I wonder whether you have ever pictured something happening or gone along to an event and had a good idea
For example, maybe you have gone to a concert to see an orchestra play and it has been beautiful.
Maybe you have gone to a football match and your team has won.
Maybe you have hoped to see a beautiful waterfall and you got there and were not disappointed.
I remember being in New York with my husband. We had decided to go and see a show on Broadway.
We saw the people selling tickets for shows such as The Lion King, Mamma Mia, Phantom and Moving On. The latter was a Billy Joel show. A musical, we assumed, so we bought our tickets and went.
Now I have to admit that whilst I like the music of Billy Joel I was not sure what a Billy Joel musical would be like. Surely Mamma Mia using the music of ABBA would be easier to get my head around.
Anyway, we went, the show began, the music started and then a group of dancers appeared who performed ballet, to live Billy Joel music granted, but still ballet.
Now I did not expect that! So for the next two hours I happily watched ballet
The unexpected can often be quite pleasant but not always.
In our gospel reading this morning (Matthew 3:13-17) we heard of the baptism of Jesus, an event that took John the Baptist by surprise.
John the Baptist had waited for a great Messiah and prepared the way, he had spoken of the chosen one, the anointed one who was greater than him who would appear in a very dramatic way.
John the Baptist was expecting something great, something amazing and Jesus the great one came and asked for baptism from him.
John’s expectations and words were not met in the way he expected. A little like a ballet in another guise but even more so.
Jesus insisted on being baptised by John and then when he came out of the water the Holy Spirit descended like a dove.
There were no whistles, cheering, no change in weather. It was all quite laid back, except for the heavens opening and hearing the voice of God.
John the Baptist had an unexpected moment, but it was a moment of realisation that God’s plans were underway and would all happen just not quite in the way he expected.
God appeared but not in the way that people had expected neither was it in the way that they had prepared for.
How many times has God taken you by surprise?
God is not always where or how we expect Him to be, but He is there.
Sometimes in the words of another person, in the comfort of a friend, in the love of a family member.
God is a God of surprises and this was certainly the surprise that John the Baptist would have felt.
It is a little like the magi, they searched for a great King and instead found a newborn baby in a stable.
God has a tendency to take us all by surprise.
Jesus appeared for baptism but why?
Well, it was so He could be like us.
Baptism marks a time when we or someone on our behalf make promises so that we can be made an official part of the family of God.
Jesus went through baptism to signify that He was like us, and that He belonged to the family of humanity and the family of God.
Jesus who is God became one of us.
Jesus explained in the gospel reading that it had to be this way to fulfil righteousness.
This is a strange phrase, it has echoes of the suffering servant that Isaiah prophesied and anticipated as appearing.
The suffering servant has been thought of as Jesus, and the servant does things for righteousness.
Or, to put it another way, to fulfil a command to bring people back to God.
In our reading from the book of Acts (10:34-43) we heard Peter explaining that God has no favourites.
This is from a very exciting chapter when the unexpected had happened.
Peter had followed all the dietary laws expected of him as a Jew. He knew that he was not to mix with non-Jews, Gentiles, but he had a dream where God had asked him to eat food which would have been seen as unclean for a Jew to eat.
Peter challenged this with God and received the reply from God that Peter could not call unclean foods that God had given him to eat.
This challenge was unexpected, a big surprise for Peter. He was being challenged by God to accept those who were different.
We are told in this chapter from Acts that at the same time Peter received his vision so did a man called Cornelius, whose vision was a command from God to go and visit Peter.
Cornelius was a Gentile. He and his family went, they spoke to Peter about their faith.
Peter realised that he was to welcome Cornelius in the same way as he would welcome any other believer.
The story ends up with Peter baptising Cornelius and all his family.
Before this he spoke to other believers, who were Jews in their following of dietary laws.
Like Peter they had come to believe in Jesus.
The role Peter had was to explain to them the news he had received from God.
News which meant that the Gentiles were loved by God and accepted in the same way.
This is the part of the chapter that we have heard this morning.
This was a huge change to people who had thought that God was exclusively theirs.
It is all a reminder that in the same way that Jesus went to John for baptism, and Peter welcomed Gentiles, God is unexpected and He loves us just as we are.
There is a saying, ‘there is nothing you can do to make God love you less, and there is nothing you can do to make God love you more.’
The greatest thing to know in life is that God loves you.
The greatest thing to do in life is to respond to that love, knowing that the unexpected may be right around the corner but God will give you strength for that.
May we be ready to listen to God, and to be prepared to change if God asks us to do so.
AMEN
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