Year B
Genesis 9:8-17
Psalm 25:1-9
1Peter 3:18-22
Mark 1:9-15<\/p>\n\n\n\n
May the words of my mouth\u2026 O God\u2026 speak your Truth\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n
After the flood God declared\u2026 I have set my bow in the clouds\u2026 and it shall be a sign of the covenant between me and the earth<\/em>\u2026 and this is where we get our word rainbow\u2026 but the Hebrew word in this verse\u2026 qeshet<\/em> actually refers to a bow and arrow\u2026 Biblical scholar Nahum Sarna reminds us\u2026 that the word qeshet<\/em> always designates a weapon of war\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n Although a common weapon in the ancient Near East\u2026 the bow was not too common in early Israel\u2026 though the Benjaminites were noted archers\u2026 Jonathan used a bow\u2026 and later the bow became the weapon of leaders and kings\u2026 and by the time of Jeroboam\u2026 the bow may well have been Israel\u2019s national weapon\u2026 and to throw in a little humility\u2026 Genesis 49:24 affirms that man’s ability with a bow is controlled by God\u2026 <\/p>\n\n\n\n But in his book Understanding Genesis Sarna also writes that in today’s passage\u2026 this symbol of divine hostility\u2026 has been transformed into a token of eternal reconciliation\u2026 the rainbow is a sign of God\u2019s disarmament\u2026 the retirement of God\u2019s war-bow to the sky\u2026 an unloaded weapon\u2026 pointing away from the earth… and an invitation for humanity to do the same\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n But in 1Peter\u2026 there’s a bit of looking back we have to do\u2026 we heard that Jesus preached to the spirits in prison from Noah’s day\u2026 who did not obey God’s law\u2026 while God waited patiently… and while Noah built the ark\u2026 from our modern perspective\u2026 it’s difficult to imagine that every person who was alive when Noah was\u2026 could have done something so egregious to be deserving of death\u2026 what would that say about God\u2026 but it raises one of two questions\u2026 did Jesus go and preach to them while they were trapped in some kind of limbo… waiting for Jesus to be born\u2026 or did Jesus speak to them through Noah\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n Either way\u2026 when we consider what happened immediately after Jesus’ baptism\u2026 just as he was coming up out of the water\u2026 before the dove descended\u2026 before the Spirit drove him into the wilderness\u2026 before he was tempted by Satan\u2026 before he was with wild beasts.. and before angels waited on him\u2026 before all this happened\u2026 a voice from heaven said\u2026 You are my Son… the Beloved… with you I am well pleased<\/em>\u2026 and as in Luke\u2026 but unlike in Matthew\u2026 these words are for Jesus’ ears alone\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n Michael Toy\u2026 a graduate of Princeton Theological Seminary writes\u2026 it’s a passage that showcases what theologians and philosophers call ontology\u2026 or Jesus\u2019 nature of being\u2026 the Gospel writer starts by declaring Jesus’ identity\u2026 Jesus is the Son of God\u2026 the Beloved\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n And so with Jesus’ identity affirmed\u2026 we can better understand what 1Peter meant when he wrote that Christ suffered once for all… the righteous One suffered for the unrighteous many in order to bring us to God\u2026 through baptism\u2026 Toy continues\u2026 it’s interesting that the author of today’s Epistle chooses to bring in the story of Noah and the flood as a prefiguring of baptism\u2026 because it’s a look backward… whether the flood is understood as a historical event or as a literary metaphor… the great flood was a devastating tragedy\u2026 and baptism is a looking backward\u2026 it’s a turning toward suffering\u2026 toward devastation\u2026 and even toward death\u2026 it’s a look backward at the wilderness from which we’ve come\u2026 not just individually\u2026 but collectively as humanity\u2026 because as a culture\u2026 as a religion\u2026 we have certainly come from a truly wild place\u2026 from a wilderness place\u2026 and we have suffered\u2026 and we have caused suffering\u2026 <\/p>\n\n\n\n In v. 5 of today’s Gospel\u2026 Mark says about the Baptizer that\u2026 people from the whole Judean countryside\u2026 and all the people of Jerusalem were going out to him\u2026 and were baptized by him in the river Jordan<\/em>\u2026 in today’s Gospel\u2026 we hear that Jesus came from Nazareth [of Galilee] and was baptized by John in the Jordan\u2026 both the people “in” and Jesus “in”\u2026 but these two words in English are not the same two words in Greek\u2026 when it refers to the people\u2026 the Greek word does just mean