Keeping faith when faced with stormy waters

This past Sunday, the church celebrated the baptism of Christ. Why did Jesus need to be baptised? Well, we are told that he was baptised in the river Jordan, and at the moment he came up out of the water, God’s spirit hovered over him and God spoke to him saying, ‘you are my beloved son, in you I am well pleased’.

In the story of creation at the very beginning of the Bible, we hear that the earth was a formless void – a chaotic swirl of cosmic ocean – it’s the writer’s way of saying – before there was anything there was nothing. And over that dark ocean, God’s spirit breathed, and God spoke – ‘let there be light’.

The same elements are present in Jesus’ baptism as in the story of creation. The water, God’s spirit and God’s voice. Jesus’s baptism signals that something new is happening – that God is on the move! When he is baptised, God in Jesus is acting from within our world – baptism is the way he enters our world alongside us.

And we need to know that he is alongside us more than ever at the moment as we face the current crisis in our hospitals.

When we face stormy waters and unpromising seas of chaos in our lives, we might remember that God has taken control of the waters, we need not fear them anymore. He has found a way through and has taken charge.

In those times when we feel alive with the spirit – inspired and close to God – we might remember that the spirit is his gift to each one of us.

And when we doubt who we are, when we feel dejected and lost, we might remember what God has declared to each one of us.

You are my beloved child – in you I am well pleased.