With detail Matthew records the first dramatic action of Jesus' ministry - his baptism at the hands of John. Galilee was not a great place from which to hail. It housed too many different kinds of people with suspicious backgrounds to make it a prestigious address. Yet Matthew begins his baptismal narrative by reminding readers that Galilee was Jesus’ home - a fact that makes John’s confession all the more startling. Matthew 3:1-11 carefully presents John the Baptist as a serious, prophetic figure, his life and work foretold by Isaiah, his mission carried out with zeal and authority. John’s baptism wasn’t a nice, nurturing sacrament like we conduct for infants here at the font. John was confronting people at the river bank and dunking them to cleanse them of their sins. When Jesus, a scruffy traveler from a questionable land, appears before the well credentialed John seeking baptism, the Baptizer wrestles with an inferiority complex.

In my old Abnormal Psychology textbook from college, “inferiority complex” is defined as “strong feelings of inadequacy and insecurity which color an individual’s entire adjustive efforts. That pretty much sums up what John the Baptist was feeling. In the presence of Jesus, John felt inadequate. In the presence of Jesus John was insecure. In the presence of Jesus John’s skills seemed impotent. In the presence of Jesus John’s resources appeared limited. In the presence of Jesus, John lamented, “I need to be baptized by you Jesus, and instead you come to me? I’m the one with all the faults and weaknesses to be cleansed of, and you want me to wash you?”

Do we blame him? Egos can be pretty fragile and we protect them carefully. We sit in class and have done our reading, the teacher asks a question for which we have an opinion, but the person who speaks before us is so articulate that we’re afraid to follow with a comment of our own. A problem emerges at work where two bosses are locked in disagreement. Because they are organizational superiors, you feel it’s no place of yours to offer comment or suggestion. You witness an act of discrimination in your community, but remain silent because how could a single voice lead to any reconciliation? You look at issues of disease, poverty or ecology and see such widespread problems that any act of your own seems futile. We’re tempted by inferiority complexes and it’s easy to succumb, because by throwing up our hands, we can relinquish all sense of responsibility!

Amidst John’s emerging inferiority complex Jesus responds in The Message translation, John, “do it. God’s work, putting things right all these centuries, is coming together right now in this [moment].” In that moment, John wasn’t being asked for some supernatural power; he wasn’t being asked for some mind blowing creativity; he wasn’t being asked for some costly remedy. Jesus was simply asking John to meet the immediate need that was presenting itself. And John did. Rather than allowing his sense of inferiority to incapacitate him, John went ahead and did the baptism. And we read that the heavens opened up with an outpouring of God’s Spirit that heralded the start of Jesus ministry of teaching and healing.

Isn’t it interesting, that this baptism took place not because of any great faith that John demonstrated, but rather because of the great faith that Jesus demonstrated in him? And isn’t it interesting that a 2,000 year avalanche of spiritual energy and guidance and hope that eventually covered the globe, started not with some grandiose vision, but rather with the simple commitment – to meet the single need – at the moment it presented itself? And isn’t it interesting that seeing in ourselves what God already sees in us holds the power to change the world? And isn’t it interesting that despite all the claims by governmental leaders and all the leverage wielded by affluence and influence, that the world is still most often changed “for the right” as Matthew 3 says, by casting aside our tempting inferiority complexes and simply doing God’s work in one place, at one time as the opportunity presents itself.

In his book, A Theology of the Social Gospel, Walter Rauschenbusch, a great theologian of the turn of the early 1900’s viewed baptism as an opportunity for all Christians “to express their solemn dedication to the tasks of the kingdom of God, and accepting their rights as children of God within that kingdom” (p. 200). Thus instead of being a liturgical, sacramental act, Rauschenbusch finds the power of Jesus’ baptism to be in its embodiment of Christian ethics in the world. In recent weeks, I’ve stumbled across a number of real life stories that put flesh and bones on this theoretical statement.

I was talking with a couple of Rotarians this past week, one of them Terry Stevens from our congregation who is currently a district president for Rotary International. I’ve attended some of their meetings over the course of my ministry and have always found them helpful ways to connect with other professionals in the community, but I wasn’t aware of their commitment to world health, perhaps you were. Back in 1985 Rotary International decided to take up the cause of immunizing against polio and started doing it; one person at a time, one city at a time, one country at a time and now 23 years later, largely due to the persistent efforts of Rotarians on the ground around the globe, polio has been nearly eradicated. Only four countries remain to be targeted with only 500 known cases worldwide.

At a clergy leadership academy I conducted here at Good Samaritan this past week, we hosted Sister Irene O’Neill from the Sisters of St. Joseph Carondelet Center located on the campus of St. Catherine’s College in St. Paul. For several hours she captivated us with her stories of a small community of nuns with no political or economic power, simply a compassion for people and a passion for justice that has been improving the quality of life for people in the Twin Cities and beyond for longer than Minnesota has been a state. They started St. Joseph Academy as a school for early settlers in Pigs Eye (later to become St. Paul). When a cholera epidemic broke out one summer they turned it into St. Joseph’s hospital to provide comfort care for the dying. They saw poverty and prostitution and chemical abuse rampant in dilapidated buildings at the intersection of Portland and Franklin in downtown Minneapolis and started reporting one drug dealer at a time, buying and redeveloping one building at a time, one corner at a time until a redeveloped block of affordable housing and social services transformed into what is now Hope Community. Sister Rose started a free store for the homeless who came in to get clothes, sandwiches and boxes to sleep in. Up to fifty people a day started to linger for coffee, conversation and companionship. They came to realize the importance of checking in with each other in case one of them who were sleeping under a bridge or on a park bench or behind a dumpster went missing. And a church of sorts emerged called Peace House. No inferiority complex among these sisters. They’re now taking on the challenge of safe drinking water in India and are connecting with the likes of Oprah and Bono!

A movement is afoot within our United Methodist connection as well. Perhaps you’ve heard of Nothing But Nets. Currently, in Africa, one million people die each year of malaria and 75% of those are children. Worldwide, one person dies of malaria every 30 seconds and it’s a preventable disease. With a matching grant from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, just $10 pays for the purchase, distribution and training for use of one insecticide treated bed net that wards off the nocturnal disease carrying mosquito. The United Methodist Church has partnered with the United Nations, the National Basketball Association, and Sports Illustrated to wipe malaria off the map…one net at a time…one mosquito at a time…one bed at a time. Why can’t we plead inferior to this task? Because during the time it took to tell you this story, three more people died of malaria and at least two of them were children.

The young son of a Baptist minister was in church one morning when he saw for the first time baptism by immersion. He was greatly interested in it, and the next morning proceeded to baptize his three cats in the bathtub. The two younger kittens bore it very well, but the old family tomcat rebelled. The old feline struggled with the boy, clawed his skin, and finally ran away. “Fine”, he yelled in disgust. “Be a Methodist if you want to!”

It’s true, we don’t often immerse, and it’s true that we Methodists do see baptism as commission to start running and clawing to make a difference in the world; one need at a time. For the disciple, there’s no room for inferiority complexes. Instead may we also strain to hear God’s voice introducing us: “This is my beloved daughter; This is my beloved son … with whom I am well-pleased and with whom I go out with a mission in the world!”