading in the water was a way to avoid the scent of bloodhounds. It was a good thing to wade in the water. I learned crossing rivers like the Ohio meant literal freedom for runaway slaves. I learned the verses of the song were in code, so that a people who could not communicate openly about escape could pass along the way to freedom right under their captors' noses with the verses about Moses’ children dressed in red or the white dress of the Israelite.

God’s troubling the water was meant to push God’s people over into God’s promised land. God’s stirring up of the water was to send the remnant over into the land God wanted them to live in. It reminded me of the Jordan River, that place God acted to lead the people into the promised land, that place where just two weeks ago, we found God telling Joshua to get the people ready for their river crossing. Is it any wonder then that it is to the Jordan that Jesus came to wade in the water to be baptized by John?

Baptism is something we think we know. Cute and adorable. Baptism, meek and mild. After all, we baptize babies in the UM Church, and babies are cute and adorable. Even this account of Jesus’ baptism seems pretty. Like a Christmas card. It's the Spirit descending like a dove. A painting on a ceramic plate.

BUT. . this baptism is not sweet or cute or adorable. It’s actually kinda scary. First we have John the Baptist appearing in the wilderness. The Gospel of Mark even calls him, Not John the Baptist, but John the Baptizer. I like that even better. Baptist is a passive label, like Democrat or Republican or even Presbyterian. "Baptizer" is a revolutionary at work. Like if you get too close, he might just baptize you, zap you with some transforming energy ray and change you into a new person entirely. And baptism was a big deal, to the people getting baptized and to the powers that be that attached themselves to Herod or to Rome. There were a fair number of these prophet types around hoping that what they did would cause God to act to save God’s people from Roman oppression, to make good on all those promises about a Messiah. They were always hanging out in the wilderness because that’s where God has a way of showing up. And the river Jordan was the border to the promised land. Baptism is political. Scary. Potentially threatening. Pledging allegiance to something else other than Rome, other than Empire. Pledging allegiance to the kingdom of God. A place where slavery to anything other than God was not allowed. A place where justice rolled down like waters and righteousness like an ever flowing stream. (God’s gonna trouble the water).

And this John the Baptizer, everybody knows, wore a hairy coat and ate locusts and wild honey. But do you know why? Because he was eccentric? Trying out for Fear Factor? Well, I don’t know for sure, but I think part of the reason is, Elijah did it. And Elijah was supposed to reappear just before God sent the Messiah to save the people. So, John’s walking around in an Elijah costume, eating Elijah food, and people would've gotten the message. Including the powers that be. That’s why they kept such a close eye on John and what he was doing. So, it’s not a pristine little font and a lovable little baby. It’s a band of people by the river that symbolizes God’s power to act, following a fellow dressed for God’s liberating battle, calling them to repent, turn, commit, make a decision. Calling them to Wade in the Water. And getting baptized was the way you showed that you had made that commitment. And into this context comes Jesus of Nazareth, no longer a baby in swaddling clothes but a grown-up. The One qualified to baptize, the Messiah himself, coming to be baptized. And God’s gonna trouble the water.

God’s Spirit descends on him, God crashes the party, God is on the loose, God is at work, God is with us. God has intruded into this event to pronounce who Jesus is that God is pleased with him. Pleased that he’s baptized, pleased that he has begun the path to public ministry, pleased that he has made this public commitment, pleased that he has begun his journey of healing and suffering, his journey to the cross. God’s plan for salvation, and freedom, and healing was in motion down by the riverside. Jesus was gonna wade in this water and then be led up out of the water by the Spirit straight into the wilderness of temptation. I so want that to say that Satan dragged Jesus kicking and screaming into temptation. But God's Spirit led God into the wilderness. The wilderness is a place God knows very well. See, God’s gonna trouble the water. And Satan and temptation and all the powers of death and hell will not be able to prevail against this water-washed and Spirit-born Son of God.

We also get baptized, as a way to mark the start of our Christian journey. Some get baptized by immersion, others get baptized by sprinkling. In the Methodist church, we baptize babies a lot, because we see baptism as something that God does for us, a sign of God’s love for us, a love that comes before our ability to respond. Babies, you see are notoriously unable to do a lot. They do three things, just about, and those things are not singularly impressive. Eat, sleep and require diaper changes. And yet, our Church says, you are that beloved child, beloved by God just the way you are, before you could impress anybody, before you could talk or walk or join a committee. Beloved and called and bought with a price.

