(Isaiah 43:1-7; Luke 3:15-17) J G White

10:30 am, Sunday, Jan 12, 2024, FBC Amherst

Today, we heard a scripture story of the baptism of Jesus. Once baptized by cousin John, a divine voice is heard to say of Jesus, “You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased.” The sort of words any one of us might want to hear from some person in our life, not to mention God.

Do you know that old Spanish story of the son who was banished and estranged from his father? Finally, the dad needed to welcome him back, and posted a note in the city newspaper. Dear Paco. All is forgiven. Meet me at noon Saturday in the town square. Your Papa. On Saturday, hundreds of men named Paco showed up in the square.

That need to belong again to others, that essential longing, can be strong and permanent in this life. I think the other striking thing about Jesus, at his baptism, is that it happened at all. For we Christians see Christ as a perfect human. Not in need of forgiveness, nor of repenting and making a turn-around. That is what John down by the river was offering to multitudes: a baptism of repentance.

Jesus, we say, in our biblical thoughts, did not need a baptism. Yet He saw it as important, even necessary to do. He identified with all those people who came out for forgiveness and truth. He entered the waters with them, before He began His work. Almighty God, pleased with Jesus… would be pleased with all of them? Perhaps.

That baptism also confirmed the identity of Jesus. Which is what ours does also, in a way. Confirms that we belong to Jesus, are part of the family of God. We belong. We belong on the side of the right and the good and the beautiful and the eternal. We belong to each other.

Sometimes, it seems we live at a time in the world when belonging is at a low ebb, and challenges like loneliness are running high. Perhaps there is longing, some strong longings, for belonging, for community, for friendship and neighbourhoods and shared life.

The stories and the lyrics of our Faith have a powerful message of belonging, in the face of people being scattered, in trouble, or hurt. Our other text today, from Isaiah 43, speaks beautiful hope, way back in history. Hope in the midst of the ancient Jews being in exile. The Choir sang some of those hopeful promises which have echoed through the millenia. Though all seemed lost, they would live on, be restored, be together, and belong to their God.

Adonai, God, created you, is the one Who formed you.

God says: Do not fear, for I have redeemed you.

I have called you by name, you are mine.

When you pass through waters, through fire, I will be with you.

I am your God, your Saviour.

You are precious in my sight, and you are honoured.

‘I love you.’ (The one place God says this in scripture)

Do not fear, for I am with you.

I will bring your people back, those also called by my name.

This is a message to Israel of old. ‘You still belong to me,’ says God. ‘We all belong together, lovingly.’ This comes to life again, centuries after, in Jesus, this One baptized with the crowds. This One who travels, and touches with healing, and teaches with startling authority, and stirs up enough trouble to get executed. And yet, still lives.

So Christ becomes the uniting Person in humanity. A prime and basic way we discover that we belong, we still belong to the good God of all things. And in God, we discover what it is to be people together. Like the amazing African concept, Ubunto. Ubuntu says: I am because we are. So, I am nothing without the community; and the community is nothing without each one of us.

We keep learning to belong, and help others know they belong. We allow our longing to blossom into real belonging. We have learned so much. And there is more to learn about belonging.

In 1984, Jan Phillips was a young, American, ex-Catholic on a peace pilgrimage around the world. She got to India, and was personally challenged in so many ways.

The culture of work was a steep learning curve for Jan. She’d go to a store to buy a can of beans, and it took about seven clerks to take care of her and take her payment. So inefficient! Another day, on a bus, they were held up because of road work: hundreds of local people were working with small buckets and big spoons to remove a hill and widen the road. “You’re using people to get rid of a hill?” Jan exclaimed, with exasperation. “Where are the bulldozers and caterpillars?”

Then she tells this story: She was staying at a Gandhian ashram founded by a man who’d lived with Ghandi since his teenage years. When Jan woke up one morning, she learned they were going to build a barn that day. The whole community. By now it was monsoon season, and the temperature was well over 100. The rains would be arriving soon, and the air was thick with humidity.

“How does this work?” she asked Nayan Bala, an English teacher visiting from New Delhi, whom she’d befriended.

“Looks like we just take our place in line,” she said, pointing to a crowd that was beginning to take shape by the creek.

They formed a long line from the creek to the building site. There were about 40 people. Teenage boys filled up tin bowls with water, sand, and pebbles at the creek. They handed them off to other boys who carried the bowls up a ladder, then handed them off to the women in the field, who passed them along to the men at the foundation.

“Nayan Bala,” Jan shouted to get her attention… “This is ridiculous!” she yelled, pointing my arms at [some] lazy [water] buffalo. “Look, we can hook them up to the flatbed, fire up that tractor, and automate this whole process. It’s stupid for us to be doing it by hand. Don’t you know time is money?”

Those final words tumbled out in slow motion, echoing through the caverns of Jan’s brain. Time stopped and they stood frozen, staring into each other’s eyes.

Oh my God! she thought. The Ugly American has outposts in my head. She was ashamed and Nayan knew it. Before Jan could utter another word, she touched her arm, leaning toward her to say, “I don’t think you’ve been in India long enough to know that we try to give work to as many people as we can. Everyone is happy to be here. They’ll be able to say to their children and grandchildren when this barn is built that they helped build it. You wouldn’t want to take that away from them, would you?” (Jan Phillips, Still on Fire, Unity Books, 2021, pp. 172-174)

It was then that Jan Phillips understood.

I hear, in her story, such an illustration of belonging in a community, in a culture. Our culture here is different, isn’t it? Our community and our congregation has its own ways. FBC, we have built community and helped people belong, our whole life, 215 years. We have had our varied ways of including people. I wonder if the natural ways we used to have to include new people into the fellowship, aside from Sunday worship, were the many groups: Sunday school classes, Men’s Fellowship, the Mother’s Association, the Choir, the Women’s Missionary Society, the Youth Group, and so on.

Now, we have far fewer of these smaller groups, eh? So, in this time, we must take care and pay attention to how we welcome people and do our part to help them belong – to help one another belong. And all the practical things we endeavour to do we must keep rooted in our connection with God in Christ. It will be by inspiration that we grow in our love of strangers in our midst, in our neighbourhoods. It is by the Spirit that we become braver in opening conversations up about spirituality and our own faith practices. It is by faith that we gain confidence in what we know we have to offer to one another.

Albert Schweitzer, famous medical missionary, to-notch organist, and influential Christian thinker, was born 150 years ago on Jan 14th. He finished his influential 1906 book, The Quest of the Historical Jesus, with these words about Christ.

He comes to us as One unknown, without a name, as of old, by the lakeside, He came to those men who knew Him not. He speaks to us the same words: "Follow thou me!" and sets us to the tasks which He has to fulfill for our time. He commands. And to those who obey Him, whether they be wise or simple, He will reveal himself in the toils, the conflicts, the sufferings which they shall pass through in His fellowship, and, as an ineffable mystery, they shall learn in their own experience Who He is.

Welcome to the fellowship of experiencing Jesus. Of followers, of disciples. It is here, with Christ, we belong. Anyone else can also belong. And Jesus has His own longings for all to know they belong. To experience being at home with God. May you and I be, for others, part of that experience of belonging.

Amen. May it be so.