Standing in our Baptism

This last month, news companies stirred with excitement as scientists were able to take humankind’s first picture of a black hole. Through the use of the Event Horizon Telescope, which is actually a series of ten telescopes throughout the world, scientists made use of radio waves to capture that first fuzzy, but incredible image of a dark spot in our universe surrounded by a halo of light.

I’ve always had a bit of a fascination with black holes. For as much as we know about the universe, black holes continue to be a quagmire of confusion for us. They are unique places where photons of light, space, and even time itself are disrupted and dismembered into a spiraling sphere of intense gravity. These black holes are also perhaps a glimpse of what the eventual end of our universe will be.

Some scientists believe that the universe which possibly started with a big bang will end with the big crunch as they call it. It is the idea that the universe which has been continually expanding since that first moment of creation will eventually slow in its expansion, come to a place that seems nearly static, and then gravity will take its course in retracting the universe back into a singularity—into a black hole more intense than any we know.

Now, not to worry too much because the scientists that believe the Big Crunch is a possibility also predict that we are billions of years away from that eventuality—but still it is curious to think about creation as we know it coming to an end. It is the realization that we humans are not the only ones with a limited life span—but that even the stars and planets of the universe… every molecule of the universe has a time of life and a time of death. A time to vibrate with excitement, and a time to be joined in a cataclysmic cosmic conclusion.

Our text from Revelation sits in the midst of the cataclysmic conclusion of life as we know it as the Seven Seals of the Apocalypse are being broken. In the first six seals, peace is stripped from the land as countries fall into open warfare. Starvation sweeps over the people… disease and pestilence becomes overwhelming… as the Sixth Seal is broken, one can almost imagine creation falling into a black hole. John, the author of Revelation, writes of his vision:

12 I watched as he opened the sixth seal. There was a great earthquake. The sun turned black like sackcloth made of goat hair, the whole moon turned blood red, 13 and the stars in the sky fell to earth, as figs drop from a fig tree when shaken by a strong wind. 14 The heavens receded like a scroll being rolled up, and every mountain and island was removed from its place.

Revelation conjures up an incredibly terrifying image of what the end might look like. But I want to throw a word of caution out there.

I don’t believe that the author of Revelation was writing about the Big Crunch Theory that might happen in 22 billion years or so. Nor do I believe the author was writing about several other possible theories that we could potentially match-up with the language of Revelation. No. The author of Revelation was speaking to something much more personal… more real… more… imminent.

The early church in the 1st century after Christ’s death had been experiencing incredible growth as the Good News was spread by word of mouth. Jesus’ message of grace and forgiveness of sins had caught on like wildfire. And there were forces determined to extinguish those newly sparked flames of faith.

Christians were under persecution in a way that is thankfully difficult for us to comprehend in our society. Gestapo-like-individuals would seek out underground home churches and round the Christian converts up to be sent off the to lions of the arena or face some other heinous form of execution. To be Christian was to live with the constant stress and anxiety that death could come at any moment.

And it was to these early Christians and Christians in persecuted places afterward that these words were written.

Leading up to our text, the first six seals had been broken and it feels as though an unstoppable avalanche of death seems ready to roll out against the people. Chapter six leaves us with the foreboding question: regarding this oncoming onslaught: Who can stand against it?

Imagine, for a moment, all of your greatest anxieties rolled into one moment. All of them just a blink of an eye away from being unleashed as your worst fears become reality.

And then, a pause. The author does not leap directly into those fears becoming reality. He does not continue to write on about the seventh and final seal being broken and the floodgates of death spewing forth. Instead, we have today’s text.

In Verses 9 and 10 we see a great multitude of people from all tribes and nations and languages crying out in one voice. “Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne and to the Lamb!”

They cry out against the darkness. They cry out against fear. They cry out against evil itself as they call upon God for salvation.

And then a bit later we hear a little of John’s interpretation about who these people are. This multitude of people clothed in white robes are those who have gone through the great tribulation… through the greatest challenges of life that we encounter. They are those who have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the lamb… in other words, they are those who believe and have been baptized. And in these critical moments of Revelation as death seems ready to overwhelm and the question arises who can stand against such darkness… we hear these people doing what we do in worship: they are remembering their baptism. They are remembering who claims them and what that claim means.

Rachel Held Evans, author and theologian who died just this last weekend at the age of 37 had some poignant words on the subject of Baptism in her book Searching for Sunday:

“In the ritual of baptism,” she writes, “our ancestors acted out the bizarre truth of the Christian identity: We are people who stand totally exposed before evil and death and declare them powerless against love.”

Evil and death

She goes on to talk about a tradition in some Orthodox churches where adult converts to Christianity literally spit in the face of evil before going under the water. She adds, “It’s a brave, defiant thing to do. And Christians ought to do it more often, if not in our baptisms, then in our remembrance of them. Or maybe every time we take a shower.”

The people of the early church were inspired by the words of Revelation by remembering who it is that we place our trust in. Whether we face persecution and lions or disease and broken relationships, we hold to the same promise from God.

She goes on to talk about a tradition in some Orthodox churches where adult converts to Christianity literally spit in the face of evil before going under the water. She adds, “It’s a brave, defiant thing to do. And Christians ought to do it more often, if not in our baptisms, then in our remembrance of them. Or maybe every time we take a shower.”

You, just like our early church ancestors who faced enormous persecution, have been claimed as a beloved child of God. And with that claim on our lives by God we receive the promise of healing and restoration… of renewed life and life eternal.

The claim that God makes on our lives through Baptism and beyond tells us that in the midst of darkness, in the midst of fear, in the midst of evil itself… God is with you. And because God is with you, you are able to stand against all the frustrations and heartaches that the cosmos has to throw against you.

But this Revelation text also reminds us that the claim on salvation belongs to God… not to us. We don’t get to choose who is saved and who is not as much as we sometimes perhaps wish we could. And when the day comes that we stand in the Kingdom of God we will see people from a wide spectrum of human society.

We will see people who we perhaps had disdain for in this life.

We will see neighbors who drove us bonkers.

We will see family members whom we had an everlasting grudge against.

We will see people of other nations that built missiles against us and other people that we built walls against.

We will see people who we turned our backs on in their time of need… and we will see people who had turned their backs on us in our times of need.

And similar to the scientists who used telescopes from around the world to be able to see that first image of the black hole… so too do we see those voices from across the world united in recognizing the life that Christ brings to the world. And together we will cry out in one voice that Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne and to the Lamb. And the differences that we thought were so important to hold up in life and separate ourselves from others will wash away through the promises of Baptism fulfilled.

Remember that you are baptized. Remember your baptism when you wash your hands. Remember your baptism when you shower. Remember your baptism when you get caught in a rainstorm or, yes, even a thunderstorm. Remember always that through the waters of baptism you are a claimed child of God and what a difference that makes both for this life and the next as we begin to see things in a new way.

And remember also the other people that God claims… and wonder how that might influence how we live our lives today.

Revelation, in the end, is not a book to scare people away from sin—though that is how it is often used. The Book of Revelation is a book of hope for those stand in the face of great adversity. It is a message of hope for those who should be hopeless. It is a message reminding of God’s light even in the deepest of dark places.

Rachel Held Evans said, “We are people who stand totally exposed before evil and death and declare them powerless against love.”

Remember your baptism and stand in it—remember Christ’s love for you and for your neighbor—Remember that Christ stands with you and for you—and remember that because of Christ and that promise you received in baptism, -you- stand in the light of God.

Peace be with you.

Amen.