desert and there went out to him all the country of Judea and all the people of Jerusalem, and they were

baptized by him in the river Jordan confessing their sins. Now, John was clothed with camel's hair and had

a leather girdle around his waste and ate locusts and wild honey, and he preached saying after me comes he

who is mightier than I, the thong of whose sandals I'm not worthy to stoop down and untie. I have baptized

you with water but He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit. In those days Jesus came from Nazareth in

Galilee and was baptized by John in the Jordan, and when he came up out of the water, immediately saw the

heavens opened and the Spirit descending upon him like a dove and a voice came from heaven, thou art my

beloved son with thee and I am well pleased." Won't be long now when all of our airways

will be attuned to the inauguration of president elect Obama. So, in recognition of all of that, I share

with you this morning a story. This happens to be a story about president

Bush, senior, president George H.W. Bush. Seems that president Bush was visiting at a nursing home and he

was going down the hall there with his entourage and aids and reporters.

He would come up upon a resident in that home who was moving very slowly in the other

direction and, as he was walking by, president Bush reached out his hand and put his arm on his shoulder

and shook his hand, and then he whispered to him, he said, "sir, do you know who I am? And with that, the

man's face went blank. He turned and he looked at the president, straining to focus his eyes, and then he

shook his head and he said, "no, sir, I don't. But if you ask the nurses, I'm sure they can tell you."

Do you know who you are today? Do you know who you are?

Another story comes out of the midwest, a small midwestern town. A young man is driving rather

fast down the center street of town, down Main Street, and, so, the one Police Officer pulls him over and

asks him where he's going in such a hurry? And before the young man could answer, he says, "son, I think I'm

going to have to put you in jail for a couple hours so you can cool your jets. The young man says, "but,

officer, I can explain." And before he could say another word, the Police Officer again says, "son, I

said, you need to be quiet. You're going to jail and that's all there is to it. And he takes him out of

his car, handcuffs him, and takes him to the jailhouse. He's in there about an hour and the Police

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Officer goes in the back to see how his prisoner is doing. And he says with a smile, "so, son, how are

you doing back here? You know, you're real lucky that the chief is away right now at his daughter's wedding.

It won't be long and he'll be back here but he will at least be in a good mood. And the young man said, "I

wouldn't count on that. I'm the groom." You know who it is who is next to you or in

front of you or behind you? Before my wife and I moved to Maryland, we

lived in a small town called Pleasant Plains. It was 8 hundred people in the whole town. We had two major

businesses. One was a Casey's which, if you're not familiar with Casey's, it's 7-11 with gas pumps, okay?

The other major business was a tavern, a gin mill, that served sandwiches. And so, if you wanted

something to eat, you either went to Casey's and bought something in that little carousel that spends

around, or you would go to the gin mill and get a sandwich.

It was a Saturday afternoon and my friend John and I went down there to get a sandwich. We had

ordered and were waiting for our food, when a friend of his came in, walked right over to the table, and

before either of us could say anything, he began to
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enter into a conversation in which he was sharing the escapades of the night before. John interrupted him

shortly after he started and said, "Tom, I want you the meet my friend here, Jay." And we shook hands.

And John said and, "by the way, Jay is my pastor. And Tom laughed and said, "oh, yes, right." And then he

continued on with his story. It wasn't long before he realized that John was laughing hilariously at things

that weren't even funny. And he stopped in the middle of his sentence and he turned and looked directly at

me and said, "you really are the pastor, aren't you?" And I said, "yes, I am."

