Love Rains-Love Reigns

Today the Church celebrates Baptism of the Lord Sunday.


Mark 1:4-11 (NRSV)

John the baptizer appeared in the wilderness, proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. And people from the whole Judean countryside and all the people of Jerusalem were going out to him, and were baptized by him in the river Jordan, confessing their sins. Now John was clothed with camel’s hair, with a leather belt around his waist, and he ate locusts and wild honey. He proclaimed, “The one who is more powerful than I is coming after me; I am not worthy to stoop down and untie the thong of his sandals. I have baptized you with water; but he will baptize you withe the Holy Spirit.”

In those days Jesus came from Nazareth of Galilee and was baptized by John in the Jordan. And just as he was coming up out of the water, he saw the heavens torn apart and the Spirit descending like a dove on him. And a voice came from heaven, “You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased.”

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Only love
Can bring the rain
That makes you yearn
To the sky
Only love
Can bring the rain
That falls like tears
From all high

Love, Reign O'er Me, by Pete Townshend, from Quadraphenia by The Who

A love greater than anything we could ever hope to imagine or understand. Love that comes from the one The one who is more powerful than anyone who has ever walked the face of the earth. The love that makes you yearn to the sky.

In the water there is birth, and in the water there is rebirth. In the water there is life and in the water there is death. In the water there is the warmth of being washed and in the water there is the peril of being washed away.

This is the water, this is the sacrament Jesus ordains when he participates as he is baptized in the waters of the Jordan

Yet if you ask “why does the fully human, fully divine Son of God and Son of Man need a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins?” This good question has a very good answer; Jesus does not need this baptism for himself. Jesus chooses this baptism not for his needs but for ours. In his baptism, Jesus identifies himself with the Church, the church which he is the cornerstone. Being fully human, he knows we need this baptism, being fully divine, he ordains it for our sanctification.

Tears fall from on high; these tears are the waters of our baptism. These are the waters John bathes us in while we are confessing our sins. These are the waters of our birth as we leave the womb, just like the fully human fully divine Jesus left the womb of his mother Mary. These are the waters of the tomb, the death and new life we come to in the water, at the cross and in the resurrection.

As God's love rains, God's love reigns.