Acts 8:14-17
Now when the apostles at Jerusalem heard that Samaria had accepted the word of God, they sent Peter and John to them. The two went down and prayed for them that they might receive the Holy Spirit (for as yet the Spirit had not come upon any of them; they had only been baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus). Then Peter and John laid their hands on them, and they received the Holy Spirit.

Luke 3:21-22
Now when all the people were baptized and when Jesus also had been baptized and was praying, the heaven was opened, and the Holy Spirit descended upon him in bodily form like a dove. And a voice came from heaven, “You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased.”

In Wind and Water: Remembering our Baptism
Our readings this morning are on baptism: the baptism of Jesus in water, and the baptism of the Samaritans in the holy spirit. The invitation this morning is to remember our baptism, and to reflect on what this means for us. And, of course, the invitation also is for anyone who has not been baptized and who would like to be baptized to come and talk to me about that.
As we follow the story of Jesus according to Luke we find, in chapter 3, an important text on baptism. These two verses describing the baptism of Christ are formative both for the church, and for our individual walk as Christians. Baptism is one of our sacraments.
Two Sacraments
In Christian spirituality, there are two generally recognized sacraments. That is, in all of Christianity, across the board, these two sacraments are recognized and agreed upon. Given the divided condition of the church, this is actually an amazing fact. Most Christians can at least agree on this: we have these two sacraments–baptism and communion. Of course, some traditions recognize more than two sacraments. Some don’t recognize any. But the point is, Christians can, for the most part, agree on these two.
I’m saying this because it’s good to know. If you’re going to profess Christianity, if you want to be a Christian, then there are things to know and things to do in this religion. In general, it’s good to know what a sacrament is. And more specifically, it’s good for us, as Congregationalists, to know what we are, as Congregationalists, and to know what we think about the sacraments, and for what purpose they are used.
But in a general sense, the whole point of religion, in its purest sense, is spiritual growth. Religion formulizes the spiritual growth process. In other words, religion is the public expression of a personal and private spiritual growth process, a process that has been experienced and communicated by many individuals in the past.
Spiritual Growth
Spiritual growth is losing something. It’s not gaining something. It’s not getting more. It’s moving from a self-centered position to a position of service. So usually we’re asking, “What can I get? What can I get out of this. I want this. I want this.” But spiritual growth is the process of moving to an “other-centered” position. Focusing on others: on service to life, and service to God and asking the question, “What am I being asked of here?”
These people have written about their experiences, documenting them for us today. So religion is a kind of container for all of this wisdom. Ideally, that is. What actually happens is, unfortunately, sometimes something else.
The Paradox of Institutional Religion.
Religion, like any institution, can lose its original vitality and purpose, being corrupted by all the usual human failings. These human failings come from, as the writer Ruben Habito puts it, our “egoic sense of self, subject to greed, ill-will, delusion, and all forms of selfish preoccupation.” In other words, our selfishness gets in the way of our spiritual growth.
But the good news is that the good news is always the good news. In spite all human failings, the gospel remains the gospel. God’s grace and love are always here. God loves us and accepts us, just as we are, right now. God’s love and grace are like the sunlight, available for anyone to see.
And so you may ask, “Why do we even need institutional religion at all?” That’s a good question, and one that I often ask myself, too. On my more cynical days, my answer is, of course, we don’t. We don’t really need it. Institutional religion is a thing that human beings create. The steps to spiritual growth are already well understood. The information is out there, available for everyone. Institutionalized Christian religion is a thing that has grown up around these already outlined steps. And because of this, there are secondary needs and motivations that get baked into the pie, so to speak. And so, the whole thing can be very confusing. We don’t really need it.
And yet. And yet… this is my cynical and skeptical self speaking. When I really stop to reflect on what this world would be like without the church, I shudder. The church is from God. The original church developed directly from Christ’s ministry. And so, we cannot say that it is merely a human endeavor. There is something else going on, a mystery, something divine and unexplainable. The church is much larger than the flawed human creatures who attempt to embody the teachings. In my own experience I have found that the vast majority of clergy and congregants are noble and sincere people, genuinely aspiring to live out the mind of Christ.
So we are confronted with this paradox. Even though it does good, even though it serves others, people do sometimes get hurt by institutional religion because of selfishness, ego, and human failings. Anywhere human groups form, these failings are found. And yet, the sun is still shining. The truth of spiritual growth, and the truth of the Christian path are as valid and as transformational as ever.
So this is the challenge. To sort through all the stuff that doesn’t matter, and get to the stuff that does matter, the stuff that does make a difference, at the everyday level, in our spiritual realization, our character development, and our relationship with God.
What is baptism?
Baptism is the first formal entry into the church as an institution. It’s a way of publicly stating a profession of faith. And at the same time, baptism is a meaningful and personal expression of that faith. And, more than this, if you will allow me, baptism is an expression of something mystical and mysterious, something that cannot be described in words, and yet, something very real all the same. The act of baptism retraces Christs death, burial, and resurrection. We die to sin, we are buried, submerged in the water that cleanses our soul, and then we rise up to a new life in Christ, raised to walk in a new light with him. (My own Baptist roots are showing here, as you might recognize from this description, since I was baptized in full immersion.) In our church, we have this baptismal font, but the symbolism is the same: death, burial, cleansing and resurrection to new life.
In Luke 3 we read:
“Now when all the people were baptized and when Jesus also had been baptized and was praying, the heaven was opened, and the Holy Spirit descended upon him in bodily form like a dove. And a voice came from heaven, “You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased.””

