Baptism of Christ: The 1st Sunday after Epiphany

"They grow up so fast!"  With the festival day of Epiphany now behind us, this week we fast-forward to the very beginnings of Jesus' adult ministry.  All four of the gospels we find in the Bible begin their story of Jesus as an adult with some encounter with his forerunner, John the Baptist -- that "voice in the wilderness" that was calling people to change their hearts and lives because God's kingdom was near.  We'll hear from Matthew this week of Jesus' undergoing the ritual of baptism that John was carrying out, and of the divine affirmation in that moment of Jesus' as God's chosen and beloved, with whom God was well-pleased.

While the baptism of Christ was not exactly the same as our own Christian baptism into Christ, the remembering of Jesus' baptism at the initiation of his ministry gives us a great opportunity to reflect upon and give thanks for our own baptisms, our initiation into the body of Christ and to ministry in Christ's name.  In worship this week, we'll encounter all of this through an enacted retelling of the story, a rite of baptismal remembrance, and then have the opportunity to respond through interactive worship stations inviting our prayer, meditation, creative action, and more.