Episode Transcript
[00:00:04] Good morning everyone.
[00:00:06] If there's some people moving around, it's just our baptism candidates getting changed and people sitting down. So please don't worry about a movement in the building. For those who don't know me, I am Hannah. As you probably saw, I'm a secondary school teacher. I'm sorry it's so ingrained in me, I just can't help it anymore.
[00:00:25] And I'm also part of the eldership team here. I am married to Tendi and we have a 17 month old boy and to everyone whose water cup he kicked over last week. I'm really sorry. He doesn't understand the difference between a cup of water and a football. We're working on it. We're working on it.
[00:00:44] I love baptisms.
[00:00:47] Isan is my very best friend, as everybody knows who knows us. And when I told her I was speaking, she said, but you always cry at baptisms. Why are you speaking? Which is completely true. And I am a little teary, managed to hold it together. Baptisms are a real signpost and a really special moment. My own baptism was a slightly interesting time. My parents, God bless them, are very traditional church of England. So when I joined Holy Spirit tongue speaking church, they thought I joined a cult and were deeply concerned about it because I'd been confirmed and christened and all the normal, very Anglican traditional things which are beautiful in their own place. But it wasn't my heart and what I felt God leading me to. And then on that actual baptism Sunday, the building that we were in, which was our old building, the tap had broken. So our first job as baptism candidates was to fill the tank with buckets and it was freezing cold water. And I don't do very well with freezing cold water because I'm married to Tendi and he's from Zimbabwe and I'm from England. Everybody thinks I like the cold weather and he likes the hot weather and it's the other way round. I am the lizard. I could live in the sun all day, every day. And he's there in the shade going, where's the cold? I need the cold, please bring me the cold. So it was, it was an interesting baptism.
[00:02:08] Jesus. Baptism is recorded in all four gospels and it was very clear. It was a holy moment. We read in Matthew 3, 13, 17. Then Jesus came from Galilee to the Jordan to be baptized by John. But John tried to deter him, saying, I need to be baptized by you and do you come to me?
[00:02:31] Jesus replied, let it be so. Now it is proper for us to do this, to fulfill all righteousness And John consented. As soon as Jesus was baptized, he went up out of the water. At that moment, heaven was opened and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and alighting on him. And a voice from heaven said, this is my son, whom I love. With him I am well pleased. Jesus baptism is after his birth, the next thing we hear in Matthew's Gospel. Although the four gospels differ slightly in what they do and don't include just due to who wrote them and different aspects that they decided to include Jesus baptism is signaled by all as the start of his ministry. This isn't when he first knew he was called by God, he always knew that just like the baptisms this morning. Isn't our precious people becoming Christians. That happened for some years ago. For other months or days, Jesus knew he was Christ. John tells us, in the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God. Jesus is part of the Trinity and that part that came to earth, the incarnate God in flesh. So his baptism isn't a revelation of understanding. It's symbolic. It's a signal. It's prophecy being completed, the process of going through water that takes you from one state of being to to the next. Jesus before his baptism was a carpenter's son, the cousin of John, who's a radical in the desert. After his baptism, he is, as Matthew writes, my son, with whom I am well pleased. We see this pattern of being transformed as you go through water in various other places in the Bible. As with so many aspects in the Bible, what happened in the Old Testament is repeated in the New Testament. But Jesus shows the perfect way. The first example of going through water is of course, Moses and the Israelites in Exodus. The Israelites have been enslaved by Egypt for many years. They were originally treated fairly, but then the Pharaohs changed and changed again. And then they were enslaved and treated ever harshly. God sent Moses to tell Pharaoh to free his people. But repeatedly Pharaoh refused.
[00:04:55] Eventually we got to the place of the 10 plagues. All warnings are ignored until finally the last plague, which is the death of the eldest child. For all who listened to the warning of Moses and his brother Aaron, they took the blood of a lamb, painted it on the doorway, and death passed over them. The beginning of Passover. But for those who ignored him, tragically, the firstborn son died that night, Pharaoh's son included. After this preventable tragedy, he finally allowed the people of God to go. God gave clear instructions of where the Israelites were to go, and they left Egypt, coming to the water's edge of the Red Sea. As they traveled, though, Pharaoh's heart hardened again. He called his army generals, he set his chariots and he raced after them, ready to enslave them. And now the Israelites have a raging army approaching on one side and the sea on the other side. We read in Exodus 14:21.
[00:05:57] Then Moses stretched out his hand over the sea, and the Lord caused the sea to go back by a strong east wind all that night and made the sea into dry land, and the waters were divided. So the children of Israel went into the midst of the sea on the dry ground, and the waters were a wall to them. On the right hand and on the left, the Israelites passed through the water, leaving slavery on one side and entering freedom on the other side. For when the Egyptians also tried to cross the Red Sea, the waters came down and the whole army was destroyed. The Israelites were free. They left slavery, crossed through the water, and entered freedom when they next hit land. For us today, baptism symbolizes leaving our old life before we were in Christ, passing through that water, and entering our new life in Christ as we come up out of the water. For the Israelites, they physically went from being slaves to being free. For us, it's that symbolic marker that now we are in Christ. We have freedom from death, and we have that eternal life. Sin no longer has a hold on us because we are made new in Christ. And this passage marks our first key of baptism. Baptism is symbolically passing from our old life to a life of freedom in Christ.
