Baptismal Solidarity

Baptismal Solidarity

Here’s a little Seminary inside lingo, 1st Isaiah and 2nd Isaiah. Before chapter 40, it’s clear that the original prophet Isaiah was writing about Jerusalem and the kingdom of Judah when it was still being ruled by the descendants of David. Starting at ch. 40, it’s equally clear that more than 100 years later, someone was inspired by God to update Isaiah for the Jewish people in their Babylonian exile.

While fearing the worst, 1st Isaiah still hoped that a good King would rule with personal righteousness and justice for all people, starting with the people of Judah. 2nd Isaiah understood that an exiled nation wouldn’t be able to act like a King. So in ch. 42, we read the first song about the “Suffering Servant,” whom Christians would interpret as a foreshadowing of Jesus. But before we jump to Jesus, we should be clear about who 2nd Isaiah identified as the Suffering Servant: not just one King but the Jewish people as a whole. And instead of a single King crushing “bruised reeds,” that is, their enemies, and snuffing out “dimly burning wicks,” that is, their lives, the entire Jewish people were to be “light to the nations, to open the eyes that are blind, to bring out the prisoners.”

Five centuries later, the Jewish people were effectively in exile under Roman occupation. And for many, the first step to ending that exile was to confess how they had failed to trust God’s promises for them and keep their covenant with God, by being baptized by John, neither of which Jesus needed to confess. But I don’t believe that Jesus was being baptized because he personally had to get right with God, but in a way to get right with us. Jesus’s baptism was an expression of his solidarity with us, even in our unrighteousness and injustice, our sin. And if Jesus is in solidarity with us even in our sin, then he is never out of solidarity with us, even unto death.

Today, though we have no baptisms, is an opportunity for us to renew our solidarity. First we renew our solidarity with each other who have received “one baptism for the forgiveness of sins,” as we say every Sunday in the Nicene Creed. But on this Sunday, we renew the more concrete commitments of our Baptism, our commitments to God, to each other, and to all of the bruised reeds and dimly burning wicks out there with whom we are called to be in solidarity. To be in solidarity with each other is to know that we need each other, that we cannot do any of this without each other. Of course, we need Jesus, we cannot do any of this without Jesus. But if Jesus is in solidarity with us, then Jesus needs us, will not do any of this without us.

Baptism is the Sacrament of our solidarity, our interdependence with God and each other, the recognition that we cannot live without each other. That is the commitment we renew with God this day, and that Jesus renews with us.

January 11th, 2026,

The 1st Sunday after Epiphany

The Baptism of Our Lord Jesus Christ

The Rev. David Kendrick