So, if you were baptized as a baby, it means that you have no memory of the event itself, so when we say "remember your baptism and be thankful" your first response might be "I can't." But let me assure you, God remembers it. And the Church remembers it. People came up and called you who you were, a child of God. And they identified the grace already at work in you, a grace that would lead you to grow in the faith and make that faith commitment for yourself when you were older. And those few drops of water on your head were just as radical and revolutionary as being baptized in an ocean. It is part of the way our God works that when we see a new Christian being born, a new baby in the family of God, we here the angels shouting “Roll Jordan, Roll!” It may be a quiet event with 'nary a locust in sight, a few drops of water and a little baby's head, but when the water touches skin, we hear it: "Roll, Jordan, roll!"

We remember that it is our baptisms that tell us who we are, before nationality and race, before party and politics. And we baptized are called to say to all those forces of evil so at work in the world that God is still on the loose. God’s gonna trouble the water.

We can say to those victims of senseless gun violence, our God knows what it is like to be an innocent victim. God is still on the throne of this weary world., and has a church that grieves with those that mourn and stands with those that suffer. A church that rolls up its sleeves to clear away the brush of brokenness and the debris of despair. Wade in the water, children. God’s gonna trouble the water.

It reminds me of John 5--where the angel of the Lord would stir up the water at the spring, and people with ailments and hurts and sickness would lay there. And if they could be the first one in when God "troubled" the water, they would get well. John 5:1 "Now in Jerusalem by the Sheep Gate there is a pool, called in Hebrew Beth-zatha, which has five porticoes. 3 In these lay many invalids—blind, lame, and paralyzed. 5 One man was there who had been ill for thirty-eight years. 6 When Jesus saw him lying there and knew that he had been there a long time, he said to him, “Do you want to be made well?” 7 The sick man answered him, “Sir, I have no one to put me into the pool when the water is stirred up; and while I am making my way, someone else steps down ahead of me.” 8 Jesus said to him, “Stand up, take your mat and walk.” 9 At once the man was made well, and he took up his mat and began to walk."

When God troubles the water, it’s for our healing. When God troubles the water, it's for God's kingdom. It might look like our prison ministry, or this crazy cooperative parish. When God troubles the water. And when the man couldn’t get to the water, God sent the Living Water to him. “Do you want to be made well?...Stand up, take your mat and walk.”

Friend, if you wanted to stay on your little mat, you should’ve stayed out of the water. If you didn’t want to be made well….you should’ve stayed out of the water. If you wanted a life where you only answered to you….then you should’a stayed out of that water. If you wanted going to church to be optional, then you should’a stayed out of that water. If you wanted Church "meek and mild and cute and adorable" you should'a stayed out of the water. If you wanted a church with folks who look and sound just like you, you should'a stayed out of the water. If you wanted to remain chained up to the dysfunctional person you used to be, then you should’a stayed out of that water. If you really really wanted to have that affair, you should have stayed out of the water. But if you wanted an assurance that you would never be alone in your wilderness….If you wanted to find out who you really are in Christ Jesus. If you wanted to find out what you were made for…If you wanted to see what the Kingdom of God really looks and sounds and tastes like, then I’m so glad you waded in that water. I'm so glad you waded in that water.

I love that our parish sits on the side of that little lake (hence the name, Lakeside). (That's right, I figured that out. I have several advanced degrees). But Christians are not called to stay on the banks of the river. (Probably why Lakeside’s emblem is a boat, not a beach chair!). We are called to wade in the water. We are called to remember in the midst of trials and tribulations that we are baptized, that when that water hit our head, we were more than just wet. We were wedded to a story that goes back to creation. We were tied to that voice that said “Let there be light.” We were tied to that band of Israelites tromping through walls of water on either side. We would have with us a God who would lead us by still waters and through the valley of the shadow of death. Baptism does more than make you damp. It also makes you a little dangerous. Oh children, wade in the water. God’s gonna trouble the water.