When Things Seem Futile

[This is the journal entry for my quiet time with God yesterday.]

Look: “‘And now, do not be distressed and do not be angry with yourselves for selling me here, because it was to save lives that God sent me ahead of you…

“... it was not you who sent me here, but God…” (Genesis 45:5, 8)

The speaker is Joseph, son of Jacob, grandson of Isaac, and great-grandson of Abraham. He lived about 1900 years before the birth of Jesus. He’s speaking to his brothers.

Years before, resentful of their father’s favor of Joseph and Joseph’s superior attitude toward them, the brothers had sold Joseph into slavery, convincing Jacob that his son had actually been killed by a wild animal.

But now the brothers stood before Joseph, who had been effectively made the prime minister of Egypt.

It would have been an opportune time for Joseph to take revenge on his brothers for his years of slavery and forced separation from his family.

Instead, Joseph believes that, as he will articulate more succinctly in Genesis 50, while his brothers meant their action for evil, maybe even death, to Joseph, God used their action to take Joseph to the exact place he needed to be, to accomplish good. 

Joseph, the dreamer, interpreter of dreams, and person with a gift for administration, was, as head of Pharaoh’s government in Egypt, able to institute a program whereby the government held surplus crops in reserve during flush years for distribution and sale during the subsequent years of famine. By this work, Joseph was even able to save his own people, the descendants of Abraham, ancient Israel, so that they could continue to be God’s light to the nations...and ultimately, become the people from whom Jesus, the Light and the Savior of the world, would come.

Listen: When someone has hurt me, my impulse is to hurt them back. 

Or, at the very least, ignore them, insult them, or be disdainful of them.

Now, when a person is physically, emotionally, or sexually abusive to us, avoidance is a good idea. God doesn’t expect me to deliberately subject myself to danger. 

That’s why Jesus refused the devil’s temptation to hurl Himself from the pinnacle of the temple. We tempt God when we mistake faith for fatalism and simply acquiesce to our own harm. Even though God protects His people, He doesn’t protect them from taking unwise risks, like not wearing a helmet while riding on a motorcycle or texting while driving, to use two examples.

But as Joseph stands before his brothers, he holds all the cards. He has power. His brothers’ families are at risk of dying off from the famine. Joseph is the second-most powerful man in Egypt who has gone through slavery and imprisonment for years because of the actions of his brothers. It would have been so easy--and, in the eyes of the world, justified--to put his brothers into slavery, hold them in prison, or even kill them. 

He sees things differently. He’s grateful to be positioned to save his father’s people and to forgive the brothers.

Joseph seems never to have forgotten God, worshiping and obeying Him even through his long captivity. He had resisted when Potiphar’s wife’s attempts at seduction by saying that he couldn’t violate either God’s will or Potiphar’s trust by having sex with her. He told the Pharaoh that God--Israel's Yahweh--who gives interpretations to dreams.

In the verses that caught my attention today, Joseph sees beyond his own pain to see that God, Who might have seemed far away or even absent during his years of slavery, actually had been with him all along and actually had a reason for sending him to Egypt in the first place.

Not all the painful circumstances we find ourselves in are sent to us by God, of course. Job, for example, endured hardships that came from Satan. Sometimes the fallen world is where our hurts come from. Sometimes those hurts come from our own stupid, silly, or sinful actions.

But wherever we find ourselves, God can transform the seeming futility of painful circumstances and help us live for His purposes within them. Joseph knew this.

I get fussy. I like things to go the way I want them to go and when they don’t, I can bellyache. There’s no record of Joseph bellyaching. He followed God and sought to be faithful where he was.

Respond: Lord, by the power of the Holy Spirit, help me to be faithful where I am today. Forgive my fussiness and bellyaching. Help me to trust that You never forsake me and are always there for me. Jesus' death and resurrection prove that. Thank You for the forgiveness of my sins and for Your resurrection promise given to all who trust in Christ. In Jesus’ name, I pray. Amen

[The painting is Joseph Recognized by His Brothers by Marc Chagall.] 

[I'm the pastor of Living Water Lutheran Church in Centerville, Ohio.]

The Encounter That Can Change Everything

[This message was shared during worship with the people and friends of Living Water Lutheran Church in Centerville, Ohio, this past Sunday.]

Matthew 4:12-25
Some of you have heard me talk about Ayman. He was the Syrian-Muslim owner of a deli we frequented in days gone by. 

