An interesting article in US News & World Report a couple of
weeks ago. It was entitled "A Return to Tradition" (1) and
reflected on some changes that people are seeing in current
religious practice. It says,
Something curious is happening in the wide world of
faith, something that defies easy explanation or
quantification. More substantial than a trend but less
organized than a movement, it has to do more with how
people practice their religion than with what they
believe, though people caught up in this change often
find that their beliefs are influenced, if not subtly
altered, by the changes in their practice.
Put simply, the development is a return to tradition
and orthodoxy, to past practices, observances, and
customary ways of worshiping. But it is not simply a
return to the past -- at least not in all cases. Even
while drawing on deep traditional resources, many
participants are creating something new within the old
forms. They are engaging in what Penn State
sociologist of religion Roger Finke calls "innovative
returns to tradition."
The article goes on to describe folks placing greater
emphasis on worship elements that had great meaning for
generations past but supposedly no longer mattered to the
faithful of the 21st century. The phenomenon is crossing all
religious lines - Christian, Jewish, Muslim - according to the
article. What does it mean? No one is quite sure, but that
simply offers a new avenue of investigation for scholars, so stay
tuned.
For what it is worth, I think the news story is not really
"news" at all - this return to tradition is a movement that began
years ago and is only now being noticed. For example, in our
Presbyterian family, many of us grew up without ever hearing much
about the seasons of the church year, liturgical colors,
lectionary lessons, etc. - Christmas and Easter were observed, of
course, but Lent and Advent and so on were left to the Catholics
and Episcopalians. But in 2008, we take for granted that on Ash
Wednesday we will have ashes on our foreheads, the color purple
will appear on our pulpits, and the scripture lessons will begin
to focus on introspection and repentance. We have been moving in
this direction for years.
What we observe here today is another reflection of that
movement. As a boy in the church, I never heard of a Sunday
being set aside to remember the Baptism of the Lord nor to
reaffirm our own baptism, and, to be honest, I think my
experience was the poorer for that. I am glad we have recovered
that practice. Not only is it personally meaningful but it helps
us to understand a passage that could be confusing.
In a recent issue of The Christian Century, novelist and
poet Kathleen Norris writes,
I suspect that to many Christians baptism seems a
curious and antiquated custom. People want their
children baptized but can't say much about why they
want it, and what the rite is meant to signify. Many
adults who attend church faithfully nevertheless would
be hard-pressed to say what their baptism means to
them. It might help to remember that in the early
church the baptism of Jesus was a much more important
feast than Christmas. Now that Christmas has become
the year's biggest marketing machine, we may count that
as a good thing: imagine John the Baptist in his animal
skins as a singing plush doll. (2)
The scene in our lesson shows a throng of people from all
walks of life having made a mini-pilgrimage into the countryside,
come to see an itinerant preacher who is more than passing
strange: a coarse camel's hair tunic with a leather belt around
his waist, certainly no model for a plush doll. They had come
because there was a sense that something was missing in their
walk with God, so they were ready to listen to a new voice. And
this was a powerful voice.
Suddenly Jesus is there. The request for baptism. John's
initial reluctance, then acquiescence. Finally, the dramatic
climax. As our lesson has it, "As soon as Jesus was baptized, he
went up out of the water. At that moment heaven was opened, and
he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and lighting on
him. And a voice from heaven said, "This is my Son, whom I love;
with him I am well pleased."
THIS CHANGED EVERYTHING! Jesus' baptism ushered in a new
baptism. Christian baptism became not just a washing away of
sin, as John's baptism was, but the baptism that brings the power
of the Holy Spirit and a special relationship with God. Why?
For no reason other than God chooses to do it.
Part of the message of Jesus' baptism and our own is that we
are loved. Most folks understand that, and that is why they get
all warm and fuzzy when it comes to presenting their little ones
for the sacrament. But there is more: WE HAVE WORK TO DO.
Remember, this happened at the START of Jesus' work. This was
his commissioning service. Now, 20 centuries later, when someone
is baptized in the church, whether infants or adults, it is no
different. We still have work. We are receiving our commission.
Walter Rauschenbusch, that great Social Gospel theologian of
a century ago, found justification for bold social action in the
enigmatic "kingdom of God" lessons Jesus taught his disciples.
