New Life Inaugurated through God’s Servant – Baptism of our Lord

New Life Inaugurated through God’s Servant

Is. 42:1-9, Mat. 3:13-17, Rom. 6:1-11 T Baptism of our Lord

INI

We’re broken. We don’t do the things we want to do, and we do the things we don’t want to do. Our flesh is weak and can’t accomplish the things we want. It prevents us from being the person we want to be.

The new year always brings up this age-old question – what habits am I going to tweak this year, so that I CAN be who I WANT to be? As each year comes and goes, you find yourself either repeating your resolutions from last year, or finding some other area in your life that you’re dissatisfied with.

We want improvement. We want better habits. But what does God want?

Improvements and better habits seek to preserve what ultimately feeds our sinful flesh. They cultivate pride – self-exaltation – and shape a version of the self that’s suitable for ME.

But God wants us to do more than tweak our habits. He wants a heart fully devoted to Him. He doesn’t merely want improvements on that which is old, weak, and frail. For, He promises NEWNESS. Not a new, nice, shiny layer to hide our decaying flesh, but a new life altogether.

Because the fact of the matter is, the old sinful flesh can’t be trained. He always leads towards death. He can’t be negotiated with – because his pride always wins. He can’t be cleaned up – because he’ll always wallow back towards filth.

Truth is, He must die. And thanks be to God that He sends His servant to bring new life.

         This new life is something that Isaiah prophesied in the Old Testament reading. He wrote – “Behold the former things have come to pass, and new things I now declare; before they spring forth I tell you of them (Is 42:9).” That which leads towards death and destruction shall pass away. And by the Word of the Lord, the new life comes. But when does this come? Who brings it?

         Isaiah writes what God promised to His people – “Behold my servant, whom I uphold, my chosen, in whom my soul delights. I have put my Spirit upon Him; he will bring forth justice to the nations (42:1).” This servant is unique from the rest of God’s servants. He’s one specially chosen by God. God delights in such a one—and when you read the rest of Isaiah, it becomes clear why this matters. God’s covenant people, Israel, had not brought Him delight at all. Instead, they stood under His judgment, having broken His covenant and failed in the calling He gave them. Yet, in their place shall arise a servant, whom God shall anoint with His Spirit.

         And what will God’s servant do? This servant shall establish a new way, a new life for all people. And what does this new way entail? Isaiah says He will bring justice to the nations – meaning not just punishment for the unjust. But also an invitation of mercy to hide one’s weakness under God’s atonement. Isaiah also says that this servant will not operate through forceful rule and domination. He won’t overcome his enemies by shouting at them or arguing against them, but by simply proclaiming the truth.

         And through this divine act of patience and mercy by this servant of the Lord, not only will God’s people be invited to receive the care and compassion of this divine servant, but the Lord says “I will give you (the servant) as a covenant for the people (that is, God’s covenant people Isarel), and a light for the nations.” The servant of the Lord not only fulfills the covenant to Israel, but is a light to the whole world! And what else does this servant bring? He opens the eyes of the blind. He frees prisoners from dungeons. He is the light that shines in dark places, and brings clarity to all that which surrounds us. This Servant of the Lord doesn’t repair Israel’s failure. But He inaugurates something entirely new in its place.

         What a joyous day when this servant should burst onto the scene, and bring this new life, this new way! Unfortunately, Isaiah wouldn’t see this servant. Neither would his Israelite contemporaries. But God keeps His promises. And in God’s wisdom, 700 years later, God’s servant inaugurated this new life. But He wasn’t merely a servant – a man like you and me. It was God’s only-begotten Son, Jesus.

         The age of new creation dawned on all the world at Jesus’ baptism. For He was anointed by the Father at His baptism. The Holy Spirit proceeded from the Father and rested upon the Son in the form of a dove. And the Father confirmed this anointing by saying – “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am delighted.” Yes, the delight of God, and the Spirit of God, rest on this chosen one – this Messiah – just as was prophesied of old. He was baptized by John, not because HE needed a baptism of repentance. Rather, he was baptized to reveal Himself to the world. God revealed that Jesus is God’s Son. He is the Servant from Isaiah 42, anointed by the Spirit of God. He is the righteousness of God made manifest in the flesh, that our weak, frail flesh might BE redeemed.

         So, Jesus wasn’t baptized because HE needed cleansing from sin. But because WE do. He doesn’t need new life. We do. And He numbers himself with sinners – appearing as our brother in our flesh and blood– that through His righteous, God-pleasing life, we might have a NEW life through Him. Our final hymn today puts it beautifully in the final stanza – “Jesus, once with sinners numbered, full obedience was Your path; You, by death, have consecrated water in this saving bath: dying to the sin of Adam, rising to a life of grace; We are counted with the righteous, over us the cross You trace.”

         The new life brought by Jesus was then demonstrated in His ministry. He fulfilled all that which Isaiah prophesied. He opened the eyes of blind – both physically, AND spiritually. He brought people from darkness to light – including the Gentiles like the centurion who’s son died, and the Syrophoenician woman whom Jesus indirectly called a dog. Even though they weren’t a part of the old covenant people, by faith in this Servant who inaugurates new life, the whole world is invited to become a part of the new covenant.

         The new covenant invitation was then delivered to you through Holy Baptism. For this is the place where God unites us to Jesus. Not in some sort of quasi-spiritual way where we can say “God is with me”. But in the sort of way that Paul says “if we have died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with Him (Rom 6:8).” Elsewhere he says “I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me, and gave Himself up for me.”

         Baptism unites you to Jesus’ death and resurrection. Through this heavenly bath, new life isn’t a far-off reality. It’s given to you in the present. It’s yours by the power of the Holy Spirit. The Christian life isn’t one to be lived distantly in the future, it’s to be lived now. For the Servant has come. He’s inaugurated the new life. He freely gives it to you in your baptismal waters.

         And as our steps gain closer to glory, the Holy Spirit brings this newness to us each and every day as we remember who Christ has made us to be. And thus, what we’ve been freed to do. Truth is, the new life you live means you’ve died to sin. That means, who YOU want to be, and what YOU want to do must die. So that who GOD wants us to be and what GOD wants us to do might be worked in us through the Spirit we first received in our baptism – so that HE might resurrect us from the ashes.

         And being raised in the image of Christ through the power of the Holy Spirit, God looks at us, His new creation, and says – “I am well pleased.”

At Christ’s baptism, God’s work of new creation began. There, the old sinful man was not reformed or improved, but drowned and put to death, so that the new man might rise in Christ.

Renewed by the remembrance of God’s promise, we daily remember who we are: God’s children and heirs of His inheritance. We remember what we have been freed from—death, darkness, and rebellion—so that we do not fall back into enslaving habits. And we remember what lies ahead: the new creation God has promised to His faithful.

Not because we have earned it, but because the Servant inaugurated it through His innocent suffering and death, and through His victorious resurrection.

INI

Pastor Joshua Ralston