Do you know who this is, is the question? Certainly that's what John the Baptist was saying to

the people that day when Jesus came and joined their group. There were people coming all day long to be

baptized, and when Jesus came and walked forward, John said, "do you know who this is?" And certainly their

answer came after he was baptized. People found out. John found out. Jesus heard the reaffirmation of who

he was. And the people knew not only who Jesus was, but who they were. They realized they were no longer

the discarded, the forgotten, the abandoned. They were now in the midst of the Son of God. That Jesus

was there to walk among them, to share their lives, to

love them. And things would never be the same. One of the phrases that we say over and over

again, because it is so vital to our faith, is remember your baptism and be thankful. We say that in

almost every ritual we perform because baptism tells us, identifies who we are. In our baptism, God claims

us. The same words he said to Jesus he says to each one of us, you are my beloved. In baptism, we claim

God. We come to be a recipient of grace and forgiveness and a new start. But too many times I

think we forget how vital all that is. If I were to say to you and you didn't know me, if I were to come

and say to you I was married, what are your first thoughts when I say I was married? Most of us presume

what? To whom. I was going to say more times, if you say I was married, many of us think, well, you're

either divorced or widowed, right? Meaning that at one time I was connected to a person, but now I am

not. If I say I am married, then you would say to whom? To whom are you connected with? To whom are

you identified with? To whom is part your being? Why is it, then, that we always ask, were

you baptized? Or you respond, I was baptized. Instead of I am baptized. We need to claim who we

are. I am baptized. I am the beloved of God. I am
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God's son. I am your brother. I am of great worth. When I was investigating my call, part of

that process was to spend six months with a mentor. They assigned me a pastor of a church that I had no

connection with. It was Reverend Keith Ferguson, a wonderful man that I grew to love in that time

together. Keith was going to go home to his family in Nebraska from Illinois and needed someone to fill the

pulpit during his 10-day visit. He asked me if I would do that. I couldn't say no, so I very nervously

said yes. You see, I hadn't preached much before that. And the only time I did preach was in front of

my home church with people that I knew. Now I was going to be in front of a larger church with all these

strangers looking at me. The day came when I was to fill in at that

service. I drug Chris there to the church an hour before service. She kept asking, "do we really need

to be here this early?" You see, I wanted to make sure everything was right. I walked up in the pulpit

area, I walked down the aisle. I walked the halls of the church. I wanted to make sure that everything

went well. The service started and the lay people led the service. Not unlike ours, they opened with a call

to worship and sang hymns and did the prayers, and
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shared their joys and concerns. The offering was taken up. Finally it came time when I was introduced

and I stood up there. It was a pulpit raised much higher than this one. I stood up and I looked at all

of those eyes looking back at me, and I saw the most unexpected thing, I saw all of these warm smiles

shining towards me. And I started with a story about my father and me when I was a little guy. It was

Father's Day, Sunday, when I was preaching. I shared that story and the smiles just kept growing and I

continued the message and when I finished, the smiles were still there. No one had looked away. I didn't

see any one making out the grocery list. If they were, they were hiding it from me. And I thought,

wow, I didn't realize I was this good. And the service was over and I stood in the back, began to

greet the people as they came through. When the third woman approached me, she shook my hand, she thanked me

for being there and then she said, "it is so wonderful to finally meet you." She said, "you're Jim's boy,

aren't you?" Jim is my father. And I said, "yes, I am." And she said, you know, I grew up with him in

school in the town of Horster. In fact, most of us here are Herster transplants. We all knew your dad."

As it turned out, they had all claimed me before I
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even knew who they were because they knew my father. They claimed me. I was their beloved. They welcomed

me. They showered their love upon me through their smiles and their attention. I will always remember

them and be thankful. To me, that's the heart of baptism, remembering who we are, whose we are, and

remembering because of the Father, we are connected in a way that is very special and we must claim that for

our own. Do you know who you are? Can you say, "I am

baptized instead of I was?" Can you hear God saying, "you are my beloved?" Do you hear Jesus saying, woman

come, walk with me. Brother, come share with me. Sister, come live with me. We need to start waking up

and claiming who we are. Otherwise, we're only cheating ourselves.

It was scary for me to show up at that church and risk seeing those people and meeting them,

but look what happened? I discovered God in an all new way. Sometimes God can be scarry, but this season

I want to invite you to come, come and hear the voice saying, "this is my child, come and be healed in the

love that God offers, come feel that water that is Spirit flowing over us. Come and be washed clean.

Come and be made new. Come and see what God can do for you.