What Are You Looking For?

John 1:29-42

January 18, 2026

 

            In seminary one of the big decisions you must make is what kind of internship experience you will have. If you wanted to graduate in three years, you would have to find an internship that was summer only, or that you could do part-time during the year while you still attended classes. But if you were willing to make seminary a four-year experience, you could do a full year internship after your second year of seminary and come back to finish school in your fourth year. That’s the option I wanted. I was still single. I could go where I wanted without worrying about how it would affect someone else, and it would provide me with the opportunity to experience a new place and church.

So, when it came time to look for a church internship, I was excited to get a call from a pastor who co-pastored a church with his wife in Alaska, wondering if I was interested in the internship their church offered. The church was not located in a city like Anchorage or Fairbanks. This couples’ church was in Barrow – now called Utquiagvik -- north of the Arctic Circle. I was excited to get the pastor’s call, and I began to think about it and pray about it, and I was seriously considering accepting. This would be the adventure of a lifetime. I thought that was what I was looking for: adventure. This would be the experience to end all experiences. I would be an arctic advocate for Jesus.

Because I was seriously considering this, I talked to my parents about it. They listened and told me to think hard about it before I made any decisions. I don’t know how long it was after this initial conversation that my mother called me. Her voice over the phone sounded serious and urgent, which she was. She wanted to converse seriously with me about the reality of spending a year in the Arctic Circle. “Amy, she said, You are an adult and you can do what you choose, but please think carefully about what this would mean. I think you could find a way to adapt to the cold – as an aside, I lived in Northeast Iowa 11 years, so I did learn to adapt to cold – but I don’t know how you could deal with the lack of light. You will have months of relative darkness, and I don’t think that would be good for you. I think it could really cause you harm. I fear you will end up terribly depressed and that makes me worry.”

I took her words to heart. She was right. I am not an arctic kind of person. I need light. I crave it. I doubt I would have made it the full year. I’ve been to Alaska in the years since, and it is beautiful. But I also went there in the summertime when there was nothing but light. How would I have coped with so much darkness?

You might be wondering where I’m heading with this story because light is not overtly mentioned in our passage from John’s gospel. In some ways this reading from John acts as a hinge passage between the story of Jesus’ baptism which we read last week and the calling of the first disciples, which we will read Matthew’s version next Sunday. In John’s gospel, which is distinctly different from the three others, we do not read a description of John baptizing Jesus. Instead we read John the Baptists’ testimony to Jesus and to his identity.

If we were to read this chapter in full, we’d see that it takes place over a few days. Our part of the passage starts on the second day. John sees Jesus coming toward him and declares,

“Here is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!”

The day before this John was questioned by religious leaders who wanted to know who he, John, was. They wanted to know the full scope of John’s identity. But John tells them about the identity of another one who will come. John tells them that he is not the Messiah, but there is one who is the Messiah. He is the one they’ve been waiting for. 

            Knowing more about what happens on the first day explains John’s remarks on this second day. John exclaims, “Here is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.”  Then he goes on to say that this Lamb of God is the one I was telling you about yesterday. He may be coming after me, but he ranks far ahead of me. I didn’t know him, but this is why I’ve been baptizing. And I witnessed the Spirit descend on him and remain there. The one who told me to baptize told me that this is how I would recognize the Messiah. This is the Son of God.

            We move to the third day. On this day John is standing with two of his disciples. Jesus walks by, and as he does, John proclaims, “Look, here is the Lamb of God!” When John’s two disciples hear this, they leave John to follow Jesus. 

Now we come to the crux, the heart of this passage. Jesus sees John’s disciples following him, and he asks them,

“What are you looking for?”

They call him “Rabbi” which the gospel writer translates for us readers as “teacher.”  But instead of answering his question, they ask him what seems like an unexpected question, at least for a moment and a meeting like this. These potential disciples ask, “Where are you staying?” Jesus responds not by giving them directions or details. He just says, “Come and see.”