Rauschenbusch asked, "Why not connect baptism to the kingdom of
God?" If Jesus himself was baptized before preaching, the
reasoning went, why not see that event as a great swinging door
in divine history - "the exit from the kingdom of Evil and the
entrance to the kingdom of God." (3) Baptism enabled Jesus to
proclaim that the kingdom of God was among us, even though its
power was not yet fully realized. In Rauschenbusch's view,
baptism becomes an opportunity for all Christians "to express
their solemn dedication to the tasks of the kingdom of God, and
accepting their rights as children of God within that kingdom." (4)
There is work to do, so let's get on with it.
That wonderful Georgia preacher Fred Craddock tells a
story. (5) There is a little community in southwest Oklahoma, near
the Washita Creek, where the Native American Black Kettle and
most of the women and children of his little tribe were massacred
by General Custer as he and his troops swept down in the early
morning hours. The community is named for the general, Custer
City. The population was about 450. There were four churches: a
Methodist church, a Baptist church, a Nazarene church, and a
Christian church where Fred ministered for about three years.
Each had its share of the population on Wednesday night, Sunday
morning, and Sunday evening. Each had a small collection of
young people, and the attendance rose and fell according to the
weather and whether it was time to harvest the wheat.
So saying, the most consistent attendance in town was at the
little café where all the pickup trucks were parked, and all the
men were inside discussing the weather, and the cattle, and the
wheat bugs, and the hail, and the wind, and are we going to have
a crop. All their wives and sons and daughters were in one of
those four churches. The churches had good attendance and poor
attendance, but the café had consistently good attendance, better
attendance than some of the churches. They were always there.
Once in a while they would lose a member there at the café,
because their wives finally got to them or their kids, and you'd
see them go sheepishly off to one of the churches. But the men
at the café still felt strong. "We are still the best, biggest,
and strongest group in town." And so they met on Wednesdays and
Sundays and every other day, discussing weather and crops - not
bad men, but good men, family men, hard-working men.
The patron saint of the group that met at the café was named
Frank. Frank was seventy-seven when Fred first met him. He was
a good, strong man; a pioneer, a rancher and farmer, and a
prospering cattle man too. All the men there at the café
considered him their patron saint. "Ha! Ol' Frank will never go
to church."
Dr. Craddock describes meeting Frank on the street one time.
He writes, "He knew I was a preacher, but it has never been my
custom to accost people in the name of Jesus, so I just was
shaking hands and visiting with him, but he took the offensive.
He was not offensive, but he took the offensive. He said, 'I
work hard, I take care of my family, and I mind my own business.
Far as I'm concerned, everything else is fluff.' You see what he
told me? 'Leave me alone, I'm not a prospect.' I didn't bother
Frank. That's why I, the entire church, and the whole town were
surprised, and the men at the cafe church were absolutely
bumfuzzled when old Frank, seventy-seven years old, presented
himself before me one Sunday morning for baptism."
Some of the talk in the
community was, "Frank must be sick. Guess he's scared to meet
his maker. They say he's got heart trouble. Going up there and
being baptized, well, I never thought Ol' Frank would do that,
but I guess when you get scared... " All kinds of stories.
But this is the way that Frank told it to his new pastor.
Fred writes, "We were talking the next day after his baptism, and
I said, 'Uh, Frank, you remember that little saying you used to
give me so much: I work hard, I take care of my family, and I
mind my own business?'
"He said, 'Yeah, I remember. I said that a lot.'
"I said, 'You still say that?'
"He said, 'Yeah.'
"I said, Then what's the difference?
"He said, 'I didn't know then what my business was.' He had
discovered what his business was - to serve [the purposes of
God]."
"And so I baptized Frank," writes Dr. Craddock. "I raised
my hand and I said, 'In the presence of those who gather, upon
your confession of faith in Jesus Christ, and in obedience to his
command, I baptize you in the name of the Father, the Son, the
Holy Spirit, Amen.'"
What's YOUR business?
Amen!
1. Jay Tolson, US News & World Report, 12/24/07, pp. 42-48
2. Kathleen Norris, "Marked for a Purpose," The Christian Century, 12/25/07, p. 17
3. Walter Rauschenbusch, A Theology of the Social Gospel, (New York: Macmillan, 1922; repr. Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1978), p. 201
4. ibid., p. 200
5. Fred Craddock, Craddock Stories, (St. Louis: Chalice Press, 2001), pp. 67-69
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