Genesis 9:8-17
I Peter 3:18-22
Mark 1:9-15

We have heard a lot this morning about remembering. We began with a story telling how God promised to remember a covenant made with Noah. It seems strange for God to promise to remember something, since God knows everything. It is precisely because God knows everything that he promises to remember, because one of the things God knows is the fact that we need reassurances of God’s love for us. The promise to Noah was that God would never again destroy the world with water. Actually, the story makes it clear that it is not only to Noah, but to every creature that came out of the ark that the promise was made.

In our second reading this morning, Peter mentions Noah, but does not mention the promise to Noah. Instead, he mentions another promise God makes to us involving water. God promises to bring us to himself through Christ, and the reminder of that promise is the water of baptism. Our translation calls it “an appeal to God”, but many translations call baptism “a pledge from God.”

Our gospel story this morning from Mark also talks about baptism – the baptism of Jesus. We might wonder why Jesus was baptized, but we might never know the reason. The important thing is that we can be grateful for what it shows us. Like Noah, Jesus came safely through the water. Like Noah, Jesus had a dove bring him good news. Like Noah, Jesus went through a difficult forty day period. Like Noah, Jesus was given a pledge from God that has been passed down to all who come after him: “You are my son, the beloved. With you I am well pleased.” After Jesus heard this good news, he went out into the wilderness, where the scripture says he was tempted by Satan. We sometimes think of Satan as an evil prince dressed in black, plotting against God and causing us to sin. That image may or may not be correct some or all of the time. Actually, the word “satan” is a legal term meaning “accuser” or “one who gives false information.”  Maybe the main way that Satan was tempting Jesus those forty days after his baptism was by trying to get him to doubt what he heard at his baptism: “You are my beloved son; with you I am well pleased.”

We don’t put a lot of emphasis on Satan as a dark prince, and that is probably good, because that was over-emphasized in the past and used too often as an excuse to take the blame of our wrongdoings off of our own shoulders. The fact is, we are usually our own worst satans, casting doubts on our relationship with God – either by telling ourselves we don’t need God, or by telling ourselves that God would not want us. Sometimes it seems we are like Jesus in the wilderness for a long time facing these temptations, hoping and praying that God will give us a sign of his love for us. Yet the whole time, God does give us a sign, or as Peter says, a pledge. Like Jesus, we need only to look back at our baptism to know that God has called us to be his children in whom he is well pleased. As one of the psalms we recite every day at Lauds says: “the Lord takes pleasure in his people.”

God takes pleasure in us as his children, and also as his bride, his friend, and his own body here on earth. God takes so much pleasure in us that God freely chose to become one of us. Whenever we feel lost in the wilderness, falsely accused of uselessness and abandonment by God, we can always remember our baptism and Jesus’s baptism and say: “Yes, I am a child of God. God is please with me. I know it because I was told so at the water.” But we can’t stop there, because baptism also involves promises that we make to God. Sometimes, they are made out loud, sometimes they are implied, sometimes they are made on our behalf, depending on the tradition of the denomination. The promises usually involve forsaking Satan and choosing to follow Jesus as our only Lord, recognizing and working for the dignity of all whom we encounter, and continuing to grow in faith and knowledge by meeting with other baptized people to pray and break bread together. We have the choice of keeping them or breaking them. We also have the choice of merely paying them lipservice, which is the most dangerous choice of all, and is the one we do most often.

However, God is still there, keeping his promise. It may seem that we are the ones asking God to remember his faithfulness and love, but more often it is God pointing to the water saying: “Remember my covenant. You are my child. I take pleasure in you.” God remembers. We forget. We might wander in the wilderness, falsely accusing ourselves and the people around us, but God remembers. God remembers what it was like to be tempted by false accusations, and God remembers his love for us. We are God’s – always accepted and beloved, and pleasurable.   AMEN