QUIETLY AND FAITHFULLY AT WORK

9th January 2005 : Baptism of our Lord : Year A
Isaiah 42:1-9 : Acts 10 34-43 : Matthew 3:13-17

In many ways it is bizarre with the events of the Boxing Day tsunamis and earthquakes still very present to arrive today at a baptism, where we have already heard words about water and dying.

Some sensibilities will find this offensive or insensitive and the temptation is to sidestep our scripture and tradition by politely refusing to emphasise these crucial theological and symbolic aspects of entry into God’s Church. … But such choices are counterproductive because they devalue part of the Church’s greatness and God’s glory, which is about faithfully continuing the work of the kingdom, no matter what befalls us or our world.

The prophet Isaiah speaks with restraint and yet power about this:

Here is my servant, whom I uphold,
my chosen, in whom my soul delights;
I have put my spirit upon him;
he will bring forth justice to the nations.

He will not cry or lift up his voice,
or make it heard in the street;


a bruised reed he will not break,
and a dimly burning wick he will not quench;
he will faithfully bring forth justice.

He will not grow faint or be crushed
until he has established justice in the earth;
and the coastlands wait for his teaching.

These are images of God’s servant faithfully and without fanfare going about his business, day after day.

It is one of the things at which the Church excels: being present, going about God’s business, reminding the world that whether in the midst of individual, community or national calamity and tragedy, God does not abandon us.

This is one of the crucial underpinnings of the resurrection of Jesus, which is mirrored so powerfully in baptism: that although the calamity and tragedy should reach the ultimate point – the extinction of life – the Living God not only CAN but WILL proclaim the divine imperative to choose life.

And yet even so momentous an event as the resurrection of Jesus occurred quietly, in darkness, without publicity and the PR team, no headlines in the West Judaean, no two-page spread advertising that Jesus was back by popular demand and you could see him at the following locations, courtesy of Abba-Father Enterprises (Inc.) …

Two things come to mind: one is the motto above Carl Jung’s gate, which I’ve mentioned before – VOCATUS ATQUE NON VOCATUS, DEUS ADERIT – Called and Not Called, God Will Be There. And the other is an old Redemptorist pewsheet I used to keep on my desk when I worked in a library. It showed a quiet forest scene – it could have been a vignette from our own south-west – tall trees and a long, not-too-winding pathway into the heart of the forest. The heading for that Sunday was God is quietly at work …

I continue to draw strength from both elements of this equation, the refusal of God to abandon Creation, always being present, always mixing with those in need, always THERE, called or uncalled, always “quietly at work”, without fanfare or attention-seeking, acting in our own lives and in the life of Creation, acting through the words and deeds of the faithful.

Today we will baptise J_n into God’s Church (not the Anglican Church), and God will thereby – as we Anglicans understand it – add one to the number of the faithful who, empowered by the same Spirit who descended upon Jesus at his baptism, will quietly grow in the faith which surrounds him. And God – called and uncalled – will quietly work within J_n, through the love and nurture of his parents and family, and in the prayers and support of his sponsors and we in this community of faith who witness God’s actions this morning.

Yes, we will continue to speak of water and dying, but now we will also add life – new life.

May we all remember our own call quietly and faithfully to continue God’s work in Westfield and beyond, in the name of Jesus, in the power of the Holy Spirit given us at our own baptism …