Lectionary Commentaries for January 12, 2025
Baptism of Our Lord

from WorkingPreacher.org


Gospel

Commentary on Luke 3:15-17, 21-22

Mitzi J. Smith

“He will be called son of God” (klēthēsetai, huios theou, Luke 1:35). Later in Luke, he is also called the prophet of the Most High and next, he is called Jesus (1:76; 2:21). As the angel Gabriel promised Mary, God claims Jesus as his beloved Son at his baptism (1:35; 3:22). Jesus belongs to God; he is not a fatherless child, as the manner of his birth to Mary implies (1:30). She is an enslaved young girl of the Lord/Master (hē doulē kyriou; 1:48), which I have argued should be taken both literally and metaphorically.1

All the male children in a Jewish household, enslaved and freeborn, are circumcised at eight days old; 33 days after the birth of Jesus the parents present him to YHWH at the Temple and a purification offering is sacrificed for Mary (2:21–24; Genesis 12:1–8; 17:10–12). Observance of these rites was expected or anticipated. Anticipation or expectation of future events is a major theme in Luke’s birth narratives.

The general historical context of expectation (of relief from desperation and oppression) is identified with the words “in the days of King Herod of Judea” (Luke 1:5). King Herod the Great served the interests of and at the pleasure of the Roman Empire, just as his three sons did. Herod Antipas, known to commit evil acts against his people, ruled over Galilee, and his brother Philip was over another region (3:1, 19; 9:7–9; 13:31; 23:7–15). During the first century, many Jewish persons in Judea and Galilee had been enslaved by Rome. And some Jewish persons, including leaders, learned to profit from empire at the expense of their own people (23:1–16).

Times are desperate, and the future is bleak and uncertain. Expectation is accompanied by questions and guessing, even when an angel announces the anticipated event. The questions and guessing are a natural human reaction, given that the expectation of a future event arises in contexts of desperation and impossibility.

The first anticipated event in Luke is the birth of John (the Baptist) to Elizabeth, who is the (post-menopausal?) “barren” wife of Zechariah, a priest who serves in the Temple (1:5–13). Unfortunately, then and today women’s role in patriarchal society is viewed primarily as giving birth. And if a woman cannot give birth, naturally she is viewed as contributing little to the advancement of society. But as the African American actress Tracy Ellis Ross declared, women “do not need to push out a baby in order to help push humanity forward!”2

Call the roll of women who birthed no children but made significant contributions to society: Rosa Parks, Frida Kahlo, Virginia Woolf, Florence Nightingale, Jane Austen, Sally Ride, Lorraine Hansberry, DOI Takako, Esther Eng, Anna May Wong, Grace Harper, Ella Baker, Marion Anderson, Dr. Margaret Chung, Gerda Wegener, Emily Dickinson, Dr. Rebecca Cole, Dolly Parton, Oprah Winfrey, VP Kamala Harris, and so many other “childless” women.

The angel of the Lord (who we might presume is a male similar to Gabriel) initiates a conversation with Zechariah about Elizabeth’s body without her knowledge (1:11–20, 24–26). It’s no wonder Zechariah had questions. What does he know about a woman’s body? He is being asked to rely on another male’s words about his wife’s body. Nevertheless, Elizabeth conceives and gives birth to John, who will become John the Baptist. John will prepare a people for another anticipated male child more powerful and worthy and who will perform a different baptism (1:17; 3:15–16). John baptizes with water, but the people should anticipate that Jesus will baptize with “the Holy Spirit and fire” (3:16c).

In the conversations between the angel and Zechariah, the future birth of John is linked to messianic expectations (3:7–9; 15–17). John brings the “brimstone” in his sermonettes, referring to the crowds as “brood[s] of vipers,” unrepentant, and failures at bearing good fruit. There is no middle ground, no human complexity with John. Trees (people) who fail to bear good fruit are chopped down and burned in fire (3:9). Is this the same fire with which Jesus will baptize? Water normally extinguishes fire, but the baptism with water precedes the fire baptism. Jesus will baptize with the same Holy Spirit that was present with and overshadowed his mother Mary at conception (1:30–35).

But before Jesus has done anything, before he begins his public ministry in Luke, the voice from heaven publicly announces, “I am well pleased with you” (3:22b). The only thing Jesus has done so far is to humble himself by submitting to be baptized by a man who describes himself as unworthy to untie Jesus’ sandals and who has lived in the margins of society.