in\u2026 but when it refers to Jesus\u2026 the Greek word means “into”\u2026 it’s a more consuming word\u2026 and as a result\u2026 Herman Waetjen [of the San Francisco Theological Seminary]\u2026 has suggested that when Jesus was baptized into the Jordan\u2026 was submerged into the water\u2026 that Jesus submitted to John’s baptism full on\u2026 and what this means\u2026 is that as God’s Son\u2026 Jesus\u2026 completely renounces the old order\u2026 rejects Empire\u2026 has his feet firmly planted in God’s realm\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n Jesus was submerged into the Jewish history\u2026 and miracles\u2026 with which the Jordan was associated\u2026 for example\u2026 when the Exodus was over\u2026 and Joshua and the Israelites approached the Promised Land at Shittim\u2026 they crossed over the Jordan on dry ground\u2026 carrying the Ark of the Covenant\u2026 and that night\u2026 near Gilgal\u2026 they built an altar to God\u2026 in the story that we just heard last week\u2026 where Elisha was following Elijah\u2026 and the company of prophets kept telling Elisha that God was going to take Elijah from him that day\u2026 Elijah rolled up his mantle and struck the water and the two of them crossed over on dry ground\u2026 Elisha himself performed two miracles at the Jordan\u2026 he healed Naaman’s leprosy in 2 Kings 5:14 by having him bathe in its water\u2026 and in a story from 2 Kings 6:6\u2026 an iron axe head\u2026 which was lost in the river by one of the woodcutters\u2026 was recovered\u2026 when Elisha threw a piece of wood into the water and the iron axe head floated to the water’s surface and was retrieved\u2026 <\/p>\n\n\n\n According to the text\u2026 the Jews from Judea and Jerusalem may have encountered the water of the Jordan differently than Jesus did\u2026 just going in and not into it\u2026 they may not have submitted to the full depth of John\u2019s baptism\u2026 they may have appreciated the idea of repentance\u2026 they may have had good intentions\u2026 they may have thought it was the thing to do\u2026 but they may have been hesitant\u2026 they may have been reluctant to give up all those behaviors and attitudes which served them well\u2026 but which prevented them from hitting God’s mark for them\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n Jesus on the other hand\u2026 proved to be a more genuine disciple of John’s\u2026 as Peter writes\u2026 baptism is not the removal of dirt from the body<\/em>\u2026 it is the outward sign of an inner change in identity\u2026 and that change comes not\u2026 with the exception of the pandemic\u2026 not from staying in safe protected places\u2026 but in venturing out into some of the wildernesses which surround us these days\u2026 they are not necessarily the places we want to be\u2026 but God is with us\u2026 and we are waited on by angels\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n We meet some wild beasts in these wildernesses\u2026 but they can bestow spiritual gifts on us\u2026 gifts which invite us to turn our lives more sharply toward God\u2026 because God is forever ready to\u2026 in spite of our resistance\u2026 ready to bring order out of the chaos of our individual and collective lives\u2026 it’s just up to us\u2026 to set the pace\u2026<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Year B Genesis 9:8-17 Psalm 25:1-9 1Peter 3:18-22 Mark 1:9-15 May the words of my mouth\u2026 O God\u2026 speak your Truth\u2026 After the flood God declared\u2026 I have set my bow in the clouds\u2026 and it shall be a sign of the covenant between me and the earth\u2026 and this is where we get our word rainbow\u2026 but the Hebrew word in this verse\u2026 qeshet actually refers to a bow and arrow\u2026 Biblical scholar Nahum Sarna reminds us\u2026 that the word qeshet always designates a weapon of war\u2026 Although a common weapon in the ancient Near East\u2026 the bow was not too common in early Israel\u2026 though the Benjaminites were noted archers\u2026 Jonathan used a bow\u2026 and later the bow became the weapon of leaders and kings\u2026 and by the time of Jeroboam\u2026 the bow may well have been Israel\u2019s national weapon\u2026 and to throw in a little humility\u2026 Genesis 49:24 affirms that man’s ability with a bow is controlled by God\u2026 But in his book Understanding Genesis Sarna also writes that in today’s passage\u2026 this symbol of divine hostility\u2026 has been transformed into a token of eternal reconciliation\u2026 the rainbow is a sign of God\u2019s disarmament\u2026 the retirement of God\u2019s war-bow to the sky\u2026 an unloaded weapon\u2026 pointing away from the earth… and an invitation for humanity to do the same\u2026 But in 1Peter\u2026 there’s a bit of looking back we