One day, Ayman told me that his brother-in-law, who was from a Christian background, had died suddenly and at a young age. Ayman told me when the visitation would be. I arranged to be at the funeral home just before the calling hours, allowing me to spend a little time with the family before I went to an evening meeting. I actually met members of both families, Christian and Muslim. After giving my condolences, Ayman offered to walk with me to the door.

We’d walked into another room when he asked if we could talk. “Mark,” he asked, “what do you think happens to someone who dies?” 

I explained as respectfully as I could (because God's Word tells us to be respectful to those from other backgrounds when we share the substance of our hope as Christians) that, as a follower of Jesus, I believe that all who turn from sin, or repent, and trust in Jesus, have life with God that never ends. 

I said that Jesus makes us part of His eternal kingdom as His Holy Spirit enables us to believe in Him. 

I told Him that I believe Jesus is God in the flesh, how Jesus came into our world to die for us and bring eternal life to all who follow Him, and how everyone who follows Jesus is in His hands even after we die. 

I tried to point Ayman to Jesus. 

As I was leaving, Ayman told me, with warmth, “Mark, I really liked hearing what you said back there.”

What happened to elicit such a reaction in a mostly non-practicing Muslim? This is what happened: Jesus happened. 

I had no idea that Ayman was going to ask that question of me. 

I hadn’t rehearsed anything. 

All I did was pray, as I always do in such circumstances, “Jesus, give me the right words and the right silences.” That’s it. 

Jesus once taught His followers how to prepare for persecution: “...when they arrest you, do not worry about what to say or how to say it. At that time you will be given what to say, for it will not be you speaking, but the Spirit of your Father speaking through you.” (Matthew 10:19-20) I think that this directive from Jesus also has application to our everyday interactions with others. We need to trust that the Holy Spirit will give us the words we need to speak when others who may not know Jesus ask us about Him. Jesus will give us the Holy Spirit do His life-giving, faith-raising work through us. Through us, people can encounter Jesus.

We see what happens when people encounter Jesus in today’s gospel lesson, Matthew 4:12-25. It shows us ways in which the Word of Jesus, God the Son, can come to us and transform our lives. In our encounter with Jesus today, we hear Him bring the Law, the Gospel, and God’s call to obedience.

Early in our lesson, we’re told that Jesus says: “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near.” (Matthew 4:17)

We moderns cringe at the word repent. “Don’t guilt me,” we say. 

Now, the command to repent is Law, God’s Law. But to repent isn’t necessarily to cover ourselves in ashes or engage in a lot of self-referential blubbering. 

The word in the original Greek in which Matthew and all the New Testament writers composed their books is metanoeite. It means change your mind, as in, “I was walking along a path that pleased me, but when God got through to me, showing me how I was destroying myself, I changed my mind and went the other way.” 

A few months ago, a man I’ve known for some time wrote to me about a conversation he’d had with a friend. He’d said some rough words to this friend. He told me, “I think that I was right. But what do you think?” 

Honestly, I don’t always answer such questions immediately. 

I want to be careful about giving “life advice” when I know that I fail and fall in this business of living, let alone living righteously, as anyone else. 

I also wait in order to pray over my responses to questions I get. 

But I finally did write that man what I think he already suspected, that his rough words maybe were too rough and that even when we speak hard truths, we must do so with the love of Jesus for the other person. After getting my email, the man changed his mind. He repented and apologized to his friend. 

My response to him had nothing to do with me. God gave me His Word and His wisdom and the Holy Spirit changed the man's mind. That was all the work of the Word of Jesus speaking through me.

Jesus also says in verse 17, “the kingdom of heaven has come near.” 

That, friends, is good news, the gospel from God! 

This gospel tells us that though we may live in a world of darkness, sin, and death and though we may be sinners, violators of God’s Law who can hardly stand to look at ourselves in the mirror in the morning from guilt and shame, let alone look into the eyes of Jesus, Jesus, the King of kings, has come with God’s grace--His charity--to bring us into His light, under His reign. 

He does this not because we deserve His love, but simply because He chooses to love us. 

We may find it hard to love the unlovable; but God does love the unlovable, even you and me. And that's something to be celebrated, relished, and enjoyed, something that fills us with thankfulness and praise to God!

When Jesus and His kingdom come to us and His Word of love gives us the faith in Him that makes us His, we are compelled to believe and empowered to believe that absolutely nothing, not even death, can separate us from God or His loving, eternal intentions for us. 

