January 10, 2010 – Baptism of the Lord Sunday

There’s a lot of name-calling going on today. God calls. And people are named.

·        In Isaiah, God says to the exiled people of Israel, “Do not fear … I have called you by name, you are mine.”

·        In Luke, Jesus is called and named by a voice from heaven saying, “You are my Son, the Beloved. With you I am well pleased.”

·        And in today’s Call to Worship, the voice that spoke on the days of creation speaks again, whirling mighty oaks and sparking flashes of fire. It is a wild and disruptive voice. But it recreates the world … and blesses God’s people with peace.

Baptisms are about name-calling. Before water, and before Holy Spirit, this is a sacrament of name-calling … that results in a blessing.

It has to do with receiving a name and being known.

Most name-calling is different. You know that. Most of the time it intends to hurt.

Friday on the radio, I heard that French politicians are working to pass a law against name-calling in marriage. They want to crack down on verbal and emotional abuse between husband and wife.  Already they have a law on their books banning verbal abuse in the workplace. Now they’re trying to make it illegal in the home.

Meanwhile, estimates are that it exists in at least 25% of all homes (1 in 4, here in the U.S.) – not as an occasional outburst for which a person later apologizes, but as a persistent rant and series of putdowns that the abuser feels justified to make because she isn’t pretty enough for him any more or he doesn’t bring home enough income. What an atrocious number, 25%!

When verbal name-calling isn’t stopped, it generally escalates into physical abuse, psychologists say. Regardless of what we learned as children about sticks and stones, and even if it does not turn physical, words can do horrible – though invisible – harm. We are genetically predisposed to believe what a loved one says about us. So, when a spouse, parent, or significant other engages in coldhearted putdowns, the effect is devastating and recovery slow.

Name-calling in scripture runs in the opposite direction, however. Rather than finding fault, it embraces: “You are my beloved.” Rather than singling out, it unites: “You are mine. With you I am well pleased.” And instead of causing anxiety and dis-ease, biblical name-calling brings blessings of peace.

I’m not talking about a blessing of status or privilege, but a blessing for service. Some people feel “blessed” when they have it better than others, and they want to keep it that way. But in the Bible, blessings always spill over with blessings for others – for the weak, the needy, the stranger, outcast or widow. Biblical name-calling sees the good in those who are different. It doesn’t point out what’s bad or imperfect.

Think about Abraham and Sarah’s call in Genesis 12.  God blessed them with the promise of having a child in old age and becoming a great nation. Sounds like status. But no. God blessed them so that they and their offspring would be a blessing to the nations.

God called them and named them to be a blessing to the world.

In baptism, Jesus receives a new name. God’s name-calling on the banks of the Jordan River gives Jesus an identity to carry to every encounter and every conflict he will face – names he can use in synagogue and street corner, beneath a sycamore tree calling Zacchaeus, and on the Galilean sea shore making disciples … praying in a Garden, standing before Pilate, enduring beatings and mocking, hanging on a cross, and rising from the grave.  Names like “Beloved” and “My Son, with whom I am well pleased.”

The same is true when any of us is baptized – child or adult. We are given a name that marks us as children of God and members of the worldwide family of faith.

I didn’t know this before, but I learned last week that some baptism liturgies avoid using the name of the person being baptized until the water is about to be applied. Worship leaders talk generically about “this child” or “these children.”

But then the pastor takes the child in her arms and asks, “By what name shall we baptize this child?”

Silly question! If the pastor doesn’t know or care about the child’s name enough to learn it before the service, why does the family want that minister baptizing their child? It seems so impersonal.

It reminds me of a story I heard of a minister in a large New York congregation who did weddings by rote. He was quite proud of it. He didn’t even go to the rehearsal. He let someone else do that. He just showed up on wedding day, was handed a folder with the names of the groom and bride, and took it from there.

But one Saturday with the bride and groom in front of him and the congregation looking on, he opened the folder … and it was empty! No names! He tried to cover. He asked the groom, “In what name do you wish to be married, young man?” The question hadn’t been talked about in the rehearsal, so the groom didn’t know what to say. The minister tried again, “By what name do you wish to be married?”

Suddenly, the earnest young fellow said loud enough for the whole church to hear, “I wish to be married in the strong name of Jesus Christ!”

If the question is asked by an egotistical or ill-prepared pastor, that’s one thing. But when it is asked during a baptism it’s something else. It becomes the occasion for name-calling … and blessing. The baptism liturgy presumes that a child is named not only by parents but by God.

Every day, countless voices call our names, trying to capture our devotion. Advertising is the primary culprit. But recently, I heard about a young woman who quit her job at an advertising agency and went back to school to change her career.

She said she “didn’t like selling stuff to people that they don’t need.” In theological terms, I’d say she doesn’t like voices other than God’s voice naming us and claiming us and telling us who we ought to be. But those voices are so loud. And God’s voice, often muted.

In biblical times, God spoke directly to people – in a burning bush, a voice from the heavens, or whatever. It doesn’t happen that way very much any more.  Or we don’t admit it.

Maybe God has a mean case of laryngitis, or has moved on to other planets.

Or maybe God has gotten more resourceful.

Lawrence Wood (Christian Century, 12/26/2006, page 19) knows a man who “fought … the idea of a personal God who intervene[s] in human life.” Instead of God, the guy looked for (and found) inspiration in music – especially Bach, whose fugues appealed to him because of their mathematical precision. But …

… his life was falling apart. His wife left him. He started drinking too much. One day as he was driving, he pounded the steering wheel with his open palms and cried out, “God, if you’re really there, you’re going to have to say something! And you know what kind of man I am! No screwing around now – no [dang] signs. You’re going to have to talk my language!”

And on the radio came “Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desiring.”

The man sobbed, and laughed at what an idiotic but perfect answer it was for him.

No one else would have heard it as the voice of God, or understood what was happening. But – that day to that man – God spoke in a way that named him and claimed him forever.

It’s not like Bach was always playing on that radio station, either. The next song that came on was “The Girl from Ipanema.” 

In today’s Gospel, it’s not clear who hears the voice Jesus heard. As Matthew tells it, everyone hears. The Voice makes a general pronouncement: “This is my Son, the Beloved.” But in Mark and Luke, the Voice speaks one-to-one, as if to Jesus and nobody else: “You are my Son.”

“You.” Does anyone else hear the least little rumbling from heaven? It doesn’t matter. Jesus heard. He heard the divine name-calling that gave him a blessing and called him to be a blessing for the world.

Parents hear it too … at the baptismal font. The pastor asks, “By what name shall this child be baptized?” and their eyes well up as they answer.

Then, as the child’s name is repeated – along with the tri-fold name of God – over the water, it’s as if a hand from heaven reaches out and taps them on the shoulder. The parents! The child won’t remember. But they are changed forever.

Others in the congregation who aren’t even related will say much later they felt it too.

It’s a name-calling. Their name-calling. Out of the blue.

So the blessing is given – not only to the one whose forehead glistens with water, but to complete strangers, who never laid eyes on the child before.

One never knows how, or when, or where God’s name-calling will come next.

It pays to keep listening.        To the glory of God.