The blessings of God are plentiful and ready to be poured out on us! God's love is more than we can contain or comprehend. I would give the person credit if I could remember who said it but someone once said, “Saying that God's grace is sufficient for us is like saying that the ocean is sufficient for one clam.” God loves you and that's the truth but can that statement encompass the enormity of that truth? God's love is huge. We swim in it and are so used to it that we don't even notice it most of the time.
This past week on the 4th a few of you were at the _______________'s for their annual party to watch the fireworks over Lake Michigan. I was struck and I heard some of you comment on the beauty of the lake and of the sunset. For those of us who don't see that every day, we are awestruck. What a beautiful scene. The sun was setting. The reflection of the sun on the water. The haze of the day making the light slightly diffuse. The unusual stillness of the air that day. It was something that grabbed the attention. It was the subject of conversation. For those of you who see that everyday, I am sure you can appreciate it but it is easier, I'm sure, to get other things done with out being distracted by its beauty. Familiarity can lead us to take a thing for granted. Even God's love for us.
Were going to have a baptism today; That's a good thing! In baptism we are participating in sharing God's love...God's grace. We will take take water, pray that God will bless and use it to pour out his grace on one of his beloved children.
Our actions are only minutely significant during the sacrament of baptism compared to the action of God at the same time. The mystery of God and the grace of God, God’s gift of blessing on us when we don’t deserve it, are the things that really matter. It is God that is continually calling us to join in an ever-deepening relationship. It is the grace of God that draws us to God, not the physical pouring of water. When we do those things we are partaking in the gift that God gave us. The gifts of his love and grace. God didn’t give us the sacrament of baptism to use as a tool, but as a way of sharing His love.
When a parent is moved to have their child baptized it is the work of God’s grace. When an child is baptized, that child may not have the memory of the event, but will have the blessing of God from the earliest time in their life. When we baptize, we are resting in the mystery of God and asking God to pour out blessings on that child, and we offer up our intentions as the body of Christ to nurture that child as to raise them up in such a way that they will come to know and profess Jesus as Lord on their own. But ultimately that relationship can only be between the believer and God.
The blessing of God is already here. It is our faith that allows us to receive it. God's love is already present. We may have not noticed it. We may have gotten used to it but God's love surrounds us and is pressing in like powerful flood waters.
Every year we hear about the Mississippi river flooding. Each community builds levies, walls of earth to raise the banks of the river, to protect their city from flooding. A year ago I lived in Ashley which is probably the flattest part of Michigan I have ever seen. There is a home owner there that has built a levy all the way around their house to protect it from the the water that has no place to go. If God's love and blessing is like flood waters then the levies we build that keep us from those blessings may be doubt and apathy that comes from familiarity.
In the scripture lesson today Jesus went to his hometown. He went to the place where it was familiar to him, and he was familiar to the people there. “I this not the carpenter, the son of Mary and brother of James and Joses and Judas and Simon? Are not his sisters here with us? And they took offense at him...and he could do no miracle there except that he aid his hands on a few sick people and healed them and he wondered at their unbelief.”
Jesus is still Jesus the son of God. But in his hometown the people were to familiar with him to appreciate the blessing that he had for them and so they did not receive it. But later he sends out the disciples in pairs and scripture says that “they went out and preached that men should repent and they were casting out many demons and were anointing wit oil many sick people and healing them.”
They brought the message that Jesus sent them with and many was the number of successes. Where Jesus had limited success, the disciples had many successes. In the Gospel according to Luke it says that “A pupil is not above his teacher; but everyone, after he has been fully trained, will be like his teacher.” and again in the gospel of John it says, “Truly I say to you he who believed in me, the works that I do, he will do also; and greater works then these he will do; because I go to the Father.”
Jesus intends for us to do greater things. Jesus as a man on the earth had limitations. Jesus as the everliving Lord of Life has no limitations. Jesus has empowered us with the Holy Spirit to be his body on earth; to tell people about the kingdom of God; To preach repentance and forgiveness of sin. We have to have faith to have the courage to go out and proclaim God's truth even though we may not know that the reaction or result may be. God prepared the hearers heart. God grants the gift of fiath to those who will hear the Good News about Jesus Christ.
We're gonna have a baptism today and that's a good thing. The family of God is growing. This little one will receive a physical sign of God's love. She is being initiated into the family of God. We are placing her in God's hands so that faith may be granted to her. We are participating with God in this act of Divine love so that she can make an apeal to God for a good conscience throguh the resurrection of Jesus Christ. We are not brought into the family of God merely for our own good. We are brought into the body to be obedient disciples. The whelming flood of Gods love flows through each one of his believers. We are the crack in the levy of apathy. Where there is complacency we will be the extravagance of God's love that gets people's attention. Where there is familiarity we will be the fresh voice of God's presence.
So how is it with you today? Is there familiarity and apathy in your spiritual walk? Let today be a day that you re-affirm your baptism and step into a new day of intentional, obedient faith to the God that has unending love for each of us.
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