18th Sunday after Pentecost--Proper 21B sermon

18th Sunday after Pentecost—Proper 21B Baptism of Bradley Black and 50th anniversary of James Meredith’s enrollment in Ole Miss A letter to Bradley Michael Black upon the occasion of his baptism. Dear Bradley, Today is an important and auspicious day in your young life. Today is the day upon which you are baptized into Christ’s body. Today is the day when you will be sealed by the Holy Spirit and marked as Christ’s own forever. Today, your parents and godparents and family are accepting, on your behalf, that you already belong to God. They are offering God thanks for your belonging, and we are all making promises that we will walk with you, teach you and learn from you about what it means to live as those who belong to God, no matter what. In our gospel reading for today, this day of your baptism, we see Jesus in an extended conversation with his disciples. These disciples have been fighting about who is the greatest among them, and Jesus has taught them a new definition of greatness—that greatness isn’t found where the world places it but rather greatness is found in service and care for others. In our reading for today, John reports to Jesus about an outsider, one who is not a part of their group, who has been casting out demons in Jesus’ name. John reports that he and the other disciples tried to stop him, but Jesus tells them not to. He tells the disciples, “Whoever is not against us is for us.” Think about that for a minute, and the difference in what Jesus is saying: “Whoever is not against us is for us,” as opposed to how we normally hear it: “Whoever is not for us is against us.” The first, makes people into allies and opens up the way of belonging. The later makes people enemies, outsiders. And that’s really what today is all about, young Bradley. It is about remembering that God calls all of us to belong; God calls all of us to be insiders in the kingdom of God. Today, your family and friends are saying “yes” to God on your behalf. We are saying, “Yes he does belong to you God, and we are so very grateful!” But Jesus warns us of the flip side of that, even as he warns his disciples. The temptation is, once we have accepted our own belonging, to say to others, “Sorry, but you don’t belong like we do. We are in, but you are out!” Jesus says that is putting a stumbling block in front of “these little ones,” and he offers the disciples a stark, shocking warning against doing that. Another person put it this way: “every time you draw a line between who's in and who's out, you'll find Jesus on the other side."i In addition to your baptism today, little Bradley, we have something else going on in the life of our diocese. Our bishop has asked us to commemorate this 50th anniversary of James Meredith’s enrollment in Ole Miss and to also remember solemnly the resulting riots that took place. All across the diocese (and in the Methodist and Roman Catholic churches in Mississippi as well), we will be offering prayers for “racial healing, understanding and renewed commitment to reconciliation.” We will be remembering a time in the life of our state when some people were so focused on their own belonging that they put a stumbling block before others who were equal inhabitants in the kingdom of God. We will renew our own baptismal covenant, where we promise God that we will “seek and serve Christ in all persons, loving our neighbors as ourselves” and that we will “strive for justice and peace among all people, and respect the dignity of every human being”. Today we will also “repent and return to the Lord”, confessing to God the times when we have not paid attention to our own and others’ belonging to God; we will confess the times when we have, in fact, put a stumbling block before one of God’s little ones. And so today we remember; we renew our own baptismal covenant; we pray that our own belonging may never be a stumbling block to another who also belongs to God; and we give thanks to God for you, sweet Bradley, who belongs to God and who helps us to remember Jesus’s call to care for all the little ones in God’s kingdom. Your sister in Christ, Melanie+ i. Duane Priebe, Professor Emeritus at Wartburg Seminary quoted on the blog workingpreacher.org