Diving into the River of Life

The Feast of the Baptism of Christ 2026
Isaiah 42.1-9; Acts 10.34-43; Matthew 3.13-17

In the continued process of unpacking God’s Christmas gift of Christ, we have welcomed shepherds and angels and Wise Men, and must now accompany the adult Jesus to his meeting with John the Baptist in the Jordan. Here, God the Father will proclaim his love and delight in his Son; the Holy Spirit will swoop from the skies to corroborate the affirmation and complete the gathering of the Trinity; and God the Son himself, though sinless, will receive from John the sign of the forgiveness of sins. In so doing – in entering the waters of rebirth – the Creator is immersed in the very stuff of creation, restoring and purifying its waters (an ongoing task, as it turns out) so that in due time they may purify us. This is important because it tells us something about the character of the earth, and of our place in it.

Now, if we were celebrating this festival in Greece, we would witness the priest blessing a local river or stretch of ocean, and throwing a cross into the water, which all the men and boys would dive in to retrieve, and so secure for themselves a special New Year blessing.

Such a celebration of the whole earth reminds us of its true nature as a sacramental sign of the beauty and goodness of God: the physical sheltering, mothering and nourishing of creation by Nature are a sign of the eternal providence of God. It reminds us, too, like the reading from Acts, that ‘God knows no partiality’ between peoples: ‘in any nation, anyone who does what is right is acceptable to God.’ This shines a bright light on how we are to live in relationship with other people and nations, and is a song we need to keep singing, if only to correct the lies of the racists and the despots.

Doing the right thing, ‘fulfilling all righteousness’, is what motivates Jesus in Matthew's account of the Baptism. He understands John’s misgivings about subjecting himself to a ritual designed for the cleansing of sinful humanity. But he’s ‘in for a penny, in for a pound’! And we must be just the same when responding to God’s call.

The servant of the Lord in Isaiah 42 (probably a figure representing the whole people of Israel) is similarly dedicated, and merits the Father’s delight just as surely as the Son. The Servant is chosen to be the agent of the covenant between God and the world. And how must he do so? Look again at Isaiah 42.2-4. He must proclaim and enable God’s justice for humankind, not by forceful, violent, or even brash behaviour, but by a soft and gentle attractiveness, gradually drawing people into the presence of God. Christ inherits this way of working, never damaging that which is fragile, or extinguishing that which is weak. Instead, he quietly, courageously and persistently sets out God’s programme of justice – through teaching, healing, and liberating whoever is diminished. This work of Christ begins after his meeting with John in the Jordan. It is the work to which we and all the baptised are called in our own day, for God’s sake and in Christ’s name.

Like the men diving into the wintry waters of Greece, we dive into the abundant blessings provided by our kind creator, keeping our eyes fixed on the eternal prize, unafraid to embrace the cross and, through it, to receive the gift of life which it unfailingly yields. We are of course in need of forgiveness, and must come to Christ repeatedly for renewal of our lives. Once we have received that gift, we can help to pass it on to others, until the earth is finally restored, and filled with the knowledge of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea.