This Sunday we begin a new series called The Body of Christ: Learning & Re-Learning How to Be a Christian. This is also the time in the Christian year that we conclude Christmastide and Epiphany and begin Ordinary Time (sometimes called “season after Epiphany”).
But this time is anything but ordinary! As we made the difficult decision to return to online-only Worship, there’s nothing “ordinary” about this!
Perhaps we are all filled with expectation, even if our expectations aren’t working out the way we want. Perhaps we’re questioning in our hearts, seeking answers even if the answers don’t always turn out the way we want.
This isn’t ordinary.
And so we seek comfort from the true source of comfort and goodness, the One who claims us and names us and loves us.
Luke 3:15-17, 21-22 (NRSV)
15 As the people were filled with expectation, and all were questioning in their hearts concerning John, whether he might be the Messiah, 16 John answered all of them by saying, “I baptize you with water; but one who is more powerful than I is coming; I am not worthy to untie the thong of his sandals. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire. 17 His winnowing fork is in his hand, to clear his threshing floor and to gather the wheat into his granary; but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire.”
21 Now when all the people were baptized, and when Jesus also had been baptized and was praying, the heaven was opened, 22 and the Holy Spirit descended upon him in bodily form like a dove. And a voice came from heaven, “You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased.”
Consider these questions:
- What labels and/or titles have you been given (positive, negative, neutral)?
- A voice from heaven declared Jesus as Beloved. Consider that being God’s beloved is the core of you are. How do you feel about that idea?
- What does it mean to be a beloved child of God?
- How is John the Baptist a model disciple?
- How does John the Baptist characterize the ministry of the “one coming” after him?
- Theologian Henri Nouwen wrote, “Self-rejection is the greatest enemy of the spiritual life because it contradicts the sacred voice that calls us the ‘Beloved.’ Being the Beloved expresses the core truth of our existence.” (Henri J.M. Nouwen, Life of the Beloved: Spiritual Living in a Secular World.) Do you agree or disagree with Nouwen’s assertion? Why?