This Sunday in the church year is commonly referred to as "Baptism Of The Lord Sunday". Yet, if baptism is significant at all - it is anything but common.
In Christ Plays In Ten Thousand Places, author Eugene Peterson helps to frame the significance of being baptized into Christ; through life in the resurrection community.
“Two imperatives chart the way of the baptized Christian as we set out living together in the community of the resurrection. Neither is difficult to understand, but it takes a lifetime of attention and discipline to be shaped by them. The words are: “REPENT’ and “FOLLOW”. “Repent” is the no, and “follow” is the yes of the baptized life. The two words have to be worked out in changing conditions throughout the life of the community and in each of our lives. We never master either command to the extent that we graduate and go to higher things. These are basic, and remain basic……”
Bishop Kenneth W. Goodson once walked the hallways of Duke Divinity School. His tenure as Bishop in Residence was a gift. "The Bishop" shaped many of us in significant ways. I was ordained when Methodists still did the "two-step". That is to say, I was first ordained a deacon, and then a few years later, I was ordained as an elder. The fall semester following my ordination as a deacon Bishop Goodson greeted me and congratulated me on taking this first big step toward becoming an elder in full connection. He fixed his eyes on me and said something like, "Jon - just remember that you were ordained as a deacon first, before you will be ordained an elder. No matter what - you should remember that you are ordained, first and foremost, as a servant, even before you are ordained as a priest. " Repent and Follow....no...and yes...... two imperatives for all who answer Christ's call to follow. Singer/songwriter John Michael Talbot says it like this:
Saint Francis said it this way, "It is in dying that we are born to eternal life."Do you hear the call to follow? You must lay down your life to follow. For only when you die....are you free to live.
In Christ - jon(the methodist)
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Jon: Ken Goodson indeed had a significant impact on many of our lives. It is heartwarming to see your reference to his ministry at Duke as a "gift" some seventeen years after his death. Not much time passes that someone does not mention a comment or story of his that somehow left an impression. Thank you for keeping his memory alive.
W. Kenneth Goodson, Jr. (Ken)
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