Every question in John’s gospel means more than what it seems. When John’s disciples ask Jesus, “where are you staying?” they’re not just asking him about his place of residence. They’re not looking for a house tour or a place to hang for a few days. They want to know about his relationship with God. Their question implies something more, something deeper.

“Look our teacher, John, has proclaimed you to be the Lamb of God, so we want to know for ourselves. If you are indeed the Lamb of God, the rabbi, the teacher we’ve been looking for, then what is your relationship to God? Are you in intimate relationship with him?  Are you staying with God? Are you abiding in God’s presence? Are you the one we’ve been waiting for, hoping for, longing for? Are you the one we’ve been looking for?”

Maybe they were asking, “Are you the Light we’ve been looking for? The Light that will pierce this deep darkness the world is shrouded in?”

What are you looking for? What are we looking for? What is it we seek when we seek to follow Jesus? What are we looking for? Is it a fulfilment of religious concepts like hope, peace, joy? Do we want our own beliefs and values validated? Are we looking for a personal savior or friend? Are we looking for a reason to keep going or a reason to finally stop? Are we looking for justice for causes close to our hearts? Are we looking for righteousness? Are we seeking to be valued, to be cared for, to be loved? Are we looking for the one who will tell us that we are right and others are wrong?

Maybe it’s none of this or maybe it’s all the above and more? I think Jesus understood the great lostness of humanity. I think he understood that we all come seeking … something. I think Jesus realized that we all come seeking Light to lead us from the darkness.

I need to stop and say that I don’t think all darkness is bad. The darkness of the physical world, the night can be beautiful. It is in the darkness that we can see the stars. But there is another kind of darkness, and I think this is what John’s gospel tries to get at over and over again. I think John speaks to the darkness of fear and hopelessness and violence and destruction. God took on flesh to be the Light that broke through that kind of deep darkness. I think the people who followed Jesus were looking for that Light. I think we are looking for that Light. It is Epiphany after all, the season when we acknowledge the Light of God, the manifestation of God, the revelation of God. And the revelation of God is that the Light of the World has come.

What are we looking for? We are looking for the Light, the Light out of the darkness, the Light of the World, the Light that took on flesh and bone and walked with us.

What are we looking for?

The disciples following Jesus wanted to know if Jesus abided with God; they wanted to know about his relationship with God. They wanted to know if he was the Light that they had been seeking. And what’s interesting is that Jesus does not give them a definitive answer to this question. He just replies, “Come and see.”

Jesus doesn’t say, come and worship. Jesus doesn’t say, come and believe. Jesus says come and see. Come and experience. Come and find out for yourselves. Come and find what you have been looking for. Come and find the light you are seeking.

My mom was right all those years ago. The darkness of an arctic winter, while it is right for some, would not have been good for me. To be physically and emotionally and mentally okay, I need light. But looking back, I also realize that I wasn’t considering that internship because I felt called but because I wanted to do something different. I wasn’t called there, and I’m grateful for those who are. My call led me a different direction. I didn’t know what I was looking for. Maybe that is why Jesus’ question stays with me. I’m still not always sure what I am looking for. Yet, I think that I am looking for more than just a regular dose of daylight. I am looking for the Light with a capital L. I am seeking the Light that breaks through the darkness. I am looking for the Light that cannot be overcome by the world’s darkness. Maybe you are looking for that too.

But whatever you are looking for, whatever we are looking for, Jesus calls us to come and see. Jesus calls us to follow, to experience the Light even as we seek it. Jesus calls us to follow and to trust that the Light of God will guide our way, step by step. That is the answer to the question and that is the call and that is the way. Come and see. Thanks be to God.

Let all of God’s children say, “Alleluia!”

Amen.