have to do\u2026 we heard that Jesus preached to the spirits in prison from Noah’s day\u2026 who did not obey God’s law\u2026 while God waited patiently… and while Noah built the ark\u2026 from our modern perspective\u2026 it’s difficult to imagine that every person who was alive when Noah was\u2026 could have done something so egregious to be deserving of death\u2026 what would that say about God\u2026 but it raises one of two questions\u2026 did Jesus go and preach to them while they were trapped in some kind of limbo… waiting for Jesus to be born\u2026 or did Jesus speak to them through Noah\u2026 Either way\u2026 when we consider what happened immediately after Jesus’ baptism\u2026 just as he was coming up out of the water\u2026 before the dove descended\u2026 before the Spirit drove him into the wilderness\u2026 before he was tempted by Satan\u2026 before he was with wild beasts.. and before angels waited on him\u2026 before all this happened\u2026 a voice from heaven said\u2026 You are my Son… the Beloved… with you I am well pleased\u2026 and as in Luke\u2026 but unlike in Matthew\u2026 these words are for Jesus’ ears alone\u2026 Michael Toy\u2026 a graduate of Princeton Theological Seminary writes\u2026 it’s a passage that showcases what theologians and philosophers call ontology\u2026 or Jesus\u2019 nature of being\u2026 the Gospel writer starts by declaring Jesus’ identity\u2026 Jesus is the Son of God\u2026 the Beloved\u2026 And so with Jesus’ identity affirmed\u2026 we can better understand what 1Peter meant when he wrote that Christ suffered once for all… the righteous One suffered for the unrighteous many in order to bring us to God\u2026 through baptism\u2026 Toy continues\u2026 it’s interesting that the author of today’s Epistle chooses to bring in the story of Noah and the flood as a prefiguring of baptism\u2026 because it’s a look backward… whether the flood is understood as a historical event or as a literary metaphor… the great flood was a devastating tragedy\u2026 and baptism is a looking backward\u2026 it’s a turning toward suffering\u2026 toward devastation\u2026 and even toward death\u2026 it’s a look backward at the wilderness from which we’ve come\u2026 not just individually\u2026 but collectively as humanity\u2026 because as a culture\u2026 as a religion\u2026 we have certainly come from a truly wild place\u2026 from a wilderness place\u2026 and we have suffered\u2026 and we have caused suffering\u2026 In v. 5 of today’s Gospel\u2026 Mark says about the Baptizer that\u2026 people from the whole Judean countryside\u2026 and all the people of Jerusalem were going out to him\u2026 and were baptized by him in the river Jordan\u2026 in today’s Gospel\u2026 we hear that Jesus came from Nazareth [of Galilee] and was baptized by John in the Jordan\u2026 both the people “in” and Jesus “in”\u2026 but these two words in English are not the same two words in Greek\u2026 when it refers to the people\u2026 the Greek word does just mean in\u2026 but when it refers to Jesus\u2026 the Greek word means “into”\u2026 it’s a more consuming word\u2026 and as a result\u2026 Herman Waetjen [of the San Francisco Theological Seminary]\u2026 has suggested that when Jesus was baptized into the Jordan\u2026 was submerged into the water\u2026 that Jesus submitted to John’s baptism full on\u2026 and what this means\u2026 is that as God’s Son\u2026 Jesus\u2026 completely renounces the old order\u2026 rejects Empire\u2026 has his feet firmly planted in God’s realm\u2026 Jesus was submerged into the Jewish history\u2026 and miracles\u2026 with which the Jordan was associated\u2026 for example\u2026 when the Exodus was over\u2026 and Joshua and the Israelites approached the Promised Land at Shittim\u2026 they crossed over the Jordan on dry ground\u2026 carrying the Ark of the Covenant\u2026 and that night\u2026 near Gilgal\u2026 they built an altar to God\u2026 in the story that we just heard last week\u2026 where Elisha was following Elijah\u2026 and the company of prophets kept telling Elisha that God was going to take Elijah from him that day\u2026 Elijah rolled up his mantle and struck the water and the two of them crossed over on dry ground\u2026 Elisha himself performed two miracles at the Jordan\u2026 he healed Naaman’s leprosy in 2 Kings 5:14 by having him bathe in its water\u2026 and in a story from 2 Kings 6:6\u2026 an iron axe head\u2026 which was lost in the river by one of the woodcutters\u2026 was recovered\u2026 when Elisha threw a piece of wood into the water and the iron axe head floated to the water’s surface and was retrieved\u2026 According to the text\u2026 the Jews from Judea and Jerusalem may have encountered the water of the Jordan differently 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