Epiphany 1C

Epiphany 1C January 13, 2013 A letter to Andrew Rivera upon the occasion of his baptism. Dear Andrew, Today is the first Sunday after the Epiphany, the day upon which we celebrate and remember Jesus’s baptism by John. In Jesus’s baptism, he receives the Holy Spirit, and as he is praying, God speaks to him telling him, “You are my son the beloved; with you I am well pleased.” Today is also the day of your baptism, a day which you have been counting down to with sweet expectation. It is the day upon which we recognize the fact that, since your creation, God has named you as God’s beloved son, and today you and your family and your godparents are accepting that. Today is the day that we the church make the promise to you that we will help you as you grow; we promise that we will walk with you on this way that we all follow, this way of following Jesus. We promise that we will help you learn about your own belovedness of God, and we promise that we will help you remember it during the times when you may forget. Because, Andrew, you may not know this yet, but life does have its hard places. We all go through times when we feel lost; we all go through times when we feel sad and lonely; we all go through times when we feel completely overwhelmed by the circumstances of our life; we all go through times when we feel utterly broken-hearted. And yet even in those times, you have the gift that God has given you, the gift that God has claimed you as God’s beloved son, who is precious in God’s sight. And you have the promise of God’s continued presence, no matter what. This promise is found in the words of the baptismal service, where you and God make promises to each other that you will be in this together. You promise to live your life giving it over to the way of life, death, and resurrection that Jesus lived. God promises that God will be with you, no matter what. This promise is also found in the words of the Old Testament lesson for today. Listen to it again. “Thus says the Lord…Do not fear, for I have redeemed you; I have called you by name, you are mine. When you pass through the waters, I will be with you; and through the rivers, they shall not overwhelm you; when you walk through fire you shall not be burned, and the flame shall not consume you. For I am the Lord your God, the Holy One of Israel, your Savior. ….Because you are precious in my sight, and honored, and I love you…” A wise monk recently wrote it this way: “Jesus does not spare this world from suffering. With suffering there is the promise and the paradox that God Emmanuel is with us in it all, even to the end: unexplainable and yet undeniable.”i The heart of Jesus’s truth that he lived and died and was resurrected for and taught is that we are the beloved of God, individuals and a people who are deeply and intimately loved by God. And we are called out of that love to offer love to others. This love is not a feeling. It is an action. That means that sometimes when we cannot feel love, we can still do love. And in that, God’s love becomes made real in our own lives and in the world. Another wise man wrote it this way: “I think we know the love of God when we ourselves can ‘do love’ much more than when people tell us we are loveable (that just feels good!). We can always disbelieve the second, but the first is an unexplainable power from Beyond ourselves.”ii May you always remember and live these truths of your baptism. You are God’s beloved. You are precious in God’s sight, and God will never leave you, so you have absolutely nothing to fear. We most actively know God’s love when we are doing love unto others. May you always hear God’s words whispered in your heart: “Fear not, for I have redeemed you. I have called you by name. I have called you by name. You are mine.” i. SSJE Brother Give Us a Word. 1/10/13 Br. Curtis Almiquist http://ssje.org/ssje/2005/01/04/mighty-waves/?lt;br_/> ii. Rohr, Richard. Adapted from Letting Go: A Spirituality of Subtraction. Email meditation for 1/9/13.