Righteousness Fulfilled -- Baptism of the Lord

Matthew 3:13-17

January 11, 2026

 

            Muscle memory. This is a term I hear and use often, but when I gave this phrase some thought I wasn’t sure if I fully understood what muscle memory means. According to the Cleveland Clinic, it refers to “the process by which repeated physical actions become ingrained in our neural networks allowing us to perform them with less conscious thought over time. It is a form of procedural memory that involves consolidating specific motor tasks into memory through repetition enabling automatic movements without the need for conscious thought.”

            Muscle memory is essential for becoming proficient at an instrument or at a sport or an athletic endeavor. Muscle memory is what Brent builds when he sits down and plays the guitar at night while we’re watching television or just talking, or what Zach is building when he practices scales on the piano repeatedly. They are both building muscle memory.

            This makes me wonder if there is an emotional muscle memory as well. The last time my brother came down to see us from Minnesota, he brought some more things that belonged to my mom; things that I had asked to keep but wasn’t able to get home the last time I was in Minnesota. Some of the things he brought were some of mom’s aprons. She had one apron that when I saw it again, I told my brother,

            “Seeing that apron is like muscle memory. It is an ingrained part of mom and all my memories of her”

            My brother understood what I meant and agreed. This was my mom’s Christmas apron, and she donned it every Christmas when she was getting our big family meal on the table. Maybe she wore it at other times too, but to me it will always be Mom at Christmas. I don’t have memories of every moment, every Christmas that she wore that apron, but I don’t have to have them. Seeing her in that apron is so deeply ingrained in my mind, my memories, my emotions, that it is part of my emotional muscle memory – even if that isn’t a real thing. So, as I was getting our Christmas meal together this year, I put on my mom’s apron and added again to my emotional muscle memory.

            If there is physiological muscle memory and maybe an emotional muscle memory, then I also wonder if there is spiritual muscle memory. We are encouraged by scripture and by spiritual practitioners alike to make spiritual practices and devotions part of our daily lives. Daily practice makes for daily habits. But I also think that they become embedded in our psyches. They become grooves in spiritual muscle creating muscle memory. These muscle making practices include our sacraments of the Lord’s Supper and baptism.

            Baptism is the overarching theme of our worship today. In the church calendar, this is the traditional day we celebrate the Baptism of our Lord. And on this Sunday, we also remember our own baptisms by reaffirming them as a congregation.  

            Matthew’s account of Jesus being baptized in the river Jordan begins at verse 13. However, we need to go back a few verses to grasp the larger picture of this story. In verse 11, John was calling the people to repentance, to turn around and reorient themselves to God, to be washed clean of their sins and their transgressions. He promises them that one would come who will baptize them not with water but with the Holy Spirit. So they must repent.   

            Right after John said this, practically in the next breath, Jesus shows up. He wades into that water, asking for baptism along with everybody else. It is understandable why John hesitated to do this. It would be like a renowned musician asking a first time student to teach her how to play a scale.  

            John must have felt this way because he tells Jesus, “You need to baptize me, Jesus.  There’s no way I can baptize you!”

            But Jesus responds,

“Let it be so now; for it is proper for us in this way to fulfill all righteousness.” 

            “Let it be so now.” In other words, Jesus was saying, No, John. This must happen now. Jesus’s message to John was that his baptism was not something that could wait. The time is now. Righteousness in this context conveys a sense of discipleship, more than a moral judgment.  Jesus wants John to understand that the time for his baptism is now, this moment. It is critical for discipleship that he be baptized. So John does what he is asked to do. John is obedient to God’s will, just as Jesus is. He consents and baptizes Jesus there in the river. 

            When Jesus rises from the water, the heavens suddenly open. The Spirit of God is seen descending to Jesus like a dove, and it lights upon him. A voice is heard, and unlike the other gospels, we infer from Matthew’s text that everyone there could hear this voice. It is the voice of God saying, “This is my Son, the Beloved, with whom I am well pleased.”

