01/10/21 - The Power of Voices - Westminster Presbyterian Church Westminster Presbyterian Church | Serving God and others with open mind, hands and heart - 01/10/21

01/10/21 – The Power of Voices

THE POWER OF VOICES

January 10, 2021
Baptism of Our Lord
Gen.1:1-5; Ps.29; Acts 19:1-7; Mk. 1:4-11
Rev. Denise Clark-Jones

The events at our nation’s capital building on Wednesday displayed the tremendous power words can unleash. We witnessed the power of human voices to render chaos out of order and pollute peace with violence. We watched in horror as what we thought were protestors became a violent horde of insurrectionists storming the capitol building. The mob damaged and stole property, planted pipe bombs, and threatened bodily harm to the people working there – including our elected leaders – the Vice-President and legislators. America instantly became the object of international pity from other democracies and scorn from non-democratic countries. We saw that words have an awesome power that can be used to destroy. In contrast, our Old Testament reading from the first five verses of the bible announces that God has a voice, and that voice creates. We read that God’s voice brought order out of chaos to initiate Creation. Then, we heard the words of a psalmist who delivered an ode to “The Voice of the Lord,” reveling in the power and glory of God’s creative acts. In Acts, Paul preaches to a people who had been baptized into “John’s baptism,” having not heard of Jesus. Upon hearing Paul’s words about Jesus, they submitted to baptism in the name of the Lord Jesus. The Holy Spirit came upon them and they voiced prophesy in tongues. Mark’s Gospel begins with Jesus’ baptism by John in the Jordan River. The veil between heaven and earth ripped apart and the Holy Spirit rested upon him like a dove. His identity was confirmed with God’s voice announcing: “You are my Son, the Beloved.” Each of our scripture passages for today affirms the power of the voice, with God’s voice being the one with the ultimate power and the one to which we are to listen above all other voices in the world.

The bible begins with God’s breath, also translated from the Hebrew word, “ruach,” as “spirit” or “wind,” which hovered over the waters in darkness. God did not create the world out of anything, God brought order to the unordered, the chaos, that existed. From the breath, the voice broke forth and announced: “Let there be light,” and the chaos of the formless watery darkness was ordered into day and night. God spoke and action occurred. Water, wind, and light are all sources of energy. Any scientist will tell you action is caused by energy. All the various scientific theories about the beginning of the universe agree that it began with a burst of energy.

You have heard the rest of the first Creation story in the bible – with each new creation, God added to the interdependent parts that made up a world so that the creation could be sustained — if it remained in the balance God instilled in its design. God placed humankind in a world in which we could survive. God created us in God’s image, including a voice, that we would not just survive, but thrive in a loving relationship with God and one another.

The word, “voice,” has many uses in our language. The word comes from the Latin root word, “vok,” meaning “call.” We have from this Latin root such words as invoke, provoke, vocabulary, and vocation. Each of these words carries the idea of personal expression. The individual must discern from many competing voices what their own voice will express about ourselves. The creation story in Genesis tells us God expressed the essence of God’s being – peaceful, loving, and just – in the voice that initiated the new creation that is the world in which we live. Yet because God gave us free will, we may choose to use our voices to express violent thoughts, hatred, and injustice toward our neighbors.

For the author of Mark’s gospel, who I will refer to as Mark for the sake of simplicity, the story of Jesus begins with the story of his baptism. Mark harkens back to the Genesis creation story, beginning his gospel with a similar proclamation: The beginning of the good news of Jesus Christ, the Son of God.

Jesus entered the primordial, life-giving waters heralding a new beginning for the world. The catalyst for this new beginning was God. In baptism, Jesus was given the gift of God’s Holy Spirit, the same spirit that hovered over the water in Genesis and began his ministry of announcing the kingdom of God on earth. For Mark, Jesus was the new creation to give humankind new lives.

Jesus’ baptism was no soft lights, pretty clothes, Hallmark card affair. Mark, the first of the gospel writers, described Jesus’ baptism as full of force just as Psalm 29 described God’s power. The psalmist describes God’s voice as being as powerful as a storm that wrenches trees from the ground. Mark tells us the heavens were torn apart, with divine holiness pouring out upon this man, Jesus, coming out of the baptismal waters.

