Sermon Tone Analysis

Intro

Today we continue the journey.

We have talked about what a church needs to be and now we are discussing things that a church does.

In some churches they call them the Holy Sacraments.

They are as follows:

Penance (or repentance) - We provide opportunity for people to reconcile with God.

Eucharist/Communion - We provide opportunity for a person to remember all that Christ did for us and the covenant bad between us.

Communion - We provide opportunity for a person to remember all that Christ did for us and the covenant bad between us.Baptism - We provide opportunity for a person to demonstrate their commitment by symbolically and decisively dying to self and raising to a new life in Christ.Confirmation - We provide opportunity for people to receive the baptism of the Holy SpiritAnointing of the Sick - We provide opportunity for the sick to come and receive prayer for healing - in their body, mind, and spiritMarriage - We provide opportunity for people to be married and thereby demonstrate the unity not just between the couple, but also between Christ and the Church.Holy Order: We provide opportunity for training and sending people for works of ministry.

Baptism - We provide opportunity for a person to demonstrate their commitment by symbolically and decisively dying to self and raising to a new life in Christ.

Confirmation - We provide opportunity for people to receive the baptism of the Holy Spirit

Anointing of the Sick - We provide opportunity for the sick to come and receive prayer for healing - in their body, mind, and spirit

Marriage - We provide opportunity for people to be married and thereby demonstrate the unity not just between the couple, but also between Christ and the Church.

Holy Orders: We provide opportunity for training and sending people for works of ministry.

Before we get started in today’s topic I want to let you know the main focus is to bring give you the what’s and the why’s more that the how’s.

I do this for 2 reasons:

I want to leave you knowing what it is you are doing, and why you are doing it

More Importantly, the Bible doesn’t emphasize the how that often.

Often with this type of thing people can develop strong feelings about the “how” but really, those are often just distractions based on style and preference.

Today’s Topic - Baptism

What it Is?

Baptism - the religious rite of sprinkling water onto a person's forehead or of immersion in water, symbolizing purification or regeneration and admission to the Christian Church.

Purification

Regeneration

Admission

Almost every culture has some form of symbolic ritual because deep down everyone know that people are impure.

In addition to that, even if you can become clean for a second, it doesn’t take long before the heart of man becomes dirty again.

The world these days seems to be trying hard to tell you that “I’m ok, Your ok.”

But really c’mon now.

Everyone knows it’s not true.

I don’t have to quote Bible verse after Bible verse to let you know that there’s something inside us that requires us to need grace, and mercy, and forgiveness.

I’m only human.

You don’t have to teach a child to take his friend’s toy.

You don’t have to teach a person how to lie.

Can I tell you that there is absolutely no one, including myself, that has not let me down?

Everyone since the beginning of time has tried to deal with this in one of 2 major ways.

They ignore it, or they excuse it, or worse yet, they try to convince themselves that it’s in their nature and they were born that way so it can’t be wrong.

They do things to got clean… ie.. various purification rituals.

In Jesus’ Day - 3 forms of “Ablution”

Washing of the hands.

You can see this only once in the Bible .

Another example would have been Pilate… washing his hands of his blood.

It was symbolically absolving him from guilt.

interesting to note was the cry of the people… Let his blood be on us and on our children… Taking both the guilt and the path to redemption.

Washing of the hands and feet.

ex 30:18-

This washing was in preparation for ministry.... you can actually see the ritual performed by Jesus to his disciples in a new way in .

In the OT is you were to perform ministry without being clean you should fear death.

Trying not to preach this passage but one major difference is that is the the ministers in the OT washed their own feet because noone was clean enough to wash for them… Only Jesus is pure enough to clean a person.

The Mikvah.

You see this all through the OT, especially in Leviticus.

If such and such happens… you are unclean.. you must bathe.

In the NT the pool of Siloam was a place of cleaning and baptism.

The Mikvah did a number of things.

It symbolized a recognition that you are unclean and you needed to be.

If you were a stranger to whatever group you were part of, you would perform the micvah to say I am no longer what I was, I am born new.

Baptizmo - often signified a washing or a cleansing where you went in one thing and came out another.

The clearest example that shows the meaning of baptizo is a text from the Greek poet and physician Nicander, who lived about 200 B.C.

It is a recipe for making pickles and is helpful because it uses both words.

Nicander says that in order to make a pickle, the vegetable should first be 'dipped'(bapto) into boiling water and then 'baptised' (baptizo) in the vinegar solution.

Both verbs concern the immersing of vegetables in a solution.

But the first is temporary.

The second, the act of baptising the vegetable, produces a permanent change.

Why They Did It? - Main Text

Mt 3:1-

Why did Jesus need to be Baptized by John?

Behind John’s Baptism.

The Jewish people had a rich history.

They were God’s chosen people .. the descendents of Abraham… proud.

Meant to inherit the earth and rule over it.

Their history is one of great failure.

They get rescued from Egypt and immediately start whining and want to go back.

God’s chosen people complaining about God’s way of doing things.

The entire book of Judges is basically this story… The Israelites sin and God does what He said He would always do… Other nations enslave them.

They repent.

God sends a Judge and rescues them… they sin and the cycle goes on over and over again.

Kings and Chronicles more of the same.

The prophets always give the warning for not following Him and the hope for a deliverer once they blow it.

Their recent history .. The Maccabees lead a revolt and they are free but they begin arguing amongst themselves and in a nutshell hand there freedom over to the Romans.

For 400 yrs - no prophets - God is silent.

John the Baptist shows up with a new message.

Repent for the kingdom of Heaven is near.

And he began baptizing people in a mikvah.

The people are realizing that in order for the kingdom of heaven to happen… in order for them to be the chosen people God wanted them to be.. they have to change.

The old ways won’t work

In this case people were symbolically agreeing that they had to shed the old ways and become something else.

They were committing themselves to a new path.

That’s why we see the Pharisees getting so angry.

Challenge to the Pharisees

Mt 13:7-

The Pharisees and Sadducees were the Jewish leaders of the day and they were committing the same sin that had been committed over and over and over and over again.

They were God’s chosen people that knew that they knew that they knew that there was one God and they were to serve Him only.

They knew that they were to be a separate people set apart for God.

Yet they - either by appointment or election - did not pursue God they pursued power and a false sense of peace.

They operated under the idea that they were ok because after all.. they were descendants of Abraham.

John was saying … that way won’t work.

The ax is already at the root of the tree.

The only way to survive is to micvah… repent and be born again into the new way.

What New Way?

mt 3:

The old won’t work… you must repent into this new way.. the way that was prophesied since the beginning.