            Matthew’s gospel calls to mind the Genesis story. The Spirit of God hovered over the waters, calling creation out of chaos. The Spirit of God descends upon Jesus as he stands there in the waters of his baptism. Jesus is not newly created in this act, but he is confirmed. His identity is clear. This is my Son. This is God’s Son. This is the kingdom of heaven drawn near and embodied in the identity of this man.

Jack Kingsbury, a preeminent Matthean scholar and one of the most frightening teachers I’ve ever experienced in seminary or otherwise, says that the whole first part of Matthew’s gospel is asking the question, “Who is Jesus?” In this story, we have our answer. Jesus is God’s Son, the Beloved. 

            One of my colleagues in our preaching group reminded us that John’s baptism was not a Christian baptism. John was performing a ritual baptism, a ritual cleansing, and those were practiced long before Jesus came to the Jordan that day. But John’s call for repentance gave a new twist to these ritual cleansings, and Jesus’ baptism signified a greater change in the understanding of baptism. Baptism now created a new path for new life. It wasn’t just the water alone. It was the water and the Word. This informs our Christian understanding of baptism. The waters of baptism, whether we are sprinkled or immersed, cleanse us. Spiritually speaking, they wash us clean. In theological terms, we see baptism as our way of symbolically dying and rising with Christ. We go into the water and into his death. We rise from the water and we rise into new life. Baptism is a sign of our adoption into Christ. Whenever I baptize someone, I am acutely aware that baptism joins this person with a larger family. Not only are we born into a family, mother, father, siblings, through our baptisms we become members of the family of God. Our baptisms are the sign and seal of God’s grace, love and adoption. 

            Jesus was baptized, as many commentators and scholars say, so that we could truly be baptized. It wasn’t just that he was modeling baptism as a good thing to do. Jesus, that real human being who was also God incarnate, waded into those waters, and through the power of the Holy Spirit changed them and us. 

            But one big question always rises from this story. Did Jesus himself need to be baptized?  We are baptized for all the reasons I mentioned above. But even as we claim Jesus to be truly human, a real flesh and blood person, we also believe that Jesus was without sin. There were no transgressions on his part. He had no need to repent. John wasn’t making his call for repentance, for turning back to God, to Jesus. He was leveling those words at the others who had gathered at the river that day. As I said before, I completely understand John’s hesitation to baptize Jesus. It should be Jesus baptizing John. But remember Jesus responds to John by saying the time is now.  Now is the time for this baptism. Now is the time that righteousness is fulfilled.

            For Jesus his baptism was the confirmation of his identity as God’s son. And as one commentator puts it, it was also his launching. His baptism was a key step in Jesus becoming ready to serve. In southern terms, we’d say that Jesus being baptized meant that he was fixin to go out into the world, to launch his public ministry, to do God’s will. Jesus waded into the waters of the River Jordan to be baptized because it was time. It was time to publicly serve God and live out God’s will.

            Don’t our baptisms do the same? In our baptisms our identity as children of God is formed. In our baptisms, we are called, even when we are baptized as infants, we are called. We are sent into the world, sent out on a path of discipleship that will be lifelong. In our baptisms, we experience the sign and seal of God’s grace. So, we remember our baptisms every time we worship with one another – even if we can’t physically remember them, they are part of our spiritual muscle memory. We remember our baptisms when we witness the baptism of another, when we covenant to pray for the newly baptized one, to love them, to guide them, to help and hold them just as others promised to do the same for us. And we remember our baptisms when we come forward and touch the water and take a stone. Each time we remember our baptism, we add to our spiritual muscle memory. We embed our identities more completely with Jesus. We remember again that we are called and that we are sent – out. We are sent out into the world to love and forgive and repent and witness and work. We are sent out into the world to be, as a billboard I read recently proclaimed, the reason someone believes God is good.