As one Lutheran layperson wrote this past week on Twitter, “‘ALL YOUR SIN IS FORGIVEN FOR CHRIST’S SAKE.’  If you believe this, God has given you the gift of faith. There is nothing that you need do. It is already done to you. Now, go live.” 

“I am not ashamed of the gospel,” Paul writes in the New Testament, “because it is the power of God that brings salvation to everyone who believes...” (Romans 1:16) 

It was the power of the gospel, the good news of Jesus, that warmed Ayman’s heart that day in the funeral home.

Later in our lesson, Jesus approaches two sets of brothers who are fishermen: Simon Peter and Andrew, John and James. Jesus tells them to follow Him and they do so, “at once,” “immediately.” 

After God’s Word in Jesus convicts us of our sin in the Law that says, “Repent”...after that same Word convinces us of God’s love and good intentions for us in the Gospel, we’re open to doing what might have otherwise been unthinkable to us. 

We’re ready to follow Jesus. 

We’re ready to go where He takes us. 

This doesn’t mean that if you’re a Christian, you should become a pastor or a missionary. 

It means following Him wherever we may be--at work, at school, at home, in doctors’ offices, grocery stores, restaurants, gyms, community gatherings, sporting events, social media. 

God taking on human flesh, dying for us, and rising for us tells us that the kingdom of heaven isn’t a place in the sky; it’s wherever Jesus’ gospel Word of Law or Gospel comes to us, transforming us from God’s enemies to God’s friends, forever. 

As we live daily in repentance and faith, we carry Jesus’ Word with us, creating the possibility that still more people will encounter Jesus as they did in today’s gospel lesson.

This is how darkness and death are defeated in this world. 

This is how the kingdom of heaven shows itself even in the imperfection and sadness of this world. 

Not with political agendas or social programs, though each has their places. 

Darkness and death are defeated only as the Word of Jesus pierces our sin, selfishness, and despair through the Law, the Gospel, and His call to obediently follow. 

When we hear and respond to Jesus’ Word to repent, believe, and follow Him, we are changed forever. 

And we might, by His presence in and with us, become the instruments by which Jesus forever changes the lives of others too. Amen

[I'm the pastor of Living Water Lutheran Church in Centerville, Ohio.]

For the Feast of Saint Paul's Conversion

Here's a poem, with explanation and audio, from Malcolm Guite.

My Case of the If-Thens

In my quiet time this morning, I read Genesis 28. There, God tells Jacob the schemer in a dream: "I am with you and will watch over you wherever you go, and I will bring you back to this land. I will not leave you until I have done what I have promised you.” (v.15)

This is an unconditional promise God makes. It's made without respect to Jacob's past unfaithfulness. God announces that He will be faithful to Jacob.

But Jacob's response isn't unconditional trust in God or God's promise. "If God will be with me and will watch over me on this journey I am taking and will give me food to eat and clothes to wear so that I return safely to my father’s household, then the Lord will be my God..." (vv.20-21) "IF...THEN..." "If God will do what I want Him to do," Jacob is saying, "then I'll believe in Him and worship Him."

I can be an "if...then" believer. God has claimed me as His own in Holy Baptism, sending His Holy Spirit to enable me to believe and call on Him through Jesus. But when I sense God calling me to have that tough conversation, to do something kind that will be inconvenient, to speak out for justice, to forgive as I've been forgiven, to love as I am loved, to spend time with someone even though I'd rather be doing something else, to reconnect with friends, or to tell people what God has done (and is doing) for me in Jesus, I break out into the "If thens."

If it's on my way.

If I can find the time.

If I see changes in the other person.

If I thought that it would do any good.

If I had any influence.

But I realize that since God doesn't put any strings on His promises to me, I can't put strings on the promises I make to Him. I am to live in response to His grace from moment to moment in all the moments of my life. Even the hard or inconvenient or seemingly futile ones.

God has bought me out of slavery to sin and death through the offering of God the Son, Jesus, on the cross. All who call on Jesus' name are daily being saved from sin, death, and futility.

Because I'm as human, flawed, and sinful as Jacob...and, like him, with a checkered past, I will only ever be able to keep my promises to God (or to others) with the help of God. "Without Me, you can do nothing," Jesus says (John 15:5). I've come to realize how literally true those words are!

And even when Jesus is helping me to do something worthwhile, I--me, my fears, my shortcomings, my imperfections, my selfishness--get in the way. (As Jesse Jackson famously said back in 1984, "Be patient with me; God isn't finished with me yet.") Right now, like the apostle Paul, we only see all that God has in mind for us as in a mirror dimly (or, a glass darkly).

