January 11, 2026

The Baptism of Our Lord

Matthew 3:13-17

Epiphany, Winnipeg

Over the next few minutes some images will scroll by; art work from all over. There’s a painting from the early years of this century by Lorenzo Scott, an African American artist from the southern U.S. That’s up on the screen right now: you’ll see all the regular things, there’s God the Father right at the top, and a dove coming down, and Jesus and John in the water. There are also angels in the sky and on the ground, a few other perhaps unidentified people in the water with Jesus and John. Angels and saints are there. There’s something from an artist in Cameroon, and everyone in the painting looks like they come from Cameroon. There’s a window from the San Gerardo Maria Mayela church and monastery in Mexico, and an old painting by Joachim Patinir, painted in the late fifteenth century in Italy.

If you do a Google image search for the Baptism of Jesus, at least half of the images you find will feature three characters: Jesus, John, and a dove. Sometimes there’s a fourth character, as through an opening up in the sky God the Father is peering down on what’s happening below. Just three or four actors in the scene.

But these pictures today tell a different story. Look closely and you’ll see Jesus and John and angels, as though it’s not just the two of them, but they’re there with the whole host of heaven. Look again and you’ll see crowds there too; there are people in the water with Jesus and John, there are all kinds watching from the shore. There are moms holding babies, toddlers holding an adult’s hand, people holding on to their crutches, people watching the events like they’re the most important thing there is and they just know that something big is happening. You’ll see people sitting off by themselves paying attention to something else, maybe something more interesting…or they’re listening to someone else... And there’s one picture where Jesus is staring straight at you, and you’re part of the crowd standing on the shore.

Four different artists covering four different centuries…from the U.S., and from Mexico and Italy and Cameroon, from these different corners of the earth…. According to these artists, Jesus and John and the Holy Spirit are there in the company of all the saints, the whole host of heaven and all the peoples of the earth. There’s always this crowd of people on the scene.

In that reading from Matthew that we heard a few minutes ago, we missed an important detail. We started the story today at verse 13, but way back in verse 5 the story goes on like this: "The people of Jerusalem and all Judea were going out to John, and all the region along the Jordan, and they were baptized by John in the river Jordan, confessing their sins.” They were a crowd, from all over that place, standing tall to try to see what’s going on, or nudging through the crowd to get up close. Probably not all lined up and orderly, like us polite people lining up for the theatre or the bus or communion. Just a moving and crowded crowd.

If it’s a crowd like Matthew says, try to picture who Jesus is with there by the river with Jesus, just waiting to see what John’s going to do next. There are rich people and poor people. There are men and women and some who you can’t quite pin down as one or the other. There are enemies and friends, there are Roman soldiers and the people they control. Religious leaders are there, who at least act like they are sure of themselves, and there are probably people who think that religion is nothing but trouble. There are tax collectors and the people they over-tax. Some of the crowd are paying close attention to what John says and does, some are distracted; some kids are there because mom and dad made them come, and there are parents there because the kids kept asking and asking: “Please, could we go and see that weird guy by the river?” There are the most respected members of the community, and there are those people who everyone wishes, well, weren’t there.

If it’s a crowd like Matthew says, then there might just be every kind of person you could imagine there in the crowd. And somewhere along the way one of the crowd steps into the water to be baptized, and John says to that one, “I need to be baptized by you, but you’re coming to be baptized by me?” John says to Jesus, “You’re not like all of them; you should be baptizing me.” But Jesus insists on being there with those people, taking his turn in the river, going under water like they’ve all gone underwater, doing the same thing that they all came there to do. He’s not going to stand out from the crowd. He doesn’t want any special status. He’s just going to be there with the crowd. He’s going to be Immanuel, which means “God is with us.” God with the crowd.

Jesus is never far from a crowd, really, even if he sometimes wants to be. You know some of the stories. He preaches to a crowd, he shares a meal with a really big crowd. Even if he wants to get away from the crowd – and who doesn’t want that sometimes, right? - the crowd just won’t let him get away. He’s there with really small crowds too – “wherever two or three are gathered,” he says – and he travels around with the mixed little crowd of people called disciples. A crowd welcomes him to Jerusalem and says “Hosanna to the Son of David!!” It’s a crowd that calls out later that week, “Crucify him.” And a small crowd, just a few women and some friends, is still close by when he gives up his life so that life will be won.

For better or for worse, Jesus always seems to be there with the crowd.

Maybe the crowd is the most overlooked character in all the stories of Jesus, but the crowd is the most important character. Because a crowd is a mixed and messy and complicated thing, filled with mixed and messy and complicated people, all of them loved by God. And that’s where Jesus lives. In mixed and messy and complicated and loved.

Then there’s that one last picture. It’s one of those old paintings of a scene from the life of Jesus where everyone looks suspiciously European. John is standing right there, pouring a handful of water over Jesus, who’s up to his knees in the river. Way off in the background you can see signs of the city, where anybody who’s not down by the river is doing whatever that day’s hustle and bustle demands. A few steps away there’s a small crowd who seem to be paying attention to something else, although some look over to see what’s happening by the river. Way up at the top of the picture there’s a hole opened up in the sky, where we can see God (who appears to be an elderly bearded European gentleman), who has just released a dove to fly down to where Jesus is, and that dove is coming close now.

Then, right in the centre of the picture, Jesus stands with his hands in a prayerful kind of pose, and he’s staring straight at you. The same picture is on my screen up here, and Jesus is looking me straight in the eye too. We can’t see much of the crowd around because we’re part of the crowd, right up in the front row. Behind us and all around us is the crowd, standing by the river as Jesus is baptized.

Consider who is in the crowd with us. Look around here, see who’s in the crowd, see who’s also getting that same look from Jesus. If you’re at home, who’s there with you? Who’s on the other side of the door in the neighbourhood, or the next apartment? We’re a mixed and messy and complicated crowd.

Look around and see who’s in the crowds all over, crowds gathered on the streets of Minneapolis and countless other cities in the U.S. Crowds coming to Winnipeg and Thompson from Pimichikimak, because there’s safe water and heat here. Crowds at Jets games, crowds at a concert, the crowd on the bus. All these crowds, filled with mixed and messy and beautiful and blessed and struggling and celebrating people.

That’s where Jesus shows up. Taking his place in the crowd. The Eternal wisdom, the Word become flesh, this very child of God, joins us by stepping into a little river for the same baptism, the same water, the same life, of all the crowd. He doesn’t control the crowd with force or with threats, and he doesn’t turn away from the crowd to find something more peaceful and pure. He just joins the crowd, living and dying and living again so that the crowd and the creation will live again.

I’ve tried really hard to avoid long lists of everything gone wrong this week. You know what all that is. I’d really rather avoid it. But I’m going to try something new this week, and maybe we all could. It might require an artist’s imagination, but sometimes imagination is what helps us to see for the first time what’s been there all along. When we’re in the crowd, a crowd of two or three or a crowd of thousands, a crowd all around us or the crowd we join in that magic screen in our hands or on the wall, right there in the crowd there is one up to his knees or up to his neck in whatever’s going on. We might see him, or he might seem lost in the crowd, but he’s there: Giving life when it’s so hard to live, giving light when it’s so hard to see, giving love that will make the crowd new. Calling us to follow into that crowd, where life and light and love will always find us, and always find a way.