“YOU ARE WHAT YOU DO”
Matthew 3:13-17
(01-13-08)

Some years ago my family and I were fortunate enough to be in Hawaii
for a brief period during the month of January.
At the time we were there the Mercedes Championships, a PGA Golf Tournament,
was being held at the Plantation Course in Kapalua.
My father, my brother and I were able to take in the final round of the tournament.
I remember vividly standing at the tee box on the 15th hole as the golfers came to tee off. Among those I watched were Vijay Singh, Mark O’Meara and Jim Furyk.
But the highlight of the experience was seeing Tiger Woods.
Now he was coming off the previous green and he looked none too pleased.
In fact we were told that he had just double bogeyed the previous hole.
As he came to the tee box on the 15th hole, he came up to me and said hello,
invited me to come up to the tee box,
explained that he was having trouble with his game,
in fact that he had just double bogeyed the previous hole,
and asked me to help him with his swing.
Tiger, I said, are you kidding!
Why would you ask me for help with your golf swing,
when I should be the one asking you for help, if I were ever that lucky?
But he said to me, don’t worry, you need to do this for me now,
that’s just the way it has to be.

Now if you believe that I gave swing lessons to Tiger Woods
on the 15th tee of the Plantation Course in Maui
during the Mercedes Championships 9 years ago,
you would have to be out of your mind.
By the way I was actually there and I did see Tiger tee off
and he was coming off a double bogey.
He hit a beautiful shot off the tee box but to no avail
since David Duval won that tournament by 9 strokes and beat Tiger by 11 strokes.
But there are certain things in life that just don’t happen.
A minister vacationing in Hawaii does not give golf lessons to Tiger Woods.
Even more unbelievable may be the account of Jesus’ baptism
which we read this morning from Matthew’s gospel.
Its not that the account of the event is inaccurate,
but there are obvious questions which arise from the fact that Jesus was baptized
and from the conversation between Jesus and John
which is recorded in Matthew’s gospel account.

The opening of the Gospel according to Matthew
has been dealing with the question of who Jesus is.
Over the past couple of weeks we have explored that question.
The genealogy that opens Matthew’s gospel, the account of the birth,
the visit of the wise men, the flight into Egypt and the return to Nazareth,
all these accounts are part of Matthew’s desire to establish the identity of Jesus.
He is the King, he is the Messiah, he is the Saviour,
not only for the people of Israel, but for the whole world.
Jesus fulfills the prophecies of the Old Testament.
Matthew establishes the links between Jesus and Moses and King David,
but his real intention is to make clear
that Jesus is not just another in the line of Moses and David,
but that he is far more than just a prophet or just a king,
he is the Messiah, he is Emmanuel, he is God with us, the Son of God.

So why does the Son of God, why does God himself with us,
have to be baptized by John in the Jordan?
One does not baptize the Son of God,
if anything, as John realizes, it should be the other way around.
Certain things in life just aren’t supposed to happen.
John had been baptizing in the Jordan for repentance
and the multitudes had been flocking to him, including on one day, Jesus.
John recognizes the absurdity of the situation,
realizing instantly that Jesus was the one he had been speaking of,
the one who would baptize with the Holy Spirit and with fire,
and he says to Jesus, I need to be baptized by you and you come to me?
He was right, who would have done anything otherwise?
John recognized that Jesus was the one who was to come,
whose sandals he was not worthy to carry.
Jesus was sinless, he had nothing to repent of.
So why would he come to be baptized?
In the words of one writer,
How do you make the head of the church,
a member of the church, that is yet to be born?
(Tom Mannebach, The Athenaeum of Ohio)

This is a question which has long been asked of Jesus’ baptism.
The answer Jesus has for John is that
it is proper for us in this way to fulfill all righteousness.
Its not the clearest answer that one could give, is it?
What does it mean to fulfill all righteousness?
Why is it that Jesus’ baptism by John somehow fulfills all righteousness?
The word righteousness comes from the Greek word diki-o-su-nae,
which means, the condition acceptable to God.
Earlier in Matthew’s gospel the word righteous is also used to describe Joseph.
When Joseph found out that Mary was pregnant,
being a righteous man,
Joseph planned to dismiss Mary quietly from their engagement
rather than shaming her publicly
and forcing her to face who knows what consequences.
Joseph is called righteous because he was going to do the right thing.
He was going to show compassion and mercy and grace
in a situation which did not necessarily warrant it according to Jewish custom.
To be righteous means to do what is acceptable to God.

Now it is an obvious fact that none of us are always righteous.
Some of us may be prepared to do what is acceptable to God some of the time,
but none of us do it all of the time.
Which makes what Jesus says to John at his baptism all the more important.
Jesus says that the act of his baptism fulfills all righteousness.
This story of Jesus’ baptism is the first glimpse we have of the adult Jesus in the gospel. Here at the beginning of his adult ministry
we have an image of Jesus which fulfills all righteousness.
Here, Jesus sets the tone for the entirety of his ministry to come.
What is acceptable to God, Jesus demonstrates at his baptism.
The condition acceptable to God is one of submission and service.