But God's promises are solid. I pray that today, I'll be all-in for Him and not cave in to the temptation to say, "If God gives me what I want, then I'll follow Him or seek to do His will."

Because God has never said, "If you get your act together, Mark, then I will love and forgive you and give you life with Me," with the help of God, I won't tell Him, "If...then" today.

Make it so today, Lord, I pray.

Just a few thoughts.

[I'm the pastor of Living Water Lutheran Church in Centerville, Ohio.]

Seeing, Telling

[This message was shared with the people and friends of Living Water Lutheran Church in Centerville, Ohio, this past Sunday. I hope you find it helpful.]

John 1:29-42
You all know of my former atheism, which lasted from my mid-teens into my twenties, a period of about ten years. In those days, honestly, I thought that people who believed in God were superstitious, fanatical, and dim-witted. When I heard Christians talk about their faith, I thought that, as someone sufficiently smart and resourceful, I didn’t need the “crutch” of a Savior God. 

But in those ten or so years, there was one Person from Whom I tried to keep my distance. Someone I never wanted to see. That Person was Jesus. 

Occasionally, at a bookstore or a library, I would run across an article about Jesus; I would read with a mixture of interest and revulsion. 

Or a friend would talk to me about Jesus and I would, as a friend, listen dutifully, but disinterestedly. “Well,” I would think, “he or she is a weaker, dimmer person than I realized. They actually believe in Jesus.”

And yet. When I was away from the bookstores, libraries, and friends, when I lay in my bed at night in the darkness, the witness about Jesus I had heard or read or seen from people, movies, books, articles, and the Bible would come to mind. 

I felt two things in those moments. One was terror! A perfect, risen Savior terrified me. The other thing I felt was an attraction to Jesus. 

But I would shake off my thoughts of Jesus and avoid seeing Him as best I could.

Eventually, you know, Ann and I were married and I reluctantly began attending worship with her, then listening to the witness of members of the congregation, and studying the Scriptures with them and on my own. 

For the first time in my life, I began to see Jesus for Who He is. The Holy Spirit started both tearing down my walls of resistance and building faith in Jesus within me. 

The work of the Spirit continues in me. I still sometimes try to avoid seeing Jesus or, more significantly, avoid being seen by Him. 

But as the Word of God and the sacraments of Holy Baptism and Holy Communion are unleashed into my life, I understand the truth of what Peter once told Jesus after Jesus had suggested that the disciples might want to follow some other person or some other way rather than follow Him: “Lord, to whom shall we go? [Peter asked] You have the words of eternal life.” (John 6:68) [emphasis mine]

It was tempting when I first came to see and imperfectly follow Jesus to not say anything about it to people. I wanted to keep Jesus to myself for fear that people would view me in the way I’d once viewed Christians, as weak, dimwitted, fanatical, superstitious, in need of a crutch. 


But I’ve come to learn something. It’s pointless being a witness of what Jesus is--to see Jesus for Who He is and can be for all people--if we won’t testify about what we’ve seen to others who are in as much need of Jesus as we are. 

If you learned the cure for cancer, heart disease, depression, or AIDs but didn’t share the cure with others, you would be an inhumane monster. Just so, if you have seen Jesus as the Lamb of God Who takes away the sin of the world and with it, the death and purposelessness that afflicts the human race without Jesus, it would be inhumane and monstrous. 


In another part of the Bible, the apostle John writes: “We proclaim to you what we have seen and heard, so that you also may have fellowship with us. And our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son, Jesus Christ. We write this to make our joy complete.” (1 John 1:3-4) 

When you see Jesus--really see Him--your joy in knowing Him is only made complete when you share Him with others. 

To a great extent then, being a disciple of Jesus is all about seeing and telling.

We see this in today’s Gospel lesson, John 1:29-42. Here, four people see Jesus and at least two of them tell others about Him immediately. They don't wait to take a class or memorize the Old Testament Scripture that points to Jesus or go to seminary. They see Jesus, then tell others about Jesus.

The first person to see Jesus in our lesson is John the Baptist. Verse 29: “The next day John saw Jesus coming toward him and said, ‘Look, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!' This is the one I meant when I said, “A man who comes after me has surpassed me because he was before me.” I myself did not know him, but the reason I came baptizing with water was that he might be revealed to Israel. Then John gave this testimony: ‘I saw the Spirit come down from heaven as a dove and remain on him. And I myself did not know him, but the one who sent me to baptize with water told me, “The man on whom you see the Spirit come down and remain is the one who will baptize with the Holy Spirit.” I have seen and I testify that this is God’s Chosen One.’”

