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"JUST KEEP SWIMMING" We've talked a lot about baptism over these last few months, haven't we? We've talked about how baptism marks us as God's own, just like Andy marked Woody as his own in the movie "Toy Story." We've talked about how baptism is the one thing we can rely on that will never change, amid all the changes and transitions that make up our everyday lives. Today, I want for us to talk about how it is that we can live and move as God's baptized people. Seeing that it has to do with baptism, water is going to be involved. And where there's water, there are usually fish! When we meet up with Jesus today in John's gospel, John the Baptist is singling him out to us as the one for whom we've all waited. Then Jesus meets up with a couple of fishermen and invites them to come and see what he is up to. They weren't exactly two guys that you might put on the first string of anything. Andrew and Simon Peter were brothers, and fairly nondescript ones at that. They were fishers and were sons of fishers. They didn't do anything extraordinary for a living. They came from a community where fishing was a mainstay of the economy - which means that it was something a lot of people did. Simon Peter was married. Maybe he was a father, even probably so, but we don't know that. Andrew was single and lived with his brother and sister-in-law. Elsewhere in scripture we learn that Peter's mother-in-law also lived with them. We can only hope they had more than one bathroom. They weren't terribly well-educated. They practiced the trade they'd learned from their father. And they came home from work every night, wet and tired and probably smelling like Chicken of the Sea. These were the first two guys Jesus called to ministry. They weren't wise by human standards, not influential, not of noble birth. Jesus invited two average Joes to be the first ones to come and see what life in him was all about. Then later, when Peter turned out to be pretty impetuous and hot-headed enough for Jesus to call him "Satan" sometime down the road, Peter remained the one whom Jesus named as the Rock upon which the church would be built. God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise. Then take the apostle Paul, who also went through a name change. The one who wrote this letter to the Corinthians was one who at one time was a persecutor of people like Andrew and Peter. Perhaps he took part in their very persecution! Saul was very bright. He knew the rules of his faith right down to the last dotted i and crossed t. Saul was NOT among the first that Jesus called to follow him. In fact, he was probably about the last person Jesus would think to invite! It was after the resurrection, and after Paul had already actively persecuted Christians, when Jesus met up with him on the road to Damascus. And from that day, Saul who became Paul has become known as being second only to Jesus as the most influential person in Christianity. Perhaps he was smart, but he was certainly not wise by human standards; not as influential as he would have liked to be, not too much noble about his birth. Yet God chose this "foolish" one to teach the world about grace, and mercy, and righteousness and love. Let's switch gears for a minute. How many of you have seen the movie "Finding Nemo?" We have seen it at least a hundred times at our house, for two very obvious reasons! But I think that Paul and I enjoy it more than the kids do. "Finding Nemo" is more than just a delightful and clever animated movie. One of the best things about it is the way that all the characters are all portrayed. To a fish, they're all flawed. Take Nemo's dad, for example. He's a widower, a semi-neurotic single parent with one son to raise. Nemo, his only child, is a cute kid who rebels with some frequency against his over-protective father. Cute as he is, Nemo still looks a little goofy and swims a little goofy because has one fin that's bigger than the other one. Bruce the fearsome shark is in a twelve-step program. Dori, who helps Nemo's father look for him, can't even remember what she just had for breakfast. And even in a fish tank at the dentist's office, we find quite a band of renegades. Our friend John Williams is also a parent who has probably seen more than his share of Nemo. He and I got into a discussion recently about which of the characters in "Nemo" could be which characters in the Bible. John thought that Nemo and his father could double for the prodigal son and his father, who would do anything to find his son and bring him home. I thought that Bruce the Shark could be Peter - kind of brash and in your face, wanting to do the right thing but usually shooting himself in the fin. Then John said, "So who do you think God is in the movie?" He had me worried for a minute! I thought he was going to suggest that Dori was God! But no, John suggested that God was the water./ Think about it - God was wherever they went, surrounding them, holding them afloat, enabling their very life. Even when Nemo got lost, he was still in the water. Even when his father couldn't find him, he was still in the water. And when Nemo's father and Dori got lost, or surrounded by jellyfish or at one point even sick unto death, their mantra became this: "just keep swimming, just keep swimming, just keep swimming." To a fish they were imperfect. Each one of them had their flaws. But in all that they did and in all they encountered, they were held afloat in the water of God's love. So, friends, this is where you and I jump in. We've talked about fishermen and we've talked about fish. The thing that holds all of them, and all of us, together is this: all of us are flawed creatures. Some of us are forgetful, some of us have mismatched fins, some are in twelve-step groups, some are widows or widowers or single parents, and some are impetuous children who get lost when they try to do something on a dare. But the fact that we are not perfect is very good news - because it means that we make the cut! A very few of us are wise, a couple of us are influential, but I'm not sure we have anyone here of noble birth! But that gets us through the door. It's the folks who are flawed and less than remarkable that Jesus invites to "come and see." It's the fish with mismatched fins that get to swim around in life-giving waters. Now, the water that you and I get to swim around in looks a little different than the ocean. For most of us, it came out of a font like this. Or maybe it was a lake, or a baptistery or even a swimming pool. But for those of us who follow Jesus Christ, for those of us who answer the invitation to come and see, whether we experienced it seven days ago or eighty years ago, this is the water in which we live and move and have our being. The waters may feel calm at times, as they do in the still waters of the twenty-third psalm. They may get tempestuous when the God of Glory thunders in Psalm 29. But even in that tempest, the psalmist tells us that even there God sits enthroned over the flood. In chaos, in grief, in serenity, in pleasure, in every moment of our lives - our baptism means that we live within God's reign and under God's care. And when the going gets tough, we get to just keep swimming because we know it's not going to be our wits or our good looks or our genealogy that's going to help us. It's the watery surroundings of our baptism upon which, fortunately, we get to rely. I spent the better part of my weekend with some people you know. Our Session spent about twenty-four hours together to laugh, and pray, and to break bread, and to try and discern where it is that God is calling us as a church. We even saw a panther, but I'll let Katie tell you about that! We had to make some hard decisions, which we will be sharing with you at the meeting later today. Some tough choices were made, but they were faithful choices. I'll let them tell you about it at our meeting. But in short, our Session has decided that the best thing for us as a church to do is to "keep on swimming." Whether there are jellyfish out there or Presbyterian-eating sharks, or even if we have mismatched fins, your Session knows the environment in which they swim. They are clear that you, and I, and all of us, are held afloat by a loving, gracious, and providing God And it is that very same loving God that not only enables imperfect fishers to drop their nets and follow, but enables imperfect fish to stay afloat. Friends, I can't think of a better time for us to renew the vows that we took at our baptism. This would be a wonderful opportunity for us to remember the vows that we took or that were taken for us, to remember our baptisms with gratitude, and to remember the environment God has given us in which to fully live. So if you wish, at this time, please stand and join me for the renewal of your baptismal vows.
No part of the sermons should be reproduced without permission from Rev. Sallie Watson. Audio tapes of the sermons can be requested through the church office. For more information, contact First Presbyterian Church, 818 North Main, Bonham, TX 75418, 903-583-2014, email: pastor@fpc-bonham.org or visit our website at www.fpc-bonham.org. |
