RBWords

     At weddings nowadays, it is common to have a slide show of pictures from the lives of the bride and groom!  Somehow this is intended to show the separate paths that are now being brought together and that this was always 'meant to be!"  It would be considered strange if the slide show stopped with baby pictures and resumed with pictures taken very recently!  But that is how the Gospel of Matthew (and the Gospel of Luke) handles it!  Before this scene of the baptism of Jesus, the last we had heard of him was the story of the journey to and from Egypt to escape persecution and the settlement of the family in Nazareth!  Now we have an adult Jesus who shows up at the Jordan to be baptized by the dramatic preacher, John the Baptist!  Given what John was saying about the Messiah, Jesus seems an unobtrusive person from a little village in Galilee!  John seems to have some intuition about him, however, and is reluctant to do the baptism till Jesus tells him that is how it is "meant to be."  The drama occurs with Jesus' vision of the Spirit anointing him as God's beloved Son - but it is a private vision!!  This vision will be sorely tested in the desert!

 

     Jesus' ministry thus begins in a quiet way and with considerable internal discernment.  One John the Baptist is arrested by Herod, Jesus will realize that he must take his place on the stage and make himself known!   The Gospel of Matthew constantly notes how all of this was foretold in the prophetic traditions - that it was "meant to be!"  An old hymn says it well:  "God is working his purpose out....." 

 

      Some of us come to active ministry in the same way - quietly and with great testing of our "spirit."  Yet we have received that same Spirit that anointed Jesus.  It takes us awhile to realize that God does call each of us.  Some of us will be more dramatic than others, but this is part of God's "purpose" and it is "meant to be."  Can we recognize God's "purpose" in our lives and come forward with the message?  AMEN