In these few verses, John tells us Who he sees Jesus to be: 

• the Lamb of God Who gives His perfect life in sacrifice for our sin so that all who believe in Him will have eternal life with God; 
• God the Son, Who lived before anything was created; 
• the Lord affirmed by the Holy Spirit; 
• the One Who will give that same Spirit, the very breath and life of the ever-living God to all who follow Jesus. 

Oddly, though John was Jesus’ kinsman, he hadn’t really seen much of the truth about Jesus until that moment on the Jordan when Jesus was baptized. I’ve known many Christians who have been as blind to Jesus--to His lordship and His power over sin and death--as John apparently had apparently been. Pain, adversity, change, temptation, happiness, success, and life generally come to some Christians and they crumble because they’ve never really seen or followed Jesus. They can't handle life. Their so-called faith has been or has become a habit, nothing but happy banter with people they find convivial. I’ve also known Christians who run away from seeing or being seen by Jesus better than any overt atheist. They’re afraid that if they really see Jesus, they might have to come to terms with their own sin and admit that they’re nothing without the grace God gives in Jesus. But John the Baptist saw Jesus and told the world Who and what he saw.

John’s telling engendered the interest of two of his disciples and they went to observe and listen to Jesus. “Where are you staying?” they ask Jesus. He tells them, “Come and you will see.” (John 1:37-38) One of those two disciples--students, followers--of John the Baptist, Andrew, went to his brother. “We have found the Messiah (that is the Christ, [God’s anointed Savior King]),” he tells Peter. Andrew saw Jesus and told his brother what he saw. (John 1:41-42)

During a meeting this past week, a public school teacher spoke to a group of us with passion and tears about the teachers and students she encounters each day who don’t know Jesus. They’ve never seen that He is God, that He can free them from the power of sin and death, from slavery to the condemnations and harsh of a dog-eat-dog world, from despair and hopelessness. This teacher prays and she shares Jesus when she can. But still, she cries for those who don’t yet see or know the real Jesus.

Do you understand her tears? 

If you don’t, maybe you need to begin looking at Jesus again. Read and study and pray over His Word in Scripture and ask Him, “Jesus, help me to see you clearly as Savior, God, and Friend not only of me but of my neighbors, all of my neighbors the world over whatever their backgrounds, skin colors, nationalities, or present religion.” 

I guarantee that the more you see of Jesus, the more you will, like that teacher, seek to share Him with others. Jesus will fill you with the same passion for those who don’t know Him as He had for you when He went to the cross to take “away the sin of the world.” (John 1:29)

Friends: Don’t avoid Jesus. Don’t forget about Him when you leave here this morning. 

See Him. Every day. 

Know Him. Every day. Let His life fill you. 

Then make your joy complete: Share Him. Amen

[I'm the pastor of Living Water Lutheran Church in Centerville, Ohio.]

[Above is a drawing of John the Baptist pointing to Jesus as "the Lamb of God Who takes away the sin of the world." The artist is Cerezo Barredo, priest, painter, artist. He created drawings like these while living in Panama. Like the painters of the Renaissance, he contextualized Jesus to the time and place in which he was living, in this case among the poor of Latin America.]

Impolite Savior

[This message was shared earlier today during worship with the people and friends of Living Water Lutheran Church in Centerville, Ohio.]

Matthew 3:13-17

In today’s gospel lesson, Matthew 3:13-17, Jesus travels from His home region, the Galilee, to the Judean wilderness for the express purpose of being baptized by His kinsman, John the Baptist. John is horrified at the whole idea: “I need to be baptized by you [John says], and do you come to me?” (Matthew 3:14]

John’s objections make sense. John’s baptism was all about repentance, for sinners who wanted to renounce their sin. Jesus was sinless. He had nothing for which to repent. 

But one thing is clear about Jesus from the gospels: Whenever people stood between Him and doing the will of God, He wasn’t polite. He did the will of the Father no matter what objections and obstacles people tried to place before Him.