Don’t get hung up on that word, submission.
It doesn’t mean what we have come to think it means.
Its not about being a pushover or being dominated.
Submission, in the biblical sense,
means a voluntary attitude of giving in or carrying a burden.
Jesus submits to John,
encouraging a distraught John to baptize the one who needs no repentance.
Jesus demonstrates here at his baptism what the rest of his ministry will be about.
His ministry will be about lifting up others,
those who are weak, those who are lonely, those who are marginalized,
those who are in pain, those who need his grace,
his mercy, his forgiveness and his love.
How his ministry begins, is how it will also end.
The same submission and service that Jesus demonstrates at his baptism,
he will also embody in his death on the cross.
On the cross Jesus voluntarily carries our burdens and by this righteousness,
by his righteousness, which alone is all righteousness,
Jesus offers us, who cannot be always righteous, his hope and his salvation.
We are not righteous on our own, because of what we do.
We are righteous because Jesus came and fulfilled all righteousness
and invites us to know that righteousness in our lives through him.

To this point in the gospel account,
all the declarations about Jesus have been made on his behalf.
Matthew sets out the genealogy to establish both Jesus’ Jewish roots
but also the connections with those outside God’s chosen people.
The angel speaks to Joseph telling him of who Jesus is and what to name him,
that he will be God with us.
The wise men tell King Herod that they have come in search
of the one who has been born king of the Jews.
And John the Baptist has recognized Jesus as the one who was to come,
the one who would baptize with the Holy Spirit and with fire.
Jesus has been defined by the words of others.
But now, with his first act as an adult, Jesus will define himself.
And he will be defined, not by what others say, but by what he does,
by his submission to the will of God which fulfills all righteousness.
Ultimately Jesus is Jesus,
not because of what has been said about him by others,
but because of what he does.
Emmanuel may mean God with us,
but what would that mean if the God who is with us turns out to be a God
who doesn’t care for us, doesn’t want to know us, doesn’t desire to save us?
Jesus is the Christ, he is God with us,
not because of what people say about him,
but because he is faithfully obedient in his life,
he is Emmanuel because of what does.
Friends, there comes a time when we have to be defined,
not by what people say about us,
not by the expectation of others, or even ourselves, but by what we do.
You are what you do, we are what we do.
Those of us who have been baptized, we have been baptized into Christ,
and we have been baptized into his death
so that just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father,
so we too might walk in newness of life.
Newness of life is a life which is faithfully obedient to God,
a condition which is acceptable to God, a righteous life.
We need to live up to our baptisms, to our new identities as children of God.
As Jesus did at his baptism and throughout his ministry right to the cross,
we need to live with righteousness.
And if righteousness, a condition acceptable to God,
means that we are to submit and serve, as Jesus has done for us,
are we willing to follow?
In this beginning of the new year,
are there people who we would never be willing to serve?
Who are those whose burdens we would never carry?
Who are the ones we would never be willing to give in to?

Its not enough to say that we are righteous, or even good.
William Willimon writes,
Righteousness means to live life in congruence with the demands of a just God,
to see our lives, not as our own, to use as we please,
but rather as God’s gifts, to be used as God pleases.
When we do right, when we hold one another to account,
when we urge one another to be all that God intends for us to be,
and courageously allow others to demand the best of us,
we are fulfilling the righteousness made possible in Jesus Christ.
(William Willimon, “No Problem,” Duke Chapel)
You are what you do, we are what we do.
Its not about what we say, what others say about us,
what we think, what we dream about, or even what we aspire to,
its about what we are willing to do.
What are we willing to do?
Will what we do follow in the example of Christ,
lifting up others, those who are weak, lonely, marginalized and in pain?
Is this the year that we move from talking a good game
to doing what we know God is inviting us to do?
Is this the year that we begin voluntarily carrying the burdens
of someone who is finding it difficult to shoulder their burdens by themselves?
Is this the year when we finally extend that forgiveness we have been withholding
to someone who is desperately in need of it,
when we finally reorder our priorities
to make obedience to God’s will the first call on our lives?
Is this the year when we move beyond our well thought out excuses
and finally make more space for God in our busy lives,
when we finally admit if we keep putting God’s needs off
until we get comfortable with our own needs first,
that we will never get comfortable enough?
Is this the year when our investment in God and the plans of God’s kingdom
take precedence over our investment in the temporary riches of this world?
You are what you do, we are what we do.

We are in the season of Epiphany.
The word epiphany means disclosure.
The season of Epiphany is about the disclosure of God’s most precious gift,
the gift of his son Jesus our Lord, the gift of the Messiah, God with us.
As Jesus fulfills all righteousness, as he does what it acceptable to God,
as he begins his ministry with the same loving obedience with which he will finish it, there is a new disclosure.
The heavens opened and he saw the Spirit of God
descending like a dove and alighting on him and a voice from heaven said,
this is my Son, the Beloved, with whom I am well pleased.

In this season of disclosure,
might God be desiring to disclose something of his grace, of his mercy,
of his justice, of his love, of his righteousness through you, through us?
Some of us are so sure that we are all that we can be,
that we are incapable of change or growth.
We are too old, too set in our ways, we don’t have the gifts others have,
we don’t have the resources others have.
We seem to lack everything but excuses.
Friends, God is not finished with us yet, there is still room to grow,
there is still service to render, faith to live, love to share.
Will we be open to God and what God desires to disclose through us, even us?
We are defined by what we do, you are what you do.
So what will we do?

Prayer: God of new disclosure, we are so sure that we couldn’t do what others do, what Jesus did. But we pray that we might be open to your newness, the newness of life that our baptisms call us to embrace. Be with this church and with this people as we strive to live out our faithfulness in how we serve, how we carry one another’s burdens, how we love as you have loved us. Through Jesus our Lord we pray, Amen.