Today is the Feast of the Baptism of Jesus. But I’m more interested in your baptism. If you don’t remember it, that’s okay. You can still tell a story about your baptism. And if you haven’t yet been baptized in the Church, that’s okay too. You can still tell a story about your baptism.

I’m not asking about that day a priest poured water over your head in the name of the Father and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. I’m not asking about when a minister immersed you in the water of new life. I’m not asking about that first baptism that you may or may not remember. Besides, that original baptism with water was just the first of many. 

So tell me about your most recent baptism. What happened? Who was there? How did it change you? What difference is it making in your life today?

I want to know about that something that got ahold of you and wouldn’t let go. What fire was ignited in you? In what ways did it fan the flames of your life? How did it add fuel to your fire? 

Let me give you a few examples of baptisms in my life. Maybe they’ll help you see what I’m talking about.

• I will never forget the day I went to my priest and said, “My life is a mess and I don’t know what to do.” I sat in his office and he baptized me into the truth of my pain and my brokenness. He held my feet to the fire and it ignited in me a fire of new life and a different way of being. 
• Years ago I was baptized in the Frio River on a canoe trip with my two sons. We came to a waterfall. The water created a curtain but behind that curtain there was a large hollow in the rock. The three of us sat in the hollow with our arms around each other laughing and splashing. My younger son Randy said, “We’ve never smiled this big before.” The water, the laughter, the togetherness fanned the flames of our love.
• I remember standing here in this church the day I married our older son Brandon and his fiancé Erin, and I remember sitting out there the day we buried him. The fire of love and loss changed me in ways I could never have imagined.  
• This past Friday Cyndy and I attended the opening of an art exhibit entitled “77 Minutes in their Shoes.” It’s about the Robb School shooting. The exhibit contains photographs of the shoes the children were wearing at the time of the shooting. It was a powerful and moving experience. It added fuel to the fire that burns in me for justice, peace, and nonviolence. 

When have you experienced things like that? What is igniting a fire within you today? What is fanning your flames, enlarging and expanding your life? What is adding fuel to the fire of your life? That’s the baptism I’m asking about. 

We don’t often associate baptism with fire but that’s how it is described in today’s gospel (Luke 3:15-17, 21-22). John the Baptist says,

“One who is more powerful than I is coming…. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire.”

I think we often misunderstand baptism, make it too small, and water down its power and presence in our lives. For most of us, I suspect, baptism is about the water in the font and the assurance of individual salvation. I don’t disagree. I just think it’s more than that. It connects us to something than larger than and beyond ourselves. 

In the church we’re baptized just once but in life we are baptized over and over and over again. That’s why we regularly renew our baptismal vows. The renewal of our baptismal vows declares that baptism is never a one and done kind of thing and it’s about so much more than what happens at the font in the church. 

In a few minutes we will renew our baptismal vow and recommit ourselves to

• continuing in the apostles’ teaching and fellowship, the breaking of bread, and the prayers;
• resisting evil, repenting and returning to the Lord;
• proclaiming with our words and actions the Good News of God in Christ;
• seeking and serving Christ in all persons, loving our neighbors as ourselves; and
• striving for justice and peace among all people, and respecting the dignity of every human being.

Do you see how far reaching our baptism is? Can you feel how it connects you to others? Do you hear the transformation being called for? 

Every time we come to circumstances, people, and relationships that open to us and invite us to be more fully ourselves, we are being baptized. Every time we experience something that cleanses our eyes so that we see more clearly or face a difficult truth, we are being baptized.

Every time something happens in our heart and we love more deeply, we are being baptized. Every time we feel the pain of the world and respond with compassion and offer healing, we are being baptized. Every time we begin to live from a new place of wisdom or gratitude, we are being baptized.  

That one baptism that happens in the church was never intended to be exclusive. It’s archetypical. It is the pointer to all the other baptisms in our life and world. The fire of baptism is everywhere. 

It’s in our marriage, friendships, and parenting. Our work and vocation are baptismal fire. Our passions, dreams, and creativity are the fire of baptism. Our concerns and work for justice, peace, and human dignity are baptismal fire. Even our pain, brokenness, sorrows, and losses are baptismal fire. 

Wherever life is being transformed baptism is happening. Those baptismal experiences transform us in the same way fire consumes and transforms wood into something new. So it is with us. But here’s the thing. At some point in that process the wood becomes the fire. 

There is a beautiful story about that in our tradition. It comes to us from the monks who lived in the Egyptian desert around the fourth or fifth century. 

“Abba Lot went to Abba Joseph and said to him, ‘Abba, as far as I can I say my little office, I fast a little, I pray and meditate, I live in peace and as far as I can, I purify my thoughts. What else can I do?’ Then the old man stood up and stretched his hands towards heaven. His fingers became like ten lamps of fire and he said to him, ‘If you will, you can become all flame.’

(Translated by Benedicta Ward, The Sayings of the Desert Fathers, 103)

That’s how I want to live, don’t you? I want to become all flame. What would it be like and mean in your life today to “become all flame”?

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Image Credit: Photo by Paul Bulai on Unsplash.