Untitled Sermon

Welcome to the church. My name is Tim, I'm one of the pastors here

In those days John the Baptist came to the Judean wilderness and began preaching. His message was, 2 “Repent of your sins and turn to God, for the Kingdom of Heaven is near.” 3 The prophet Isaiah was speaking about John when he said,

“He is a voice shouting in the wilderness,

‘Prepare the way for the Lord’s coming!

Clear the road for him!’ ”

4 John’s clothes were woven from coarse camel hair, and he wore a leather belt around his waist. For food he ate locusts and wild honey. 5 People from Jerusalem and from all of Judea and all over the Jordan Valley went out to see and hear  And when they confessed their sins, he baptized them in the Jordan River.

11 “I baptize with water those who repent of their sins and turn to God. But someone is coming soon who is greater than I am—so much greater that I’m not worthy even to be his slave and carry his sandals. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and with fire.

13 Then Jesus went from Galilee to the Jordan River to be baptized by  But John tried to talk him out of it. “I am the one who needs to be baptized by you,” he said, “so why are you coming to me?”

15 But Jesus said, “It should be done, for we must fulfil all righteousness (carry out all that God requires.)” So John agreed to baptize him.

16 After his baptism, as Jesus came up out of the water, the heavens were opened and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and settling on him. 17 And a voice from heaven said, “This is my dearly loved Son, who brings me great joy.”

We are so excited excited about the baptisms and I am going to gonna talk a little about that today before we dunk them.

Can we pray?

Father come, although we know that you are already here. Your presence is with us. We open ourselves to you today – would you come and open understanding to us here today. Would you open the ability to see your purposes come to pass in our lives.

The stories we have just heard confront us with a God who lives and changes lives today.

So holy spirit continue to work in the room right now, continue to speak into people's lives.

We thank you for the hope that you offer us.

For the life that you speak.

In your name amen.

It is such an exciting day for us today today, we have the opportunity to baptise some incredibly brave and courageous people. (Not because we’ve ever lost any all down come back up )

brave and courageous people because they are stepping out today to say that their identity is in Jesus Christ. And it so exciting.

This is one of those those amazing moments where we get to hear people's stunning stories.

We get to declare something new over their lives.

We are going be looking at today, maybe a couple of other passages and I want to talk a little bit about baptism.

I know we may have people here from many different backgrounds, you may be from different church backgrounds, adult baptism might be a new thing to you are or a different thing to you.

Or maybe you are here for the first time ever in a church, and you’re wondering what is this thing? I've heard about it but I don't know what is?

Baptised at 11 years old in Brook Chapel in Runcorn, it was winter and they had found the water heater was not working.

There were a few reasons I wanted to be baptised.

1) I thought it was another thing you have to do in the Christian journey. The next thing. If you had a tick box of things that you need to do; baptism was in there, prayed the prayer of commitment, read the Bible, pray regularly, go to church, ok baptism. I thought something had to tick off

2) I thought it was something to do because it says in the Bible you should. And that's a good thing, we seek to be people who follow what's in the Bible.

3) I though it's about showing people you're serious about God.

That this is really serious thing, people who are NOT baptised are not serious and all of a sudden if you get baptised you really are serious!

And there is some truth to all of the above, they are not wrong.

But what I've come to realise is that baptism is not an arrival point, it's not something you work up to, it's not something that - if you behave well enough, you get it's as a reward, this is not a good behaviour ceremony.

Its not an arrival point.

Baptism is a departure point. There is something about that moment we begin, its a springboard into all that Christ has for us.

Its not on arrival point, it's a departure point.

What I want to look at this morning is the identity that baptism reveals for us.

So whether or not you are being baptised today or not, if you're here today walking with Jesus, I believe those truths are true for you today.

. This is the first time in Matthew that we really meet Jesus as an adult. We heard stories of his birth and some stuff when he was younger.

But at the start of we meet this guy called John the Baptist.

John is out in the wilderness (as John tends to be) John is a strange guy, (strange clothes, eating locusts) and he has drawn a crowd, people begin to come from miles around to hear what John is saying.

He is preaching about the coming kingdom and then is baptising people.

So Jesus comes out to see John, to be baptised.

So Jesus is standing there - ready to go, and John is a little nervous.

I think it's probably fair enough, I'm guessing he's nervous.

Have you ever had a job to do and you thought you were doing ok, but then you have to do it in front of an expert. - Botty

Even though John was the forerunner, John had gone first - John was even called …. John the Baptist. He knew he was making easy for another.. Jesus.

I can imagine it was pretty nerve wrecking.

John doesn’t know what to do with it.

When we are in the water with people we will make a statement. “on confession of your faith in Jesus Christ…”

I’m thinking that John did not open with that statement. “On confession of your faith in yourself…”

John tries to deter Jesus, tries to stop him from getting baptised.

I wonder… if the question in John's mind is the same question in my mind as I read this.

Why did Jesus need to get baptised?

Why, in our understanding of baptism did he need to do?

The Bible makes it quite plain; he didn't need cleansed from sin, because he was without sin.

We know he wasn't doing it because he had been reading his daily devotional and came across a passage on baptism - because the Bible was being written.

We know that he wasn't trying to show us that he's serious about God.

He'd already shown that, it was already clear.

So there was another reason that he wanted to be baptised.

v15 Jesus says to John “this must be done to fulfil all righteousness ”. (fulfil all God requires)

I don’t know about you, if that had been me I would be thinking – that doesn’t explain anything. I still don’t understand??

But we now have history, and context, the gospels.

We can know what he was talking about at that point with his death and his resurrection, that was the moment of “all righteousness for us”. When Jesus died on the cross, he bought righteousness for us, so that we get to walk in this life without the fear of death hanging over us. We get to walk in a life that has eternity attached.