Perhaps this demonstrates God giving value to the lowliest in a society where wealth is concentrated in the top 1–2 percent. Maybe this God gives value, purpose, belonging, and a sense of dignity and worth to persons born into social statuses relegated to the bottom of a society. This divine affirmation and confirmation will allow Jesus to unapologetically speak truth to power, to stand in the midst of hostile crowds, and to stand firm before religious and political leaders.


Notes

  1. Mitzi Smith, “Abolitionist Messiah: A Man Named Jesus Born of a Doule,” in Bitter the Chastening Rod: African American Interpretation After Stony the Road We Trod in the Age of BLM, SayHerName, and MeToo, ed. Mitzi J. Smith, Angela Parker, and Ericka Dunbar Hill, 53–70 (Lanham, MD: Lexington Books, 2022).
  2. Jeroslyn JoVonn, “Tracee Ellis Ross Speaks Up for Childless Women, ‘You Do Not Need to Push Out a Baby to Help Push Humanity Forward,’” BlackEnterprise.com, September 21, 2024, https://www.blackenterprise.com/tracee-ellis-ross-childless-women/.

First Reading

Commentary on Isaiah 43:1-7

Julia M. O’Brien

The theme linking the first reading and the Gospel passage for this Sunday is chosenness. In Luke’s account of Jesus’ baptism, Jesus is the chosen one. After the Holy Spirit rests upon him, a heavenly voice speaks directly to Jesus, calling him “Son” and “Beloved,” one with whom God is pleased. In Isaiah 43:1–7, Judeans living in Babylon are the ones of God’s choosing. Found within a section of the book often called Second Isaiah because the words reflect the fifth-century setting of the Babylonian exile and not the eighth-century setting of Isaiah of Jerusalem, these comforting words assure the community that God knows them and they belong to God. 

The anonymous poet of Isaiah 40–54 likely was not addressing those who had been forcibly removed from Jerusalem during the Babylonian conquest in the sixth century but instead their children and even grandchildren—some of whom may have been born in Babylon. Consistently, it attempts to convince this second and third generation of exiles that their true home is Jerusalem and that God can and will facilitate their return to their ancestral lands. Like a grief-stricken mother, Jerusalem is eagerly awaiting their reverse migration (expressed powerfully in Isaiah 60:4–7, this season’s lection for Epiphany). “Go out from Babylon, flee from Chaldea,” it insists (Isaiah 48:20). 

Beneath the extravagant promises of care and protection expressed in this passage (and elsewhere in Second Isaiah), we can hear the people’s pain. Their sense of abandonment. Their fear. Their doubt in God’s power and care. Indeed, this collection acknowledges that Jerusalem was once abandoned by God (Isaiah 54:7) and has already paid double for its sins (Isaiah 40:1). How can the people trust in God’s care now?  

While First Isaiah once warned that the enemy was a weapon wielded against Israel by the hand of God (Isaiah 10:5), Second Isaiah now celebrates the power of God’s arm to save (Isaiah 40:10). God has forgiven Jerusalem, loves the people, and is ready to comfort them (Isaiah 40, 42–44). As the creator of all things (Isaiah 40:26, 28; 40:20; 41:5; 45:7–18; 54:16), God can control geography for their sake (Isaiah 40:4; 41:18–20). Far superior to the idols of Babylonian religion (Isaiah 40:12–26; 44:9–20), God has anointed Cyrus, the ruler of the Persian Empire, to destroy their Babylonian oppressors (Isaiah 45:1–17).

According to our passage, God is Israel’s creator and also its redeemer, the One who will protect the returning bands as they embark on their own exodus from captivity; they will pass through the waters as their ancestors once braved the Red Sea. “Do not fear”—the same reassurance that Moses gave to the fearful Hebrews escaping Egypt (Genesis 14:13) and that God gave to Hagar (Genesis 21:17), Abraham (Genesis 26:24), Joshua (Joshua 8:1), the shepherds (Luke 2:10), and a host of biblical characters in peril—appears twice in this short unit.  

These promises of defying fire and flood are surely not literal promises of physical protection. Instead, they are words intended to stir the emotions. They are words of the heart, extravagant promises of commitment, care, and love in the face of danger. In bold terms, this poem affirms and comforts those who feel separate from and distrusting of God.