[00:07:26] However, as we see both when the Israelites went into the wilderness and Jesus after the baptism, being free in Christ doesn't mean it's easy. For immediately after Jesus baptism, the Spirit led him into the wilderness. In Matthew 4. 1. Then Jesus was led by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. After fasting 40 days and 40 nights, he was hungry. The tempter came to him and said, and then it goes on to the passage about the temptation of Jesus. Both Jesus and the Israelites were led into the wilderness immediately after the baptism. But how they dealt with the wilderness was polar opposites. Baptism is a high in our Christian journey. It's that step that generally was something you'd either been wrestling with for a while or seemed like the natural next progression within your faith. Either way, as you have your baptism and when you come out of the water, typically it feels like a high. What we need wisdom with, though, is that that moment that should be celebrated and enjoyed is isn't confused with the expectation that this is how life now is that high is what freedom in Christ is. Jesus said very clearly in John 16, in this life you will have trouble. But take heart. I have overcome freedom from slavery for the Israelites. And going into the promised land didn't mean the sun always shone and their crops always grew, and they never had any plight that ever bothered them. There was a refining, a process, a journey that God had them on, and they often didn't like it. But it only went wrong when they disobeyed God. Hard doesn't mean wrong. Conversely, Jesus was in the wilderness alone, hungry, thirsty, weather beaten, and the devil himself came to him. But Jesus shows us the best way to deal with any hardship. Speak the Word. It is the word of God that spoke life into creation itself. God said, let there be light. It is the word of God that has the authority to decree sickness null and void, to call new jobs into being, to speak restoration over that brokenness, and to comfort all those who hurt. When you have the Word of God, you have ultimate authority. There's a story of a young soldier who was fighting and he got word that his brother and his father had died, which now meant he was the only male in his family and he had to go back to tend to the family farm. To do this, he needed exemption from the President himself. He left the battlefield, went to the White House and was met by a guard, and on asking to speak to the President, the guard sneered at him and said, there is no way the President was coming out to speak to this man. He was far too busy. Go away. Go back and fight. The man sat down on a nearby bench, wondering how on earth he was going to break the news to his mother that he would no longer be able to help with the farm and the farm probably would have to be sold. What would happen to her, he just didn't know. As he sat there thinking about what he was going to do, a little boy came up to him. If I start crying, I'm sorry, this story gets me a little bit.
[00:10:47] And the little boy said, what's wrong? The man began to pour out his heart of everything that had happened. And the little boy simply said in return, follow me. He grabbed his hand, ran round to the back of the White House, in through the door, past the guard, in past the army generals, in past the government officials, until they reached the office of the President's room. They went straight in, and there was Abraham Lincoln, poring over battlefield plans with the Secretary of State. He looked up and he said, hello, Tad. What can I do for you. And the little boy said, dad, this man needs your help.
[00:11:28] When we have the Father's authority, when we know we have that boldness and that confidence.
[00:11:38] The little boy had that boldness and confidence because he knew he was a child of the President and he knew he had access to him. And so we children of the Most High God have full access to God. When we speak the Word, we're not speaking some wise words that were written a while ago. We are speaking the words of God that have stood the test of time. The God who made heaven and earth the Most High God, who is the beginning and the end, who is the ultimate power in all the universe. There is no one greater than Him. And that must give us a boldness and a confidence.
[00:12:18] Jesus spoke the Word and the enemy fled from Him. As Christians, we may have many seasons that are hard, but that doesn't mean they're wrong. Winter in the natural is hard. It's cold, it's wet, it's dark. But all of that is necessary. And actually, if we didn't have that, that would be wrong. Those seasons aren't fun, but they are times when we can draw ever nearer to God because we know that he is our help in time of need, that he'll never leave us or forsake us. And in the difficulties, there is a refining, a growing, a deepening that often takes place. Whilst we might struggle in the valley. When we hold tight to God's word, speak his authority, and hold firm to that freedom that is rightfully yours, then we cannot fail.
[00:13:11] So our next key of baptism is freedom in Christ doesn't mean no problems in life, but speak the word of God to those situations.
[00:13:23] As Jesus rose out of the water, a voice from heaven said, this is my son, whom I love. With him, I am well pleased. As Christians, the word Christian, when you break it down, means followers of Christ, or some literary scholars say, little Christ.
[00:13:42] The Bible talks in far too many places to reference that God is our Father, that we are his children, we are his sons and daughters. We know God's love for us was the purpose behind Christ coming to earth. For it says in John, for God so loved the world, he sent his only son. God's love for you is so deep that he gave himself to take that punishment so everyone could have the opportunity to come back to him. And two, Peter, we read not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance. And the amazing thing is that God is one. Sorry. And the amazing thing about God is that when we are In Christ, the forgiveness we receive is unending.