            We remember our baptisms so that we remember God’s promise, God’s call, God’s sending. We remember our baptisms because they are part and parcel of our spiritual muscle memory. We remember our baptisms because we remember the one who was baptized to make all things new, to fulfill all righteousness. We remember. Thanks be to God.

            Let all of God’s children say, “Alleluia.”

            Amen and amen.

           

 

           

           

An Eastern Star -- Epiphany

Matthew 2:1-12

January 4, 2026

 

            It was Christmastime and our daughter, Phoebe, was two. I had taken Phoebe to have her picture professionally taken and we were given a Rudolph the Reindeer statue as a gift from the photography company. This was not a fancy statue, but it was cute. Rudolph’s antlers were meant to hold Christmas cards. But it wasn’t very effective as a card holder simply because if you tried to put more than one or two cards into the antlers, it would fall over. But Phoebe loved it, so I used it in our Christmas decorations.

            Our Christmas decorations also included a nativity. Like the one we have here in church, it came with shepherds and sheep, a couple of barn animals, an angel, Joseph, Mary, Baby Jesus, and the wise men. I put it together carefully and set it on a little table near the Christmas tree.

            Not long after doing this, I happened to look at the nativity set and saw that a certain red-nosed reindeer had joined those gathered around the manger where Jesus lay. I realized Phoebe must have moved him there, and I smiled, and then I moved it back to where I’d originally placed him. I don’t think a day had passed when I looked at the nativity and Rudolph was there again. I returned him to his original spot once more. The next day, Rudoph was back at the manger, and I realized I was fighting a losing battle. Without ever saying a word, Phoebe made it clear to me that Rudolph belonged at the side of Baby Jesus along with all the other characters in the story. So, that became his rightful place on that Christmas and for several Christmases after.

            Looking back at it now, I think Phoebe had it right. She probably didn’t realize the theological statement she was making when she first toddled Rudolph over to the nativity. Technically, a reindeer with a red nose who could fly in a story that included Santa Claus didn’t belong in the nativity scene depicting the birth of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. But for that matter, considering the divine importance of that birth and the full nature of that child, he also should not have been lying a trough used for feeding animals, nor should he have been surrounded by those animals or shepherds either. And even though I admit it’s taken me many years to even consider questioning it, the wise men’s presence by Jesus’ side should be suspect as well.

Who were these wise men? Tradition may call them kings, but scripture does not. Matthew refers to them as wise men who came to pay homage to the new king. Paying homage meant that they willingly knelt before this young king, which is a big deal especially if they were actual kings. We also know them as magi, which is connected to the word magic. It has been speculated that rather than kings, they were Eastern astrologers, who studied the stars and planets.

            Whatever and whoever they were, they were not Jewish. They were not from Israel. They were outsiders. They were foreigners. They were strangers. They were not from those parts, and their people were not from around there. But these outsiders traveled for who knows how long to see this child, because the star they witnessed at its rising revealed to them that a king had been born. And they must have realized that this was an extraordinary king, because why else would they have followed the star to find him?

            There are many layers to this familiar story. But one question about it has plagued me for a long time. If these wise men were so wise, why, WHY, did they go to Herod’s court and ask about this new king? As one commentator I studied wrote, King Herod was well known in the ancient world for being both paranoid and brutal. He killed at least one of his wives and a few of his sons because he thought they were plotting against him. One story says that Caesar, the Roman emperor, said of Herod that it was safer to be his pig than his son. Considering Herod was Jewish and did not consume pork, any pig in his court would have been safe. But his sons were not.

            It’s no surprise then that when the news got out that a new king had been born, that Jerusalem was afraid right along with Herod. The people of Jerusalem may not have been afraid of this new king, but they were smart enough to know that if Herod was afraid, anything could happen. And if we were to continue reading this story after the wise men return home by another way, we would know that the people were right to be terrified. Herod would seek to stop this infant king in the most brutal way possible.

