TRUST GOD WITH YOUR LIFE

Romans 6:1-6

Baptism of our Lord

Sunday, January 11, 2009

As the economy continues to contract, no doubt you will hear the call again and again. Calls will be made to restructure, to get down to fundamentals…getting back to basics. When this call is given in the world of education, it’s referred to as “getting back to the three ‘R’s.’” The three ‘R’s’ in question are Reading, wRiting and aRithmetic. What happened to the “A” and the “W” is beyond me.

Today, we talk about the fundamentals of our faith as we talk about our baptisms. We talk about identity in Christ and God’s salvation meeting us here in this water with His Word. Martin Luther brought everything back to Holy Baptism—organizing the catechism around the Apostles’ Creed (used in baptism); getting everything “Jesus” right. Luther followed the Apostle Paul.

As we listen to Paul in his Letter to the Romans, we hear a call, an invitation to get back to the basics—to baptism into Christ’s death and resurrection. Paul makes a call to live boldly, to live as Christ lives—to God. Wow! As we live in Christ, we can live as Christ lives—to God, trusting our lives to Him.

How is this possible? There’s another three ‘R’s’ I’d like to suggest might be helpful in framing our thoughts around Paul’s invitation in Romans 6—Renew, Remember and (I’ll admit, it had fun coming up with this one) Rendezvous.

Renew. As our calendar year changed over, many make resolutions. They wish to renew themselves—quit smoking, lose weight, improve themselves or change themselves in some way. In our worship service today, we took opportunity to renew the promises and the commitments made in our baptisms. It isn’t that God needed to renew His promises—He’s constant, He doesn’t give up. It’s you and me that need to renew our promises—our heads, hearts and hands to Him and His service.

So, you and I might be tempted to compare the efforts made in our resolutions with this renewal. In some ways, that could be helpful—both require some focus and follow-through. In other ways, combining them leaves the impression that everything depends on us and our strength. For example, how are you doing—you who made resolutions? Exactly my point, we don’t do so well. Our renewal of promises can end up like our resolutions—broken, forgotten and, embarrassing as they speak against us. So today is about more than renew.

Remember. Here’s a word that loses much in the translation out of the languages in which the Bible was written. In English, “remember” simply means “to recall.” Yes, there is some of that happening today. The doves on our walls today recall a moment and a person with water and God’s Word of salvation—they recall our baptisms. People will look at their doves and recall the moment—and perhaps, the person.

In Scripture, though, the word means more than simply “recall.” When the psalmist cries out, “Remember, O God, Your promises,” he is not asking God to say something along the lines of “Oh, yeah! I remember you!” Remembering in the Old Testament involves much more. Scripture adds participation—God getting into the moment with us (past, present and future are words more meaningful to us than God)—to the definition. God putting Himself into the moment of baptism is an ongoing participation, a relationship between you and Him.

As in Jesus’ baptism in the Jordan River, there is a participation—an exchange. In His baptism, Jesus exchanges places with us. He takes our place in our flesh. He takes our place in obedience to His Father’s will. He takes our place under His Father’s wrath. Because He takes the place that we deserve—which you’ll recall because of that weakness, that selfishness that separates us from God, that sin, He takes our place to die. He takes our cross and our tomb—paying the price for our sin.

In our baptism, the participation, the exchange continues. Only we experience the other side of the exchange. We exchange our place with Jesus. Paul reminds us that we are raised with Jesus to live a new life. We died with Him to sin’s power and live with Him to God. Our sin is forgiven and death is no longer the sentence hanging over us. We live to God. God participates in our lives.

What does this mean? What does it look like?

That’s why I chose the word, rendezvous. We hang out with God. We meet God in these moments of our lives. God hangs out with us. He meets us in the moments of our lives. How awesome is that?

To help get our heads around this reality, there are two other “R” words I would like to suggest. The first is return. Now, we will hear more about returning to the Lord during the Lenten season, as we return in our hearts and minds to Jesus’ journey to that cross. Today, though, return can remind us of repentance. Ever been hanging out with your friend and had your time together spoiled because there was this other person that kept coming between you? The problem is that other person in the story is you and me. We come between this new life we can live to God and letting the Spirit lead us into it. Repenting and returning deal with the sin and selfishness that continue to cling and intrude in this new life.

Return and repent. It reminds me of our four year-old nephew, Isaac, in church on Christmas Day. He said to his father, “I smell something.” Then, a few moments later, he said, “I smell something poopy.” A few moments later, he asked with some concern, “Do you think it’s me?” You and I ask our Father, “Is it me?”

Returning leads us to reconsecrate. That’s really what happened a few moments ago when we came to the font. We asked our Lord to reconsecrate our hearts, heads and hands to Him. We asked Him to remember the death and resurrection of His Son for us and continue to remember us—to participate, to live, in our moments.

This means regularly meeting (rendezvousing) Him in prayer. We regularly meet Him in worship and in His forgiveness. You know what happens when you have a good friend and you move away. You promise to keep in touch, but without regularly keeping in touch, gradually your friendship is reduced to exchanging Christmas cards.

Paul calls us to live in Christ—to live our lives to God. How can this be realized? You already know. I’ve heard you tell me as we’ve meet in hospital rooms. You’ve told me and others at the cemetery and when everything else seems to have fallen to pieces around you. You’ve said something like, “You know, sometimes all you have left is faith.” This is the life lived to God. This is the fundamental of the life in Christ—downsizing everything else to your baptism, to your participation with God and His with you.

Why wait for a disaster? This life is yours now. God has rescued, redeemed and restored you to be His. By baptism you are connected, immersed in this gift. This life is yours now. Today He meets you. By His grace, you and I can trust Him with our lives.