1 Corinthians 1:1-9

Paul, called to be an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, and our brother Sosthenes,

To the church of God that is in Corinth, to those who are sanctified in Christ Jesus, called to be saints, together with all those who in every place call on the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, both their Lord and ours:

Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.

I give thanks to my God always for you because of the grace of God that has been given you in Christ Jesus, for in every way you have been enriched in him, in speech and knowledge of every kind— just as the testimony of Christ has been strengthened among you— so that you are not lacking in any gift as you wait for the revealing of our Lord Jesus Christ. He will also strengthen you to the end, so that you may be blameless on the day of our Lord Jesus Christ. God is faithful, by whom you were called into the partnership of his Son, Jesus Christ our Lord.

Sermon Text

There is something powerful in a kind word from someone you know. It does not matter if it is a friend, the barista at the coffee shop you are a regular of, or someone at work. When someone gives us encouragement, it warms something deep inside us. There is never a time a kind word sits fallow, because when we speak kindness into the world, it breathes life in a way no other kind of speech can. Think of the times you have had something to say to someone, simple or heartfelt, that just caused their eyes to light up, their posture to change, their voice to lift just so.

This is the power of encouragement, a gift from God that we pass on to those who are around us. There is a vulnerability in encouragement, it is as dangerous as any other kind of frank speech. There is a fragility to it, lest it be rejected somehow. There is something transcendently powerful about the simple act of saying what we mean, how we mean it, when it enters into our heart. The power of encouragement is stronger than we give it credit, and it is something severely lacking in this life.

Think of it, how often do you really get encouragement from people? Thanks for this or that, sure, but when does someone put a hand on your shoulder and go, “You did so good with this.” That’s a rarer thing. I know that among clergy, our encouragement is often pragmatic more often than it is personal. “That was a good service,” is good, but “You really have a skill for making people feel the Spirit in your prayer.” Is something else entirely. Both are encouragement, but “Good job,” and “here is what about you, personally, that sets you apart,” are quite different. Is the latter always necessary, no, but we all know how good it can feel.

Those who work outside of more person-to-person professions might have this manifest differently. There’s only so many ways to properly hook up electrical outlets, and the ability to do that creatively often leads to fire code violations. The important thing which that shows, however, is that encouragement is not just something we should give for what people do professionally. Encouragement is something we offer to people for anything that we think that the world should have.

Our scripture for today is written to a congregation, and so we cannot get the full details of what Paul encourages about them. He speaks fairly broadly, “You are not lacking in any gift.” This is not saying that every person has every possible gift, but that the congregation together has them. Thinking about this congregation I see many different gifts. Some of them being fully utilized and some of them not yet fully embraced and developed. There are gifts of service that transcend a desire to do and become a calling to, in every way possible, make sure that goodness is done wherever it is needed. There are gifts of organization that allow for miracles to happen out of mundane things. There is gift upon gift here in North View, but as important as something general like that is, there needs to be a constant flow of personal encouragement beneath it all.

I try my best to give encouragement where I can, but I am just one person and am not always at the top of my game. We should be looking at the people in our life and find reasons to lift them up. Especially those closest to us. That can be hard – see someone every day and the cracks in their virtues can shine pretty brightly. Yet, imagine how much we might grow if we had those near us lifting us up regularly. I think half of the virtues in my life are based on what Grace has built up in me since we got married. A lot of stuff came before that, how else would I have married someone so wonderful? Still, she has made what was good about me excellent.

We should be willing to encourage one another, even if we are not presently very good at it. Until we can practice, we never will be good at it. In a world that is so critical, in a culture that is based on criticism and not on promotion, it is necessary for us to flip the script and build one another up differently.

Now, some may hear this and say, “But not everything about the people I know is good! Am I just supposed to praise the good and ignore the bad?” Firstly, more often than you might think the answer is yes. There’s a lot of things that might irritate us that are not actually any great failure on the part of those around us. In the event something is a problem that needs addressed, that is not something alien to being an encouraging person. Paul writes this beautiful letter to some of his most problematic children. He opens with such beautiful praise, but then he quickly explains how the people who have been given every good gift of God are squandering it.

