Leading with Our Baptismal Identity: A Sermon for 1 Epiphany

A lot has been said and written about the events that took place at the capitol in Washington, DC last week. From a church perspective, I don’t think anybody has spoken as prophetically and pastorally as our own Presiding Bishop, Michael Curry. So, if you haven’t seen or heard his response, I commend that to you.

One thing that I think is abundantly clear right now is that partisan politics are at an all-time high right now. Prior to 2020, many, if not most of us in our context here were content with a sort of “don’t ask don’t tell” approach to politics. But the covid-19 pandemic forced the issue in many ways, as we wore our politics not on our sleeves, but on our faces. It was abundantly clear for us to see how someone felt about a particular issue simply by looking at them.

On top of how covid-19 brought a new wrinkle to the political landscape in 2020, it was a presidential election year, and with the events that took place at the capitol last week, it was clearly the most bizarre one that I’ve ever encountered.

The last few months have “forced the issue” on where we stand in many ways. It has been more difficult for us to follow the “don’t ask don’t tell” approach to friendships and community. People are coming out of the closet on social media and in person, laying claim to where and with whom they stand. 

But aside from the covid-19 pandemic and the 2020 election cycle, we have always had our ways of claiming our identity. As I was writing this at my desk in my office, I looked behind me, and saw up high three framed diplomas hanging prominently on the wall – one from college and two from seminary. Below those three diplomas are two framed ordination certificates – one to the diaconate and one to the priesthood. And to my right, there is a framed Letter of Institution indicating that I am the Rector here at Christ the King. So, as I sit at my desk in my office at the church every day, I am claiming at least a part of my identity. And any place I go with my clerical collar around my neck, I am claiming my vocational identity without even saying a word. In many professions, educational and professional credentials are important., if not essential. So, claiming my educational, professional, and vocational identity aren’t necessarily a bad thing. But hopefully there is an identity within me that runs deeper than those diplomas and certificates on the wall.

One identifier that I think that many of us take for granted are our government-issued identification cards, - our social security cards, driver’s licenses, voter registration cards, and the like. I have all of those. And I rarely think about it. But for some, receiving or holding on to such identifiers are almost a matter of life and death. They are necessary for survival. If my house caught on fire, those cards are not the first thing I’d grab on my way out. But I have spoken with folks who have told me that those means of identification are absolutely what they would grab first. So, what some of us might take for granted, others see as essential as it pertains to their identity.

Of course, there are other much more obvious identity markers that I carry with me wherever I am – I am a middle-aged, white, English-speaking male from the American South. Without even trying, that is what I lead with whether I intend to or not. I can’t change that about myself, and I don’t want to. It is simply who I am.

I could go on and on about how we identify ourselves, whether explicitly or implicitly. And I haven’t even spoken about college football allegiances.

But our gospel lesson today serves as a reminder for us as to what is most essential about our identities. You probably know me well enough to know that I rarely speak, preach, or teach in absolutes. But today I am reminding us that the absolute most important identity that we bear is the cross on our foreheads that was given to us in baptism. As Christians, we must lead with our baptismal identity. As Christians, we must lead with our Baptismal Covenant. As Christians, we must lead with what Bishop Curry has called the “the loving, liberating, life giving, way of Jesus Christ.”

The context of today’s gospel lesson is the inauguration of Jesus’ public ministry, where he was sworn-in by submitting to John’s baptism in the Jordan River. And in this moment, his identity was revealed by the voice from heaven that declared, “This is my Son; the Beloved; with you I am well pleased.”

And since humankind was reconciled to God through the life, death and resurrection of Jesus, when folks are  baptized, the heavens open up as well, and God claims them  as God’s beloved child. Think about that for a second. Through the sacrament of baptism, we are adopted as children of God into the household of God. Our primary identity is no longer our family’s last name or our race, gender, education level, profession, socio-economic status, or nationality.  

Christian ethicist Stanley Hauerwas has noted that one problem with Christianity in the United States is that many of us seek to make Christianity more American as opposed to making America more Christian. In other words, many of us lead with our nationalistic identity, not our baptismal identity. Dare I say that many of us are much more articulate sharing what we love about the presidential candidate we voted for and our country than we are at sharing what we love about Jesus and our church.