When the apostle Peter tried to stop Jesus from talking about going to a cross to die for our sins, Jesus turned on the apostle, telling him that his desire to prevent Jesus’ crucifixion would also keep life with God coming to those who repent and believe in a crucified and risen Savior. “Get behind me, Satan! [Jesus said] You are a stumbling block to me; you do not have in mind the concerns of God, but merely human concerns." (Matthew 16:23)

When emissaries from Herod, the Judean king, tried to prevent Jesus from fulfilling the mission given to Him by God the Father of dying and rising to make God’s everlasting kingdom available to all who believe in Jesus, Jesus' response shows that He would be at home on Twitter today: “Go tell that fox, 'I will keep on driving out demons and healing people today and tomorrow, and on the third day I will reach my goal.'” (Luke 13:32)

And we all remember that day when Jesus went to the temple and, angry that God’s house of prayer had been turned into a place where wolves in sheep’s clothing fleeced God’s people, turned over the tables of the money-changing extortionists.

So, when John the Baptist objects to baptizing Jesus, Jesus is insistent. He tells John, “Let it be so now; for it is proper for us in this way to fulfill all righteousness.” “Baptize me,” Jesus tells John, “It’s the right thing to do.”

But why is Jesus undergoing a baptism of repentance the right thing exactly?

Here’s why. When Jesus underwent a baptism of repentance He didn’t need, He was cementing His connection to us. 

We are sinners unworthy of God’s forgiveness or citizenship in His kingdom. 

That’s why we need to daily repent, of course. 

That’s why Jesus teaches us to pray, “...forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us” and, because we are so prone to wander away from God’s will for our lives, why He also teaches us to pray, “lead us not into temptation.” 

In absorbing our need for repentance within Himself, Jesus establishes His connection to us at our deepest point of need. Even before going to the cross, Jesus is absorbing our sin and our death into His body so that when He offers His sinless life on the cross, His death there will bring the end of our sin and the death of our death.

It’s no coincidence that immediately after He was baptized, Jesus went into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. 

The New Testament book of Hebrews underscores the importance of God becoming one of us when it says that in Jesus, “we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who in every respect has been tested as we are, yet without sin.” 

And, considering Jesus on the cross, the apostle Paul says, “God made [Jesus] who had no sin to be sin for us so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.” (2 Corinthians 5:21) 

For Jesus, as He tells John the Baptist in today’s lesson, to “fulfill all righteousness” means to be both our almighty King and our suffering servant. Jesus makes us subjects of His kingdom of grace by taking the poisons of sin and death from us into Himself, then, as we trust in Him, filling us with His righteous, eternal life, an exchange that saves us for life with God forever! 

We can take comfort from the fact that in Jesus Christ, we belong to a God Who understands what it’s like to be tempted by sin and to be tested by adversity. 

I was teaching a class on prayer in my former parish. After class one night, a man who had sat in silence most of the evening approached me. “I have a problem with prayer,” he told me. “What is it?” I asked. “I just don’t feel that I should bother God,” he said. “I mean, I feel okay about thanking God for things. But I don’t feel that I have the right to ask God for anything.”

I tried to reassure the man, reminding him that Jesus actually instructs us to pray. That’s because God wants to be in our lives so that He can transform our lives forever. 

No matter what test you’re facing in your life today, no matter what pain you're experiencing, no matter what sins you have committed, no matter what sin tempts you, you have an advocate and a friend in the God Who went to the Jordan River to undergo a baptism He didn’t need, then went to a cross to take your burdens on His shoulders. 

Whatever your burden, Jesus Christ can bear it with you. 

He can bear it for you.

The good news of Jesus insisting that John baptize Him that day on the Jordan is summarized well by Pastor John Jewell: “He came down to lift you up! He took your place so you could take his place! He lost his life so you could find your life! He came to be with you so you could be with him!”

And Jesus, it turns out is totally impolite and utterly tenacious in reaching out to you. He's willing to overrule prophets like John the Baptist, apostles like Peter, rulers like Herod (and Pilate), and religious leaders like the high priests in Israel, to come into your life and call you to receive forgiveness and eternal life through faith in Him.

That’s good news! That’s our good news through Jesus Christ. 

Because He is so impolite and perseverant in reaching into your life, only you can keep Jesus out of your life. But, I hope that instead, you’ll take your cue from John the Baptist in today's Gospel lesson. After Jesus set John straight, he trusted that Jesus knew what He was doing.

Believe that whatever you face in life today or tomorrow, God will get you through. Trust that He will free you from guilt for your sin, that He will empower you to resist temptation., that He will give you life with God! These are the things that Jesus wanted you and me to know and experience when He went to the Jordan to be baptized by John. Amen

[I'm the pastor of Living Water Lutheran Church in Centerville, Ohio.]