Advent Devotions

Today’s author is Prince of Peace member, Scott Tunseth.

In the Gospel of Luke, the baptism of Jesus is reported in two brief verses of chapter 3 (vv. 21-22). Almost an afterthought, it is tacked on to twenty verses focusing on Jesus’ cousin John and his preaching and baptizing. So powerful was John’s message that some asked if he was the long-awaited Messiah (3:15). John quickly put that rumor to rest, saying, “I baptize with water, but one who is more powerful than is coming; I am not worthy to untie his sandals. He will baptize with the Holy Spirit and fire” (3:16). John’s own baptizing was fiery as he called everyone who came to him to repent. But not just repent, turn their lives around by living ethically. He told tax collectors to collect no more than the amount prescribed to them, and he told soldiers who came to be baptized not to extort money from anyone by threatening or falsely accusing them.

There was clearly an ethical edge to John’s preaching and repentance baptizing. He even called out Herod Antipas for his unlawful marriage to Herodias, the granddaughter of Herod the Great and the niece of both her first husband Philip and Herod Antipas. Because he feared John’s influence, Herod Antipas had John tossed into prison and later put to death (Luke 9:9; see also Matt 14:3-12; Mark 6:17-29). I guess good preaching isn’t so safe after all!

Unlike Matthew and Mark, Luke’s Gospel doesn’t report that John physically baptized Jesus, though it is implied. The report simply includes the scene of the Holy Spirit descending like a dove on Jesus and a voice from heaven declaring, “You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well-pleased” (3:22). Echoes this declaration are found in our own rite of baptism when the minister marks the forehead of the baptized with the sign of the cross and declares: “Child of God, you have been sealed by the Holy Spirit and marked with the cross of Christ forever.”

There is so much to unpack in that one pronouncement. Baptism confirms the greatest of all promises: we belong to God, and through Christ’s cross we share his own baptism. The Apostle Paul put it this way in Romans 6: “Do you not know that all of us who were baptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into his death? Therefore we are buried with him by baptism into death, so that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, so we also might walk in newness of life” (6:4). This “new” walking is highlighted in our baptismal rite when the minister declares: “Let your light so shine before others that they may see your good works and glorify your father in heaven.”

Baptism is no empty rite, even though it is sometimes done out of sense of obligation or family tradition. At its heart, baptism is about godly living; claiming the promise in order to live a promising life that leaves the world a better place to the glory of God.