An excerpt from the sermon at a baptismal service 12/15/13.
We get bogged down in the
daily workings of life that we miss the wonderfully obvious, that this world,
even in its broken state, is a pretty wild place. We are on a rock that is
spinning 1,000 miles an hour hurling around the sun at 67,000 miles an hour. That
sun that we journey around every year, gives us heat and gives us light, in
which trees turn into oxygen, in which we breathe out laughter at a nine month
old learning experimentally about gravity. We see these things, but don’t see
them.
This world and this life
is wonderfully extraordinary and is all around us and we miss it staring at our
phones, or becoming so preoccupied with things that don’t matter. Our problem is much deeper than not
paying attention, though that is a big problem. Our problem goes all the way
down into the core. Some of you listened to me preach this morning and heard a
message of the gospel, and it was established in your heart. Some of you were
daydreaming and haven’t the foggiest idea what I was preaching. Some of you
listened and heard me, but did not hear what I was saying, you did not perceive
the Words, you heard the concept, but did not perceive. Hearts have grown dull,
and you have ears they can barely hear, and have closed your eyes; lest you
should see with your eyes and hear with your ears and understand with your
heart and turn from your sin unto the Saviour and be healed.
We
are about to witness a baptism, and I wonder what you will see? When John
Baptized, some saw a religious symbol, and nothing more. Some saw a wild man
dunking people under the water, and nothing more. Hearing ye shall hear, and shall not
understand; and seeing ye shall see, and not perceive. But those who
were truly saved and truly waiting for the coming of Messiah saw something
more.
Baptism tells the story of
such a miracle that goes unnoticed and forgotten, even by those people who have
experienced it. Baptism paints a picture for those with eyes to see the most
beautiful tale of love, heroism, and devotion the world will ever know. Baptism
tells the story of death and sacrifice. Justice and mercy. Burial and
repentance. Resurrection and newness of life. Baptism does not save, baptism
speaks.
The miracle of
regeneration, where a human spirit, that cannot live, is given life to really
live for the first time is put on full display. The miracle of dead bodies
coming out of their tombs and walking about. The miracle of new creations, new
creatures having been born again and seen the kingdom of God. The story of a
Man, who called a dead man from his grave, and that man answered and obeyed and
hopped out of the tomb. The story of this Man who entered into the world, but
was bigger than the world itself, and died at the hands of wicked men (though
they did not take His life from Him) and He laid down His life voluntarily as a
sacrifice to present sinners blameless before God. Whose dead body was made
alive again and walked out of the tomb securing the death of death by the death
of Christ.
You have heard this story,
but have you really heard it? Have you really believed it? Has it been
confirmed in your soul that Jesus died and rose again? Will you see a woman
getting wet in the front of a church, or will you see a picture of Jesus dying
and rising out of the tomb? Will you see a women getting wet, or will you see a
woman who was made alive by grace? Who God has quickened from the dead, from
death to life to the spiritually dead. A picture of the new birth, and walking
in newness of life.
What will you see?
Will you see the gospel?
Will you see the working
of Grace?
Will you believe what we
will show you?
This is the gospel of
grace. All have sinned and come short of the perfect standard that God has
demanded from His creation. From birth, our hearts are bent and broken towards
sinfulness. Even our best efforts are tainted by sin. We have fallen from God
and are guilty having broken His commandments. We are a sinful people estranged
from a Holy God and we have no way to fix what is broken. We can’t do better,
we can’t repair the past. We are guilty before God and deserving to be punished
and to go where there is weeping and gnashing of teeth.
But listen to me, really
listen because I want to tell you how awesome God is. Jesus Christ, the eternal
Son of God, came into this Earth that He might seek and save those lost souls
to whom the Father had given Him. He didn’t look for good people because there
were not any good people. All were ruined and thrust into sin. But Jesus, born
of a virgin, the Word made flesh, lived a life of perfection, obedient to every
law of God. Jesus did what Adam could not do, He was born perfect and stayed
that way. Never the slightest hint of sin from the Lord, a perfect man who lived
for the purpose that when the fullness of time had arrived, He would offer
Himself to God, a sacrifice for sins.
When the hour had come,
Jesus was taken to Golgotha and nailed to a cross. The father had taken the
sins of the elect and laid them on the sinless Saviour. The Son bore the wrath
and the punishment and paid the penalty completely for the sins that we committed.
When God’s wrath was satisfied, Jesus gave up the ghost.
After three days and three
nights, Jesus rose from the dead, alive. Not a spirit, not a ghost, but bodily
arose and walked about walking in newness of life. This is the good news, for
if you repent of your sins, if you trust in what Jesus did, and trust that this
testimony is true and cry out to God to save you knowing He is the only true
and sufficient perfect Saviour, then you will have life and life eternal. By
God’s grace, die to self, and are born again, raised to walk in newness of
life, to follow your Lord and your Saviour, all the days of your life.
This
is an extraordinary world. Only because we have an extraordinarily awesome
Saviour.