[00:14:25] If we are genuinely sorry, God has forgiven us. In Lamentations 3:22-23, we read because of the Lord's great love, we are not consumed, for his compassions never fail. They are new every morning. Great is your faithfulness. His mercies are new every morning.
[00:14:50] And so, as the worship team come up knowing all of that, I wonder how many feel comfortable putting themselves in that precious phrase. This is my daughter Chloe, with whom I am well pleased. This is my Son Divine, whom I love. And with Him I am well pleased. I could imagine that might feel okay being referred to as Son and daughter.
[00:15:18] Maybe you feel comfortable with God saying He loves you, but to accept he's well pleased, that might feel a little bit more difficult. It's common for people to feel that that's a phrase similar to the good and faithful servant phrase, something we're working towards hearing when we get to heaven at the end of our life. But God didn't speak this at Jesus crucifixion or even his resurrection. He spoke it at his baptism. He spoke it at the beginning because it wasn't about how faithful Jesus was or how much he's achieved. It's about who he was as a creation.
[00:15:56] This is the heart of the Father's love.
[00:16:01] Becoming a parent is a whirlwind, and no amount of narrative can ever prepare you for the amount of love that you feel for your child. I can say with absolute confidence that I will never not love Benaiah. I won't like his choices always. I won't always agree with his actions, but I could never not love him. I just. I wouldn't know how to begin to turn that off. So if I, as a flawed being, feel like that about my child, how much more does God feel that about you, his child? God, who said in the Word, he is love not in our actions or our choices, but in the foundation that we are children of God. God is well pleased with you. He was from the very beginning. For it says in Genesis, after each aspect of creation, it is good. How much more does God see you as his good creation?
[00:16:59] And maybe that feels really hard to accept because you don't think he should be pleased with you. You don't feel you're something to be pleased with. Maybe when I speak of a good creation, you just remember all the things you've done wrong, or your flaws or your faults or your failings or your struggles. Maybe you don't feel loved or very lovable.
[00:17:19] The thing is just because we feel it or think it doesn't make it true.
[00:17:25] There are many thoughts that come into our minds, but they're not all truth. God's word is truth. And for the things you've done wrong, well, when you come to Christ, you're washed in the blood. It says in Psalm 103 that he moves our sins as far as the east is from the west.
[00:17:45] So therefore God, our father, God, the one who formed you in your mother's womb, who put that first spark there to start the heartbeat, who knows how many hairs are on your head when you sit, when you stand, he spins over in delight upon you.
[00:18:03] He the one that wrote, before any of us in this room were ever born, he wrote, this is my son, this is my daughter, whom I love, and I am well pleased because you are his creation.
[00:18:23] You are a child of God, and your foundations are in him.
[00:18:29] So our final key, God speaks over you. I am well pleased.
[00:18:36] So we have our three keys. Baptism is symbolically passing from the old life to the freedom in Christ.
[00:18:44] Freedom in Christ doesn't mean no problems in life, but speak the word of God into those tough situations, and God speaks over you. This is my child with whom I am well pleased. And there's a few responses to this message.
[00:19:01] Maybe everything felt easy and natural. And therefore we thank God for His love. We thank God that we have had the privilege of being baptized and we just dig in deeper to that love of God.
[00:19:15] Maybe that last point that God is well pleased doesn't feel like it's sitting comfortably, in which case I'd really encourage you to grab a friend, an accountability partner, whoever it might be, to pray that through with you. Just because it feels uncomfortable doesn't make it not true. You're not the one exemption. God is well pleased for you. So if it doesn't sit comfortably, please grab someone to pray with until it does become comfortable.
[00:19:46] It may be that you've not been baptized and you're thinking, actually, I really want to be baptized, and if that's the case, please speak to Mike or speak to Jason. And we're hoping to have another baptism service really soon. And it might be that you're thinking, well, I'm not a child of God, so I don't know how this applies to me, but actually I'd like to be a child of God. Those things sound good.
[00:20:10] Well, I know loads of people in this room would definitely agree with you. And it's really easy. There's no ritual, there's no tradition. It is simply coming to God with a genuine heart and saying a prayer that we're all about to say in a minute. So if I can ask everyone to close their eyes, if you're saying this prayer to come back to God or to come to God for the first time, then say this with your heart in a genuine state of openness.
[00:20:42] As a congregation, we're all going to say this prayer together.
[00:20:47] And then at the end, I'm just going to ask you to pop your hand up, and we've got some resources to give you and some people to come and pray with you.
[00:20:56] So, church, let's say this together. Father God, thank you for your love for me.
[00:21:04] I'm sorry when I haven't gone your way.
[00:21:09] Thank you that you have forgiven me.
[00:21:13] Thank you that you call me a child of God, and thank you that I can come and be with you forever.
[00:21:26] Amen.