I recognize that the distinction between identities can get blurry. After all, categories are never fully separate, clean, and defined. My fullest self is a combination of all of my identifiers and identities. But I achieved a moment of clarity yesterday in regard to identity when I was listening to Bp. Curry’s “The Way of Love” podcast. He was interviewing Ruby Sales, an African American activist whose work began in the Civil Rights Movement in the 1960’s. In his interview with her, Bp. Curry asked her about her decision to enroll in the Episcopal Divinity School at Harvard years ago. She said that she had an epiphany of sorts one day when she had a conversation with the daughter of a friend of hers. This young woman had been suffering quite a bit, and was wrestling with feelings of deep despair and hopelessness. Ruby asked her, “Where does it hurt?” When reflecting on the young woman’s answer to her question, Ruby said, “I realized that it was deeper than what Civil Rights could respond to. I realized that I needed a larger language to deal with my call.” And so Ruby Sales went to seminary to engage in the “larger language” of the Christian tradition as part of her call to bring about healing and reconciliation in the world. The secular language and framework of the social justice movement didn’t run deep enough for her. And it doesn’t run deep enough for us.

My friends, we all need the larger language of the Christian tradition to heal the wounds of our nation and our world today. Whatever  your favorite cause or movement may be, none of these movements have, on their own, a language that is large or deep enough to ease the pain, grief, despair, anger, or hopelessness, that we may be feeling as individuals, communities, and as a nation right now. And none of them have a language that is large or deep enough to bring about the love, hope, justice, and mercy that are essential in building a truly Beloved Community.

We need a larger language, a wider scope, and a deeper identity to be the Beloved Community that Gods calls us to be. And as Ruby Sales discovered, that larger language comes from the Church. As such, we Christians are called to lead with our baptismal identity over and above any other identity we may claim. The kingdom of heaven and the Beloved Community will not be brought about by the most righteous movement of the day. It can only be brought about by the most righteous person, Jesus Christ, who lived and died as one of us to reconcile us to God. And he has brought us into himself through the sacrament of holy baptism. Through our baptisms, we have been grafted into Christ very own Body, and as the Church, we are now Christ’s Body in the world.

There is a voice in my head that sounds a lot like my wife Emily’s voice, but alas, we were trained by the same preaching professors in seminary, so that makes sense. We were trained to not only to say what the think the text means for us today, but to also give an example of what that looks like. The answer to “what does leading with our baptismal identity look like” will be embodied in a few moments when we stand and renew our own Baptismal Covenant. When we do so, we will first and foremost profess our belief in the One Triune God – Father, Son, and Holy Spirt. All of what follows in the Baptismal Covenant is grounded in and flows from the profession of our belief in the one Triune God.

Then we will profess our commitment to continue in the apostles’ teaching, fellowship, breaking of bread, and prayers. We will re-commit to our perseverance in resisting evil, and whenever we fall into sin – and that is every day by the way - we will repent and return to the Lord.

Then we will re-commit to proclaiming by word and example the Good News of God in Christ, we will continue to seek and serve Christ in all persons, loving our neighbor as ourselves. And we will re-commit to striving for justice and peace among all people, as well as our call to respect the dignity of every human being. And as the covenant says, none of these commitments are possible without God’s help. We can’t do these things alone. And again, that was the epiphany that Ruby Sales had when she was talking to her friend’s daughter that day. We need the deep, large language of our Christian faith to bring about healing and reconciliation in the world. And this, my friends, is what leading with our baptismal identity looks like.

Perhaps a visual aid might be in store. Here is one of the aforementioned framed ordination certificates that hangs behind my desk in my church office. As you can see, it is large, prominent, and perhaps even impressive looking. Well, the other evening, I was going through my old baby book with Emily and our children, showing them what I looked like when I was their age. Then all of the sudden, my heart dropped. There it was - my baptism certificate! And here it is. Of course, you will notice how it pales in comparison to my ordination certificate. And that is a shame. Because the essence of my identity, above any- and everything else, is my baptism. That is who I am, regardless of what my vocational calling is. One of my mentors – Jon Coffey – had his tiny little baptism certificate framed and hanging prominently on his office wall. Ordination certificates and college and seminary diplomas were nowhere to be found. I asked him about that, and he simply said, “My baptism is the only thing that really matters.” Now that I have found my certificate, I plan on doing the same.

So, let us go forth from here, leading with our baptismal identity. Let us lead with the commitments we make in our Baptismal Covenant. And let us lead with the “the loving, liberating, life giving, way of Jesus Christ.”