By focusing solely on Jesus’ baptism for this Sunday, preachers sometimes overlook the power of Second Isaiah’s words to speak into hearers’ hearts, especially those whose painful experiences have left them doubtful of their own worth and God’s care. “Do not fear.” “I love you.” “You are precious.” Who in the congregation needs to hear those powerful words yet again? The LGBTQ2S folk who have been traumatized by violent Christian rhetoric? The struggling parents who are woefully aware of their own failures? The aging who are seeking a sense of purpose and meaning in a society that too often equates people’s value with their productivity?

It is important, of course, to notice when the need for affirmation for ourselves blinds us to the needs of others. In this passage, for example, other nationalities are not themselves chosen ones, but rather collateral exchanged for Jerusalem’s redemption (43:3–4). Although the location of Seba is not known, other biblical texts associate it with the locales mentioned here; the Hebrew term “Cush” refers to a kingdom south of Egypt and is sometimes translated as “Ethiopia” or “Sudan.” 

When read through the lens of the transatlantic slave trade, the seizure of African kingdoms for the enrichment of others is profoundly disturbing. And yet, when read through a hermeneutic of affirmation, the acknowledgment of their wealth and status underscores the prominence of Africa and Africans in a Bible that is too often read as a “white” text.  

The end of the passage encourages such a wider and more expansive interpretation. Not only “you” but also others seemingly lost will be loved and welcomed. Preachers who believe that all persons are created and called by God can read “everyone” (in Hebrew “all,” Isaiah 43:7) in ways that affirm that not only some but all will be chosen. All those who have been scattered—from the north and the south, sons from far away and daughters from the ends of the earth—will be gathered together.


For Further Reading

Mark J. Boda, John Ahn, Frank Ritchel Ames, and Mark Leuchter, The Prophets Speak on Forced Migration (Society of Biblical Literature, 2015).

Stacy Davis, “Cush,” Bible Odyssey, Society of Biblical Literature, 2024, https://www.bibleodyssey.org/articles/cush/.

 


Psalm

Commentary on Psalm 29

Rebecca Poe Hays

In many ways, Psalm 29 conforms to typical expectations for the book of Psalms, which bears the Hebrew title “Book of Praises.”1

Though much of the Psalter is more lament than praise, Psalm 29 pours forth beautiful poetic language and imagery in a hymn to Yahweh—the God who speaks. Preaching Psalm 29 invites preachers and their congregations to join in the worship of the God of water and word whose voice echoes throughout history: over the face of the deep, at Jesus’ baptism, and to us today.

The text

As is typical of hymns of praise, Psalm 29 unfolds in three major sections:2

  • verses 1–2: Opening call to praise Yahweh
  • verses 3–9: Reasons to praise Yahweh
  • verses 10–11: Reaffirmation of Yahweh’s glorious reign and its implications

The opening section comprises a summons to give (or “ascribe”) to the Lord the worship due the one who possesses glory and strength (verses 1–2). The emphatic language repeats the imperative “ascribe” three times and gives the command to “the sons of gods” (also, “heavenly beings”).

Some scholars recognize in this language—particularly when coupled with the rest of the psalm’s imagery—a building polemic against Canaanite deities such as Baal who must give way before the one true God.3 Whether “sons of gods” refers to pagan deities, angels, or earthly kings, the point is that Yahweh is at the center of all things, and the repetition of God’s name (18 times in 11 verses!) underscores this reality.

The body of the psalm centers on the power of “the voice of Yahweh” as the reason to answer the opening summons to praise (verses 3–9). The psalmist fleshes out the concept of Yahweh’s voice with dramatic descriptions of how it impacts creation: Yahweh’s voice rumbles out over the chaos waters (verses 3–4) and is able to uproot and bring down things that should not be susceptible to such destruction: the strongest trees, the tallest mountains, and the earth itself (verses 5–9).4

These descriptions reflect the violence of thunderstorms, and voicing the sevenfold repetition of “the voice of Yahweh” (qol YHWH or qol ’adonay) might even be meant to reverberate richly through a congregation like thunder through a still summer evening.5 All of this power and majesty builds and builds until a climactic moment when “all say, ‘Glory!’” (verse 9b).

