Baptism Begins A Journey

Evan D Garner

Jan 11

January 11, 2026 – The First Sunday after the Epiphany: The Baptism of our Lord, Year A
Isaiah 42:1-9 • Acts 10:34-43 • Matthew 3:13-17

What do you think happens at Baptism? When we sprinkle water on a baby’s head and utter the trinitarian formula—I baptize you in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit—what do you think happens to that baby? They haven’t understood anything about the service—about God, about Jesus, about sin, about regeneration. What could possibly be taking place in that little child’s heart and mind and body and soul?

What about someone who is older—a middle-aged man who was surprised to learn that his parents never had him baptized—who, despite being active in the life of the church for years, never received the sacrament of new birth? What do you think happens to him? Does it make a difference that he is old enough to understand all the words—familiar enough with Christianity to know who Jesus is—experienced enough to know that sin is real and that all of us need deliverance from its deadly grip? Will Baptism make a difference to him in a way that a lifetime of going to church hasn’t?

Today’s gospel lesson may not give us the answers, but I think it helps us ask the right questions. John the Baptist was out in the wilderness, beyond the edge of the community, preaching a baptism of repentance. “The kingdom of heaven has come near!” he proclaimed. “Repent. Be baptized. Prepare for the coming of God’s reign.”

His message wasn’t like the other preachers of his day. They spoke in synagogues or in the temple, but John preached on the banks of the Jordan River, out where the corrupt and corrupting tendrils of organized religion could not reach. He believed that the Way of God—the fulfillment of God’s promises—was coming to the earth and that God’s Anointed One—the Messiah, the Christ—was coming—and coming not to those who worshiped in beautiful buildings but to those who offered God their whole hearts. “Repent,” he told them, “for the day when God will come and take charge of the earth is almost here.”

And then Jesus showed up. Jesus left his home in Galilee and travelled down to the wild regions of Judea in order to be baptized by John. But why? I thought Jesus was the one God had sent to bring God’s reign to the earth. I thought Jesus was the spotless, sinless Lamb of God. Why would he need to repent? What was he supposed to prepare for?

We’re not the only ones who don’t understand what Jesus was doing. According to Matthew’s gospel account, John the Baptist didn’t understand it either. He would have prevented Jesus from being baptized, saying, “I need to be baptized by you. Why are you coming to me?” For two thousand years since, the church has pondered the mystery of Jesus’ baptism, asking why. Early on, some interpreted this as the moment when Jesus truly became God’s Son—that, in the waters of baptism, God the Father adopted Jesus, transforming a remarkable human being into a truly divine figure. But what about the incarnation? What about the message of the angels and the adoration of the magi? What about our unshakable belief in one God, not two?

It didn’t take the church very long to figure out that Jesus didn’t become God—that he was fully divine all along—but that didn’t stop the church from wrestling with this mystery. Scholars and preachers have offered a multitude of explanations throughout the years, none of which has been completely satisfying. Was Jesus setting a good example for us? Was he demonstrating his solidarity with sinners and outcasts? Was he validating the ministry of John the Baptist and declaring his allegiance to the kingdom that John had proclaimed?

Maybe it was a little bit of each of those, but I think Jesus’ words to the baptizer are significant and worth another look. When John objected, Jesus said, “Let it be so now, for it is proper for us in this way to fulfill all righteousness.” To be frank with you, I don’t know what that means. I don’t know what Jesus meant by “fulfill all righteousness.” But I do know that those words are important. With those words, Jesus lets us know that something powerful is taking place in his baptism. This is more than a suggestion or a pattern that we are supposed to follow. This is Jesus Christ giving himself to the world in order that we might be saved. His baptism—and ours—is about the fulfillment of all righteousness—the perfection of divine justice and judgment in the world and in our lives. And all of that is somehow bound up in this moment when Jesus is plunged beneath the water and then comes up to see the heavens opened and the Spirit descending upon him like a dove.

This moment is the beginning of Jesus’ journey to save us from our sins. From this point forward, everything that Jesus says and does is about delivering God’s people from sin and death. He will spend the rest of his life teaching, preaching, and healing the sick—questioning, challenging, and confronting those in authority—welcoming, embracing, and restoring those who have been cast aside by the powers of this world. And all of those things—the stand Jesus makes for the reign of God which, through him, has come into the world—will lead him to the cross. But it all starts right here, in Baptism.

What do I think happened to Jesus at his baptism? Why do I think the sinless Son of God came to be baptized by John? What if, in the waters of Baptism, Jesus not only identified with sinners but took upon himself the sins of the world—the very sins which we have come to wash off? Like a hydrographic printing process, in which a colorful film floating on the surface of the water is transferred to a cloth or phone case or water bottle, what if Baptism is the means by which our brokenness is transferred onto Jesus in order that his perfection might be bestowed upon us? And what if that means that the journey, which Jesus began at the Jordan River, is the same journey that each one of us takes when we ourselves emerge from those waters?

What happens when we are baptized? From the moment of our Baptism, we begin a journey that will lead us back to God through Christ’s defeat of sin and death. In these sacred waters, our broken and sinful human nature is washed away and washed onto the lamb that would be slain for the sake of the world. In Baptism, we become one with Christ. In Baptism, we are buried with Christ in his death and raised with him to the new life of grace. In Baptism, the person God has called us to become becomes our new reality. But, even though we believe that the fulfillment of all righteousness is granted to us all at once when we are baptized, we also know that becoming Christlike as God intends takes a lifetime of being formed into the image of God by the work of the Holy Spirit. And that is the journey we are on. That is the journey that Baptism uniquely makes possible.

From the moment of his baptism, Jesus embarked on a journey that culminated in the conquering of sin and the restoration of humankind in the cross and empty tomb. From the moment of our baptism, we embark on that same journey with Jesus—one that is both already finished in the cross of Christ and one that is only fulfilled when we take our last breath. Like Jesus, our journey is marked by the tremendous tension we feel between our place in this world and our place in the heart of God. And yet, because we make that journey within Jesus—the one who lives within all who have been baptized—we know that our struggle will always resolve into the perfect love of God. In Christ, our journey’s destination is already fulfilled. Baptism is how we take the first step.