Here, Luke describes a mystical experience, and, I have to say, descriptions of mystical experience can sound, to our modern ears, silly and fake. We are jaded. We are cynical. We are skeptical, because so often, these things have been abused. They have been used by con-artists to sell snake oil. And yet, here we read: “the heaven was opened, and the Holy Spirit descended upon him in bodily form like a dove.”
Let’s just take a pause here. Luke is talking about something holy. He is talking about a revelation, an epiphany, God breaking through. Something is revealed in the moment Jesus is baptized. God breaks through the everyday, ordinary, ho-hum, and we see and hear the divinity of Christ, expressed publicly. Perhaps, rather than “the heaven opened,” we might read, “the heart opens.” ““You are my beloved,” and then, the heart opens.””
So Jesus was baptized. And this set the example of baptism for the followers of Christ. The first baptisms were in homes. Early Christians met together to share the gospel in private homes. And if there were new aspirants to the faith, they would be baptized with water, right there in the home. The early Christians built special water pools, bathing fonts, right in the home, for just this thing. And this was before Christianity became an institution in the fourth century.
In this early time, Baptism was an organic, beautiful, home-grown expression of faith that these people developed among themselves, as a way to follow in Christ’s footsteps, to develop spiritually, because they recognized something there. They recognized that something good was happening. They recognized that there was spiritual growth, a real vitality of community, a real love in that group of people. It was real. It was genuine. And so, their baptism was real and genuine. It expressed a spiritual reality, an opening of the heart, to be purified and washed clean in the grace and forgiveness of the Christ, and to be made new in the knowledge that one is a beloved child of God.
Even today, baptism with water, as a sacrament, is something Christians only do once in a lifetime. Some of you may not remember your baptism because you were baptized as an infant. Even so, baptism by water at any age is recognized and acceptable in most forms of Christianity as an entry to the faith.
This morning, we take time to remember our baptism because we are following scripture and reading the story of Jesus baptism. And this morning, we have a second text on baptism from Acts on baptism in the spirit. This comes from Pentecost, which we will celebrate later this year. Baptism in the spirit is a “second baptism.” Even though we only have one baptism by water, there is this other level of baptism: baptism in the spirit.” We could think of baptism in the spirit as a kind of spiritual renewal or deepening of faith in which the person is reborn in the spirit.
Now, in Congregationalism, we don’t talk about this very much. There is an old joke in Congregational circles about our worship style. Whereas in Pentecostal churches, we see a more enthusiastic style of worship, more emotional and expressive, with hands raised upward expressing joy and spiritual ecstasy, Congregationalists tend to be more reserved in spiritual style. As the joke goes, we only raise our hands in worship to look at our watches.
So, baptism in the spirit is not a large part of our tradition. However, that does not mean it is not important, or valid, or beautiful. In fact, Pentecostal Christianity is the fastest growing branch of the faith. Many people find this kind of expression meaningful and beneficial. If you have never visited a Pentecostal service, I highly recommend it. And for us as Congregationalists, there is something to be said for the renewal of our faith, the kind of renewal that can happen when someone lets go of selfish concerns and “catches the spirit,” so to speak:

I have been crucified with Christ, and it is no longer I who live, but it is Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. (Galatians 2:19-20)

For those who have experienced it, this is a powerful and real experience which is completely life changing.
So we have these two texts on baptism. The invitation this morning is to remember our baptism, and to reflect on what this means. Perhaps spiritual renewal is part of God’s plan for your life this year. Perhaps this experience of a second baptism, a baptism in the spirit, will come to you this year. God’s love is always waiting there for you, like the sun is shining, like an epiphany, a surprise, a renewal of faith in love and grace, it’s waiting for you. May it roll in like a mighty wind and sweep us off our feet. Hallelujah. Amen? Amen.