Eternal Attraction
Reflections on the Baptism of Christ
RCL Epiphany 1A
12 January 2020
Holy Trinity Anglican Cathedral
New Westminster BC
Isaiah 42.1-9; Psalm 29; Acts 10.34-43; Matthew 3.13-17
Many, if not all, of us will remember our childhood experiences with the mystery of magnetism. Perhaps we received a set of magnets as a gift or we had a container whose lid magically closed and remained closed with any visible latch or we had science experiments at school. I remember wrapping a large nail with copper wire and then hooking the ends of the wire to a battery to create an electromagnet in Grade 6.
Let me refresh your memory about magnetism and magnets. Magnets have a positive pole and a negative pole. If you have two magnets in close proximity, you’ll notice that opposite poles attract and same poles repel, something that has even influenced an English expression about friendship and romance, ‘Opposites attract.’ We even say that what we don’t like about another person is often something we don’t like about ourselves.
Another wonderful thing about magnets is that they can, if strong enough, transmit their magnetic energy through certain other objects which are not themselves magnets. I have one of those magnetic paper clip holders on my desk which sometimes insists on creating paper clip trains as I try to pull just one from the holder.
Without magnetism our whole planet doesn’t work. The magnetic poles influence our weather and help us find our ways in strange places through the use of a compass. Magnetism can be used in rail transportation in so-called ‘mag-lev’ trains which ‘float’ on a rail because the train and the rail are the same polarity. I could go on, but this is not a science lesson. It is, however, a reflection on the baptism of Christ and our own, a reflection in which magnetism is an apt metaphor.
Within every human being dwells the image of God, that is, the ability to love and create. For reasons that, from time to time, still confound me and can almost bring me to despair, God has also given us the freedom to choose. We’re all aware of the power of love to create, but we’re equally aware of the power of love misdirected to warp and wound as well as the power of love withheld to destroy. Despite the dark side of our ability to choose, I believe that the image of God that is planted in each and every one of the children of God is like a powerful magnet that seeks love rather than hate, light rather than darkness, life rather than death. It is a compass that is always pointing towards God if held steady and level.
When someone offers us an expression of genuine love, no matter what form that love takes, it is hard for us not feel its attraction. When we encounter something beautiful, no matter what form that beauty takes, we are drawn to it like a sunflower turns to follow the sun. When we hear the truth, no matter what form that truth takes, we cannot help ourselves from listening to it with the ears of our soul.
I believe that the Christian community is made up of people such as we who feel the pull of God’s love made known to us in Jesus of Nazareth and have allowed ourselves to be drawn closer to the heart of God. As we grow in faith, hope and love, we discover our true selves. These true selves see the world as a work in progress, being reoriented towards God’s future where the hurts of the past and the ills of the present no longer warp, wound or destroy the creatures of God.
This future of which I speak makes itself present when, like two magnets joining, two or more human beings find themselves connected and working together for something greater than the sum of their parts. This future of which I speak makes itself present when, like that chain of paper clips I spoke of earlier, people reach out to one another and share the magnetic power of God’s love, strengthening that love in some and awakening that love in others.
Recently a report was leaked to the media before it was shared with the Council of General Synod. This report has become front page news in some places and greeted with a yawn in others. According to this report, the Anglican Church of Canada has only twenty years left if current demographic trends continue. Now I know of three such reports that have been published in the almost forty years I’ve been a priest. While I do not dispute the reality of our declines, I do believe that the reports of our death are greatly exaggerated.
We do need to draw more people into the fellowship of Christ, not for the purpose of institutional survival but for the purpose of God’s mission of building a future. The magnetic power of God’s love is pulling on that image of God in each one of us. What we need to do is to reach out, figuratively and physically, with our whole bodies, minds, souls and strengths, to link our friends, families and neighbours with God’s love. Make no mistake. There are other magnets in our world that counterfeit God’s love. They are not more powerful than God, but they seem to be doing a better job lately.
So today as we remember Jesus’ baptism by John in the River Jordan, let us remember our baptisms. Let us feel the mystery of God’s magnetism working in us again, so that others might know it again or even for the first time.
Come. Live in the light!
Shine with the joy and the love of the Lord!
We are called to be light for the kingdom,
to live in the freedom of the city of God.
Come! Open your heart!
Show your mercy to all those who fear!
We are called to be hope for the hopeless
so hatred and blindness will be no more.
Come! Sing a new song!
Sing of that great day when all will be one!
God will reign, and we’ll walk with each other
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