Texts: Genesis 9:8-17; 1 Peter 3:18-22; Mark 1:9-15
In Noah’s time people all over the world had become so disobedient to God and immoral that God sent a flood to destroy everything except Noah’s family, and the animals he collected into the ark.
Noah had listened to God and he followed God’s instructions even though the people around him laughed at him and they thought he was crazy building an ark in a place where there was no water. But because Noah trusted God and he was obedient, he and his family survived and would begin to repopulate the earth. New life for humanity had emerged from the great flood.
In his first letter Peter recalls what happened with Noah and he compares the survival from the flood of Noah’s family to baptism into Christ. The righteous will be given new life through water.
Jesus was about 30 when he was baptized by John in the Jordan River. A dove descended on him and God identified Jesus as His Son. Immediately he was driven by the Holy Spirit into the wilderness where he would be tempted by Satan. Jesus didn’t have a new life, but the people around him now knew who he was.
All three lessons today recall something similar happening—new life or a new identity through water. With a new life comes a new way of living.
What is perhaps most pertinent to us as we enter these 40 days of Lent is what Peter says about Christian baptism. Christians are baptized into Christ who was the only perfectly righteous person who ever lived. He died for the unrighteous to bring them to God, to bring us to God. Human sin was so great that only God’s Son would redeem us.
Peter describes baptism “not as a removal of dirt from the body, but as an appeal to God for a good conscience”. What’s the point of having a new life, having another chance to get it right, if we continue to persist in the old way of life?
Contrary to popular opinion, we are not born with a conscience. It is developed within a context of family where we first learn right and wrong. A Christian conscience is further developed by learning the difference between good and evil. Christians and Jews have the Ten Commandments to guide us. Most cultures have some form of moral standards by which to live. Much of what we read in the Bible is about people disobeying the commandments of God the consequences of that. When we were children and we had done something we knew was wrong we called it ‘a dirty conscience’. People with a dirty conscience tend to be defensive even while denying they have done something wrong.
Here I’m reminded of the Bugs Bunny cartoon where two guardian angels, one good and one bad, are whispering into each ear. Some would say there’s an inner dialogue going on when we engage our conscience. Would it be right or wrong to do this?
But that’s not conscience in the way Peter means it. That’s more appropriately ‘discernment’ and it doesn’t necessarily pertain to moral choices.
Peter is referring to conscience as obedience to God that makes one righteous. Noah was righteous because he was obedient to God. Jesus was righteous because he was obedient to God. One has to learn what God wants for us and from us.
There are many stories of newly baptized Christians in the early church having to change their way of life because it was inconsistent with following Christ, for example, prostitutes, mercenaries, and actors. Christian converts received three years of instruction into the Christian way of life before they could be baptized. That gave them time to gradually develop a new way of life.
When we baptize an infant or young child, the parents and godparents take vows to bring up the child to know and love Christ. Growing up in the church and learning this way of life is how we develop our conscience.
The Christian conscience is not something we engage from time to time, it is deep within us, having to do with our relationship with God, so that our moral choices become automatic. We sense what is right and wrong to do, what is evil and what is good to pursue. We internalize this as we come to know God better. Certain moral choices are simply inconsistent with loving God.
Like most grandchildren, I simply adored my grandparents, my father’s parents. My grandfather worked the night shift for the railroad in Cape Charles, Virginia. So, I’d wake up early each morning to wait for him to come through the kitchen door. While I waited I’d draw pictures and paint paintings to give him. It just made me so happy to see him and I never wanted to disappoint him. To my little mind he was like God. I knew he loved me so much.
My grandfather died when I was ten years old, and I knew he was in heaven, looking over us. So, I resolved to never do anything that would disappoint him. That’s the way we should be with God, loving him so much that we don’t ever want to disappoint him.
Only God knows what you do when no one else is watching. You might think you can get away with telling a lie or stealing something, but God knows what you’ve done. And because you have been taught the difference between right and wrong, your conscience is tweaked. There is no justification for doing something we know is wrong.
So, here we are in the desert of Lent, with God in our prayerful devotions and practice. It is the time when all Christians are challenged to engage in self-examination, to see if there is anything within us that is in need of confession and amendment. In the process we draw closer to God and ask Him to show us ourselves, the things with which we are uncomfortable and unable to clearly see. And we can trust him because He loves us so much. Amen.