This was the moment of righteousness.

Jesus saying this: this is something I must do because he knew this is something that points to what he was going to do on the cross for us.

He is saying I have to do this to fulfil what is required, all righteousness.

He is showing us is that baptism is a symbol of that death and that resurrection.

So when we go in the water and we come out of the water it's a reminder of what Christ did for us.

Paul says it like this in in the Message

That’s what baptism into the life of Jesus means. When we are lowered into the water, it is like the burial of Jesus; when we are raised up out of the water, it is like the resurrection of Jesus. Each of us is raised into a light-filled world by our Father so that we can see where we’re going in our new grace-sovereign country.

So Jesus is saying, this must happen to remind you of my death and of my resurrection.

Except back then, they didn't know what was coming soon.

And we see in these baptisms today, its a reminder of what Jesus has done for us.

That on the cross, what Jesus gave us was was more than just freedom (even though that was enough)

He gave us a new identity.

We received a new identity on the cross.

Before the cross we were doomed to death, to sin, after the cross, that was removed for us.

We became sons and daughters. A new identity was given to us .

Galations 4: 4-7 says this:

4 But when the right time came, God sent his Son, born of a woman, subject to the law. 5 God sent him to buy freedom for us who were slaves to the law, so that he could adopt us as his very own children. 6 And because we are his children, God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, prompting us to call out, “Abba, Father.” 7 Now you are no longer a slave but God’s own child. And since you are his child, God has made you his heir.

read that again - let it sink in:

Now you are no longer a slave but God’s own child. And since you are his child, God has made you his heir.

So, we get this new identity at the cross.

And baptism symbolises the new identity that we walk into.

I don't know if you've been here before, maybe you’ve been coming a number of years.

If so, you will hear us talk about identity a bit around here.

I can’t get through a preaching series without touching on it.

Maybe it would be good if we could just pause here for a minute and explain to you a bit about what that means.

We all have an identity, how we see ourselves, maybe how we see others see us. And we operate out of that. It affects our actions, our behaviour.

When we become Christians, (literally Christ -ones) our identity should then be found not in us - but in Jesus. I believe this is the key to living a transformational life, for ourselves individually, but also for the people around us, for the towns around us, and the nations.

If we can understand the identity that we carry as believers, the identity shown to us in this book, it will change everything!

Understand - we are no longer slaves. There is not anything that we have to do.

God couldn't love you any more than he already does, he can't love you any less than he already does.

It doesn't matter what you were doing yesterday or this week, he still loves you with the fullness of God, because you are a son, a daughter.

If you're a parent here today you know what that means. Sometimes kids drive us crazy. I see a few parents looking back (just act natural, don’t let on…)

but it doesn't change our love for them,

and in this identity that we've been given; as sons and daughters we are loved fully and that identity means that things can happen:

My kids have done things that I wouldn’t let any of you do. They have sat and platted my hair, jumped on me, sat on my head (please don’t try)…

No-one else could have done that - but because they are my children…

I’d sit there even when it hurts… because they are my daughters.

And that's what God gives us.

We are no longer slaves, we are sons and daughters.

it's just so important that we grab the truth the bible gives us in this, because if we don't do this,

if we don't understand the full identity that God gives us today, we will begin to live under a false identity.

We will live under half identity.

We begin to either think less of ourselves than God thinks about us or we will try and think more of ourself than God thinks us.

When we consider everything we are to him, we walk under a full identity and all things are possible in our lives.

we come back to this account of Jesus baptism , in this moment in Jesus baptism his identity is revealed to everyone who is there.

and 17

16 After his baptism, as Jesus came up out of the water, the heavens were opened and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and settling on him. 17 And a voice from heaven said, “This is my dearly loved Son, who brings me great joy.”

In that moment Jesus's identity is announced.

up to that point, few people knew fully who he was, but in that moment his identity was revealed.

Baptism reveals identity.

The brave guys who are going to be baptised today; what they are doing is having their identity revealed to us, saying they are sons and daughters of God, of our heavenly father.

They’ve already been walking with him.

Already given their lives to him.

Already talking with him, reforming their life with him,

But today as they come up out of that water, that identity is revealed to all of us that they are sons and daughters of the King .

That’s what happens today, today is an outward expression of an inward transformation that has already been happening in their lives.

I don't know today if we are gonna see the holy spirit like a dove, and resting on them… not sure but I'm up for that.

I’m not sure whether we're going to hear an audible voice from heaven speaking over them but here's what I do know the father is watching, and the father is saying these are my kids - in them I am well pleased.

because they are identifying themselves with HIM.

Can we pray:

holy spirit: make us more aware of your presence in this place again, Holy Spirit begin to rest on us today, begin to reveal your identity.

It shows who we are and whose we are today.

Remind us again of what you did for us on the cross, remind us again of the identity that you bought for us on the cross: of all the righteousness that you release to us in that moment.

That we are no longer slaves, we children of God.

If you haven't made that decision to follow Jesus yet I can’t think of a better time, I can’t think of a better time to give your heart to him today.

To give that yes to him today, so while everyone else is still in their own prayer - if you do want to make a decision to give your yes to Jesus, will you put your hand up this long enough so I can see?

I won’t embarrass you, but we want to make sure we give you an opportunity for you to respond to Jesus call.

Father we thank you for that person, thank you for the courage and bravery today, would you begin to release and reveal your mindset in them today, begin to release and reveal your mindset today.

Father teach them how to think, how you think teaches us to look at impossibility and see possibility,

Father God teaches how to think creatively, Lord not the way that the world taught us how to think.