The psalm concludes by briefly restating what has come before: Yahweh reigns supreme over all things in the natural world (“the flood”) and in human hierarchies (“as king”), and so is the one who can give strength, blessing, and peace to those who worship accordingly (verses 10–11). Yahweh’s enthronement “over the flood” recalls both God’s creative work and God’s judgment in the days of Noah, and it taps into common Canaanite mythologies about deities battling with the floods of chaos to gain dominion over the pantheon.

The psalm’s final benediction is a prayer (“May the LORD give strength to his people …”) and a promise (“the LORD gives strength to his people”). Yahweh’s reign is not a distant, irrelevant abstraction but has concrete implications for life on earth. As Brueggemann and Bellinger observe, this conclusion “invites YHWH to channel the great power imagined in this psalm toward granting shalom, peace, to the faith community. The hope is that YHWH will bring the same order both to life and to creation.”6

The context

In Psalm 29, the psalmist draws upon common ancient Near Eastern imagery for theophanies, or appearances of God in the world, to urge those who read or hear the psalm to worship Yahweh as the one true God. Some scholars even argue that Psalm 29 was originally a Canaanite hymn to the storm god Baal—the imagery of mighty waters, thunder and lightning from the heavens, torrential winds, and reverberations in the earth certainly sounds like something that might be used in worship of a storm god.7

But the psalmist leaves no room for confusion about which God commands the heavens. Psalm 29 stands as a powerful polemic against those who might be tempted to “ascribe” strength and glory to other forces at work in the world (whether supernatural, natural, or human).

Psalm 29 and the baptism of the Lord

The emphasis on the power of “the voice of Yahweh” in Psalm 29 stands as a powerful foundation for Luke’s account of the baptism of Jesus. The voice of Yahweh shakes the heavens and the earth, brings both destruction and creation, and provides strength and peace to those who heed it. The God whose voice “flashes forth flames of fire” in Psalm 29:7 breaks open the heavens in Luke 3:21–22 to announce the identity of the man from Galilee who has just emerged from the baptismal waters. Psalm 29 imbues these heavenly words with authority and reminds us of the promise of shalom that the voice of Yahweh ensures.


Notes

  1. This commentary was previously published on this website for January 13, 2019.
  2. Walter Brueggemann and W. H. Bellinger Jr., Psalms, New Cambridge Bible Commentary (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2014), 146.
  3. See, for example, J. Clinton McCann Jr., “Book of Psalms,” in Leander E. Keck, ed., The New Interpreter’s Bible (Nashville: Abingdon, 1996), 4:792, and Nancy L. deClaissé-Walford, Rolf A. Jacobson, and Beth LaNeel Tanner, The Book of Psalms, The New International Commentary on the Old Testament (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2014), 283–84.
  4. “Sirion” is another name for Mt. Hermon, which stands on the border of Lebanon and is associated with one of the traditional boundaries of Israel (see Deuteronomy 3:9, Joshua 11:16–17; see also Psalm 42:6; 89:12; 133:3).
  5. deClaissé-Walford, Jacobson, and Tanner, The Book of Psalms, 284.
  6. Brueggemann and Bellinger, Psalms, 148–49.
  7. See deClaissé-Walford, Jacobson, and Tanner, The Book of Psalms, 281.

Second Reading

Commentary on Acts 8:14-17

Chris Blumhofer

The text before us records an interlude within the larger story of the gospel coming to Samaria in Acts 8:4–13 and 8:18–25. In the larger frame, the crowds respond to Philip’s preaching of the gospel, and a powerful magician named Simon attempts to purchase the Holy Spirit so as to be able to control its power. Our passage sits in the middle: Peter and John come from Jerusalem and pray for the new believers, and they receive the Holy Spirit. 

The passage is puzzling in its record of Samaritans coming to faith and being baptized in the name of Jesus but not initially receiving the Holy Spirit. Why is the Spirit withheld from these people upon their coming to faith? The answer to this question offers itself to us as we appreciate the details of the passage.

First, the broader setting in Luke is significant: Philip brought the gospel north to Samaria after the scattering of the Christians in Jerusalem due to the persecution of Stephen (Acts 6:8–8:1, 4). Philip himself likely belonged to the rapidly expanding group of Hellenists in the church (see 6:5); as such, he is distinct from the apostles (1:13) and, more importantly, is the first non-apostle to proclaim the gospel in Acts.

