As an adolescent whenever your voice is changing it can be downright embarrassing and a challenge. Perhaps you can recall some moments of voice cracking or croaking between registers. Even with Parkinson’s or after a stroke or various difficulties in life many use speech therapy or voice lessons as you try to find your new voice. Trans folk takes voice lessons to help them find their new voice during transition. This week, I ate some chicken wings with pepper on them and it affected my voice! I had to drink some water to open my breath and throat.
Voices are in our readings on this festival of the baptism of Jesus. In the psalm, the voice of the Lord is upon the waters. God’s voice is like a powerful storm: breaking trees, bursting forth in lightning, shaking the wilderness, stripping the forests bare. It’s the voice of God we sense when we are on a snow-capped mountain or when we look across the lake or ocean. Nature has a power that we cannot control or harness. The wildfires and winds in Southern California this week left the world, especially in the fire’s path speechless.
Jesus’ baptism is said to give him his calling to public or outward ministry. The voice at Jesus’ baptism comes from the heavens. We only hear this mysterious voice here and at his transfiguration. This voice confirms Jesus as God’s son, as the beloved one. Voices are an epiphany: the voice of the thunderstorm and the voice from heaven at the Jordan River. Jesus’ baptism is the second of the three “epiphanies,” or manifestations, that form the heart of this season. The first, of course, was the visitation of the Magi; the third we will explore in next week’s readings in the wedding feast at Cana. One big epiphany comes at the cross – at Jesus’ death when the centurion’s voice declares: “Surely, this was man was the Son of God.”
Voices have a distinct character. Perhaps you have heard a voice in another room or around the corner and know exactly who is speaking.
Amidst so many competing voices today, where is a voice we can trust for justice and truth, and when and where can we use our voice: to bring forth justice and be a light to the nations, as Isaiah puts it?
There are other voices in our heads telling us we are not good enough attractive enough or wealthy enough. There are the voices trying to get us to succumb to perceived cultural ideas of how life should go and tribalism — hanging only with those who vote like us and think like us. We are tempted to think that we have God all figured out because God is surely exactly like us and agrees with us.
The radical witness of Peter and John in Acts declares that God is at work amidst Samaritans and gives the message of Epiphany or Gentile Christmas that God is at work amidst those of very different religions, ideologies, or ways of life.
What delights God? We asked that question at Bible study this past week. Some add perhaps doing justice, bearing witness. But I believe this baptism account tells us what delights God is for you to be you. Jesus didn’t say or do anything at his baptism either. But he was claimed and called by God’s love to be love for the world. The voice of God at Jesus’ baptism declares: “This is my son with whom I am tickled pink.” It echoes the words of the prophet Isaiah who declares amidst passing through the waters, rivers, and fires—“You are precious in my sight, and honored, and I love you” (Isaiah 43:4).
Pastor Michael Brown told a story about one of his congregational leaders who in his younger years had always been looking for trouble and was a self-described “scoundrel.” But then he met Elizabeth—a kind, sweet, smiling girl who loved him no matter how big a scoundrel he was. “Little by little,” he said, “because I wanted to live up to her love, I became less and less a scoundrel. Finally, we married, and I’ve spent my whole life trying to make her as happy as she made me.” Then he said something the pastor has never forgotten. He said, “The truth is, Elizabeth loved me into loving.”
God loves us into loving. We call that grace. Though we are welcomed, and beloved just as we are, we are not expected to remain the same. Watch out. The heavens are torn open at Jesus’ baptism. One Biblical commentator talks about a bomb-diving Holy Spirit coming on the scene. God troubles the water, to quote a the slave spiritual sung at baptisms that made slaves equal.
As I visited with a woman in her hospital bed, she said her diagnosis was high blood sugar, but she said, “Pastor, the real issue in my body is the stress in relating with my mother.” She went on to say that she loved her mother but her mother filled with addiction and abuse fueled a voice opposite of love. “I don’t want to be the disabled daughter. I don’t want the possessions and clothes. I want to be with her and be loved,” the daughter told me.
When struggling, we crave alternative news: a different story, a different narrative, a different way of looking at the world. Baptism gives us this lens.
As we grow in faith. As we struggle with questions and doubts. As we face the things we cannot control. As we behold both the beauty and terror of nature. We are haunted by fire and water. Baptism is a life-long conversion as we grow to understand ourselves through the lens “Child of God.” We are loved into loving—loving ourselves, loving our families, loving strangers and those in need, loving creation.
I was sent a video of a community standing in the rubble of fire with their houses decimated to sing out a message of hope. Los Angeles Lutheran Bishop Brenda Bos whose house burned to the ground, urged the message of so many Angelians in word in deed to keep reaching out in compassion and love. Preparing meals, sharing beds, given the strength to fight fires and face another day.
When the voices in your head are overwhelming . . . when you don’t know what to make of the myriad voices. When your voice cracks and croaks under the strain of life, listen to the still, small voice within. Listen to the divine voice announcing forgiveness and grace. Listen to the radical message of impartiality that proclaims all are created in God’s image. Listen to the voice of hope that envisions a different future even when everyone else is shouting that the world is falling apart.
The voice of the Lord is upon the waters. Hear the words of grace. You are my beloved. You are marked with the cross of Christ. Nothing can separate you from my love and mercy.