Part of this contrast is to do with how ancient letters were written. You were always expected to state the things you liked about someone before you explained the things you were angry about. However, I think that if we diminish Paul’s opening words to just a formality, we miss the point. Paul shows in Galatians that he is willing to skip his greeting if he thinks it is necessary. Paul includes these greetings out of courtesy, sure, but he is not only keeping to tradition. Paul wants people to know that God is with them, that the kingdom of God is being realized in them, and then and only then is he willing to tell them to get their act together.

I’m going to wrap up here for today. I think that the message here largely speaks for itself. We are people who should be living into God’s gifts. Those gifts require us to be encouraging of the gifts we see in one another. The only way we begin to encourage other people, is by practicing it. I encourage you all this week, beginning even here in this sanctuary today, to take time to encourage the people around you. Water the gift of life and grace planted in our hearts, and see what blooms as a result. Speak life into this world, children of God. – Amen.

Matthew 3:13-17

           Then Jesus came from Galilee to John at the Jordan, to be baptized by him. John would have prevented him, saying, “I need to be baptized by you, and do you come to me?” But Jesus answered him, “Let it be so now, for it is proper for us in this way to fulfill all righteousness.” Then he consented. And when Jesus had been baptized, just as he came up from the water, suddenly the heavens were opened to him and he saw God’s Spirit descending like a dove and alighting on him. And a voice from the heavens said, “This is my Son, the Beloved, with whom I am well pleased.”

Sermon Text

            Jesus was baptized… I’m gonna say it again in case it is not hitting your ears as strange. Jesus was baptized! The perfect son of God, the only sinless human in all of humanity, that God-man was washed with a bath that is described by its administrator as, “for repentance.” The waters of baptism, a sign of a transformation of self, was given to someone who had no need for transformation. You and I, we need to change our lives to abandon evil, to embrace life and not death. Yet, the person who modeled it for us was someone who had no purpose for it.

I say no purpose, but I doubt that God does anything without purpose. Think of your life, for all the moments that you are able to say, “God did that, no doubt!” and tell me if it felt random at all. I cannot think of anything in my life that matches both descriptions. I have had plenty of random things happen and I have had plenty of God things happen, and they have never crossed paths. The people who tell me about their problems with diabetes in the grocery store – that tends to be random. The people I meet in public and am able to give some kind of word that applies to their life in that moment – that is God at work.

Jesus, the incarnate word of God, therefore is not doing anything that is just a happenstance. Jesus would not go out of his way to drop into a muddy river in Israel unless it had a definite purpose. That purpose? Well, that is for us to discuss today. What comes to mind when I say Jesus was baptized, why do you think that he would have done that? Was it to wash himself of sin? What sin? Was it to meet God’s requirements of Jewish worshippers? Baptism develops later on and for converts rather than people born into the faith. What about as an example to us as believers? Now that is something we can talk about.

Jesus is not just someone we look at from a distance and think about. Jesus is supposed to be the person that we imitate in everything we do. Scary isn’t it? The things that Jesus did are the things that we should do. Think of anything you have done in the past week and ask, “Would Jesus do that?” I have not seen y’all since Christmas, so we’ll include New Years in that equation. I ain’t gonna shame anyone for having a good time, God has given, “wine to make the heart glad,” but still we can probably think to something from the holidays and say, “Yeah, that ain’t Jesus-like.”[1]

The example that Jesus gives is an example in and of everything. That includes the start of our life. Christ goes into his ministry only after receiving baptism, and we too can only begin to do the work of God after we are washed in the water of rejuvenation that is baptism. There is nothing magical about water, but there is the work of the Spirit giving us some kind of grace. We are shown that the water takes away the life that was, and we are given the chance to live into the life that is. There are many vows taken in baptism, the United Methodist Church liturgy asks the believer if they affirm the Apostle’s Creed, but also:

“Do you renounce the spiritual forces of wickedness, reject the evil powers of this world, and repent of your sin? Do you accept the freedom and power God gives you to resist evil, injustice, and oppression in whatever forms they present themselves? Do you confess Jesus Christ as your Savior, put your whole trust in his grace, and promise to serve him as your Lord, in union with the Church which Christ has opened to people of all ages, nations, and races?” Those are heave promises to make.”[2]

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[1] Psalm 104:15

[2] United Methodist Publishing House. “The Baptismal Covenant I” The United Methodist Hymnal.