The social and cultural setting is a second area of significance: Samaritans and Jews lived in great tension with one another. Jesus’ encounter with a woman of Samaria in John 4 testifies directly to this (for example, “Jews do not have dealings with Samaritans” [John 4:9]). In 2 Kings 17, we read that the Assyrians overtook this region and resettled Samaria with peoples from five foreign cities, who worshiped both the gods of their homelands and the God of Israel. Samaritans thus faced the suspicion of syncretism from their southern neighbors in Judah. 

The social divisions between Jews and Samaritans deepened after Ezra returned to the land. In the Second Temple period, the Jewish historian Josephus depicts Samaritans at times as outsiders who reside in the land of Israel (see also 2 Kings) and at other times as “apostates from the Jewish nation” (see also Josephus, Antiquities, XI.340; 12.257). In the late second century BCE, the Hasmonean king John Hyrcanus brought relations to a low point when he destroyed the Samaritan temple on Mount Gerizim.

Thus the conversion of Samaritans to the Way of Jesus through the evangelism of a non-apostle brings with it a host of complicated social and religious questions. Centuries of suspicion and tension preceded this event. The inclusion of Samaritans into the group of believers—a group at this point populated by observant Jews—would certainly raise internal tensions around matters of faith and practice, as well as external tensions with zealous Jews—Saul not least among them—who would see any association with Samaritans as a fatal compromise with syncretism and impiety.

Third, we see the Jerusalem-based church respond with integrity and openness to the news of faith among a new social and ethnic group. Peter and John go to Samaria in verse 14. The group of apostles could not have appointed two people more qualified to confirm the events in Samaria, though it was sure to create more complexity for them in Jerusalem (see Acts 4:1–22; 5:17–42). There is no hint of suspicion or doubt expressed by these two apostles that the Samaritan conversion was not authentic. In verse 15 Peter and John intercede for the Holy Spirit to come upon the new believers, and in verse 17 they lay their hands upon them. 

There is no desire to withhold the gifts of God from these believers, despite the many social and cultural prejudices they might have used as justification. Although it is not clear in the text that laying on hands was necessary to confer the Spirit, there is a powerful image in the apostles’ willingness to set aside conditions of ritual purity in order to touch a people traditionally thought to live in states of ritual uncleanness (see also the second century CE text of Mishnah, Niddah, 4.1). 

The puzzling feature of this passage is verse 16, which specifies that the Samaritans had been baptized into the name of Jesus but had not yet received the Holy Spirit. Elsewhere in Acts, baptism in the name of Jesus and reception of the Spirit occur together, though not in a strict order (see Acts 2:38; 9:17–18; 10:47). A near parallel to this passage occurs in Acts 19:1–7, where Paul travels to Ephesus and finds some disciples who had only received the baptism of John. They, too, are baptized in the name of Jesus and receive the Spirit through the laying on of Paul’s (in other words, apostolic) hands. 

John Calvin observed that it is possible to over-problematize this puzzling feature of the text. Having been baptized into the name of the Lord Jesus (verse 16) and having received the word of God (verse 14), the Samaritans had certainly received what Paul later calls the Spirit of adoption to sonship (Romans 8:15), writes Calvin. According to the Reformer, what is at stake in this passage is the “excellent” and “visible graces” of the Spirit, which are the particular riches of the church, though not identical with belonging to God’s people by faith. 

We might add to Calvin here that in Acts the visible demonstration of the Spirit’s presence does the powerful work of confirming God’s acceptance of a people, particularly a people who had long been held in suspicion (see also Acts 10:1–11:18). It is significant that the apostles are generous and open to these developments, and that their role in conferring the Spirit maintains the ultimate unity of the church in the acknowledgment of God’s Spirit and Word. 

Of course, the Samaritans would now need to disciple themselves to Jesus and walk in the Way. Practically, they would need to accept the (Jewish) Scriptural canon, including the prophets (previously rejected within Samaritan religion). Nevertheless, the question of the Samaritans as now embraced by God’s kingdom has been settled—the reign of Jesus has laid claim to a new people (1:8), and the apostles themselves have joined in the proclamation of the gospel among them (8:25).


Bibliography

John Calvin, Commentary on Acts, Vol. 1, ed. Henry Beveridge (Grand Rapids: CCEL, n.d.).