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Good Shepherd Lutheran Church Today's Frontline Devotion January 8, 2006 Water, Water Everywhere |
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Frontline Devotion for Sunday, January 8, 2006 by Anne B. Crawford
The Baptism of Jesus. This is a familiar story for most Christians. Filled with all kinds of symbolism. It marks the beginning of Jesus’ ministry, winds up the story of John the Baptist, and immediately precedes the temptation of Christ in the wilderness. It offers so many images and themes that one of the story’s most basic elements can get overlooked – water. Water is the stuff of life (we humans are made up mostly of water) and water figures in so many significant stories and events in the Bible. In the Lutheran service of Holy Baptism there is an entire section devoted to describing the power and symbolism of water – beginning with creation of water as part of heaven and earth, moving through the flood of Noah, the parting of the Red Sea for the deliverance of Moses and the Israelites, and then describing the waters of the Jordan and Jesus’ baptism. But there are other water stories in the Bible. There is Jesus’ first miracle – turning water into wine. There is the episode of Jesus calming the waters of the sea and of Peter’s attempt to walk to Jesus on the water. The importance of water is born out in the work of Jesus’ disciples as fishermen (and “fishers of men”). Water is present in Mary’s tears as she bathes Jesus’ feet, and Jesus used a basin of water to wash his disciples’ feet at the last supper. It is the subject of creation, repentance, redemption, blessing, joy, devotion, and service.
Water – something so simple and yet essential. How fitting that it should be the element of our baptism – a sacrament that is also simple and spiritually essential. It connects us to God the creator, Jesus our savior, and to one another as members of the body of Christ. It even connects us to Jesus’ crucifixion, in his words from the cross “I thirst.” A few years ago, I had the opportunity to delivery a homily on this part of the seven last words at a Good Friday service. As part of that homily I read a poem I had written on these words, that capture for me, the power of water in Jesus’ life. Here is the poem:
I Thirst
Water –
clear and pure
and clean and wet;
poured across the world
in memory.
Baptized to life
and drowned in sorrow-
there is no water
for the Son of Man,
only vinegar and bitterness.
PRAYER: Dear God, as we remember Jesus baptism this day, help us also to remember our own baptism and the promises made by our parents and sponsors, which we have affirmed since, to repent daily, read your Word, and believe in your eternal love and salvation, secured for us by Jesus death and resurrection. Amen.
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