Mark tells us the Holy Spirit descended upon Jesus like a dove. We think of doves as gentle creatures and the image we have is of a white bird floating down, gently resting upon Jesus. Well, you know another name for a dove is a pigeon. When they are after something, they don’t float, they dive-bomb down to it. I’ve watched doves in urban outdoor eating areas. They are fast and they can be pretty aggressive if there is an impediment to their target. In this case, the Spirit must have been a force to be reckoned with because, after God’s pronouncement that Jesus is God’s son, Mark tells us that Spirit forced Jesus into the wilderness where he was faced with hunger, thirst, and that greatest of challenges, the devil himself.

God intended Jesus’ baptism to be more than a photo op and an excuse for a party. As Mark describes it, Jesus’ baptism takes us back to the beginning. As our reading from Genesis 1 describes the beginning of creation, we are back to just water and the voice of God. God revealed Jesus’ identity and call with that voice. In the Greek of Mark’s time, “beloved” is used here, not as an adjective, but as a name. As God gave a new name to Abraham and Jacob, God gave Jesus a new name, “The Beloved One,” to indicate his new status and purpose. The voice also affirmed that Jesus was pleasing to his Father. Jesus proclaimed that we are beloved children of God. How arrogant and presumptuous of us to judge others not to be as “beloved” of God as ourselves. The gospels just do not support the self-centered delusion that we are more valuable than others because of the color of our skin, our land of origin, our wealth, social class or our theology.

Mark tells us that no matter how many times John the Baptizer’s followers were immersed in the waters of the Jordan, they could not earn God’s love or forgiveness by their actions. With the baptism in Jesus’ name, it is declared publicly that God has already acted for us, no strings attached, claiming us as beloved children. Whether or not we fulfill our calling to live as beloved children and to be open to the not so gentle promptings of the Holy Spirit, the gift has already been given.

Baptism is the sign that our lives have a meaning and purpose because we have a part in God’s holy design. If we order our lives based on God’s purposes for us, we will have peace. When we baptize our infants, we promise to teach and nurture our children so they will grow into a Christ-ordered life. With our baptism, we are promised that regardless of our past, we always have a future and a purpose in God’s kingdom. As God’s beloved children, no matter how far we wander away, God will always hover over us, ready to make us a new creation. The catch is, in order to continue to be remade into a new creation, we must be willing to repent when we, inevitably turn away from God.

There has been much commentary on the events at the Capitol. We have heard news commentators claim: “This is not who we are.” History reveals this is who we are. All we have to do is look at the history of lynchings in America, as an example, to tell us that. This is who we are, but it is not who God intends us to be. As I heard one pastor, a Rev. Adam Smith, observe: ‘Nobody is taking responsibility, but we are all complicit – political leaders, social media and we who listen to their voices without wise and moral discernment.’ We chose the voices and screen out any voice that tells us information to the contrary. The gospels tell us repentance is about transformation, learning a new way of being in the world — turning back to God’s voice and following with our words and actions.

But, this is what makes a Jesus baptism different from a John baptism. With Christ’s sacrifice for us, the Resurrection, and the gift of the Holy Spirit, God has given us the freedom and the power, not just to renounce evil, but also to transcend it. This power is given with the expectation that we will use it for the sake of all that God has declared to be good and beloved. We have been given the power to act like Christians when others around us – even other Christians – do not.

At his last gathering with all of his disciples, with his voice, Jesus called them together and gave instructions for the final meal. He took bread and a cup of wine, shared them with his disciples, even those he knew would renounce him later, and commanded them to continue this ritual with others in remembrance of him. He promised to be always present with them. So today we come to Christ’s Table, gathered as God’s beloved children, sharing food and fellowship with our brothers and sisters. It is a table designed for all to have a place and be fed, a Christ-filled table to create Christ-ordered lives. May this holy meal we share today support us that we might bring the light of Christ into the dark, chaotic places of the world.

Amen. May it be so!

My Story

“As a newcomer to Westminster, I’ve found it to be a most welcoming fellowship. I look forward to going to services and events and find the warmth of the congregation to be most helpful to a newcomer to the entire area. I find sermons challenging … music beautiful and well prepared … and a dignity in the worship that is all too lacking in most Protestant congregations. Mix this with an open atmosphere where it is OK to question and still be seen as a good Christian, and I know I’ve found one important ‘home’ in Central Illinois.”