            And what about this star that the wise men saw? The nature of what it might have been has been under debate for a long, long time. It has been depicted as being much larger than any other star in the heavens. Some scholars conjecture that it was two planets that crossed paths at just the right moment, making them appear to be one extra large star. Or perhaps it was a star that was imploding, again giving the appearing of being much larger than it was. Maybe the wise men saw a comet blazing a trail across the night sky and they followed it.

            Yet whatever it was that the wise men witnessed, they recognized it as a sign. They recognized it as a revelation of something new happening in the world. They understood it as a sign that a new king had been born. So they followed this sign. They followed this star, and what I believe Matthew is trying to make clear is that the light of that star shone not just for the people of Israel, but for the whole world. It shone for all people. It was a sign for all people that God was Immanuel – God with us, God with them, God with all.

            Maybe this was another reason why the people were afraid. If you have been taught your whole life that God was only with you and your kind, your people, then seeing outsiders coming to worship a king that you believed would be born only for you and yours, would have been disconcerting to say the least. If you are a leader who wields power with seeming impunity, then the last thing you want is to find out that others, that strangers and outsiders, have seen and recognized a sign telling of a new king, a new leader. Not only are your power and leadership threatened, but that light that reveals this new king is also a light that will shine into every dark corner revealing every dark deed.

            It wasn’t only this baby king that was a threat to Herod. It was also the light that led the wise men to seek him. That star, that glowing light in the sky, revealed that the Light of the World had been born. The Light of God was now shining in their midst. And nothing can be hidden when the Light of God shines.

            Epiphany means revelation. So what is revealed in this story of wise men following an eastern star to the side of a baby? What is revealed? What is made manifest? Although we don’t normally associate fear with Epiphany, I think that fears are revealed. The fear of Herod is certainly revealed, but the fear of the people as well. They weren’t just afraid of Herod’s response, although they were right to be afraid of Herod’s response. They also were afraid of the unknown. Whatever the expectations of the Messiah were, I doubt anyone expected that he would come as a baby born in the humblest of circumstances, and that he would be recognized by the “others” even before he was recognized by his own.

            What does Epiphany reveal for us? What fears come to light? Are we equally afraid of the unknown, the other, the outsider, the stranger? It seems to me that our greatest fear comes from the unknown. I suspect that if we’re honest with ourselves, we are as afraid of these things as the people of the ancient world were. I know that I am eager to proclaim that God is Immanuel, God with us, but am I equally as happy that God might be with them as well? Do I want God to be Immanuel for those I dislike and disagree with, for those I consider to be not just other but enemy? Do I want God to be Immanuel with people who have hurt and dismissed me? If I’m honest, no, but that’s the thing about Epiphany. The Light shines for all, not just me, not just the people I love, but all. The Light shines for all. The Light of God is the Light of the World. And that is wonderful but it is also kind of scary.

            It seems to me that Epiphany is more than just a familiar story that we tell and celebrate around January 6 each year. Epiphany is meant to shake us up. Epiphany is Rudoph gathered at the side of the manger. Epiphany is strangers coming from a strange land because they recognize that a child has been born for us. Epiphany is light shining in the darkness. Epiphany is the revelation that the good news is not just good news for some, but for all. Epiphany is the light that reveals the ugly and the cruel and the evil as well as the good. Epiphany is meant to shake us up and to disorient us and to turn all that we think we know upside down. Epiphany reveals our deepest fears. But it also reveals our greatest hopes and desires. Epiphany reveals that God is still working, still calling, still seeking, still with us.

            So let this Light reveal our fears, because when we can see them we can also let them go. Let this Light reveal all that darkness conceals, because then we can work for what is good and right and just. Let the Light shine into every place where violence exists because then we can work to live in peace instead. We have been walking in darkness for so long, but the Light of the World is shining. May our lives be shaken up and turned around and changed forever more. Because that is what happens when God is with us. Thanks be to God.

            Let all of God’s children say, “Alleluia!”

            The Light has come.

            Amen and amen.