May my spoken word be true to God’s written word and bring us all closer to the living word, Jesus Christ our Lord.  Amen.

Right now, I’ve got your attention. Of all the places you could be, you are here, or you are watching online, (or you are reading this sermon). Your attention could be on an infinite number of things, anything, perhaps a few things but not everything.

And I’m doing something a bit different this morning, standing at what we call “the cross.” Normally I’d be up in the pulpit, but I wanted to stand here just a few minutes to highlight how this room is set up visually.

Everyone in the nave is oriented forward. We have the lectern and the pulpit up and out just a bit from the chancel, with the choir and organ up here, which helps them lead worship. Further back and further up is the altar. Above it is that beautifully carved Christus Rex, or Risen Christ, then above that is Jesus as the Good Shepherd, for which we are named. The highest point articulates our vision of this body of Christ. The same applies in the chapel.

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While all four Gospels include Jesus being baptized by John, and the Holy Spirit descending upon Jesus like a dove, only Matthew records this verbal exchange between John and Jesus. John’s question is a good one!

John’s whole life from conception on has been building to this moment. He’s kind of like a kid who played with little bulldozers and dump trucks then went on to do site work, preparing the land for roads and construction. He has spent his life preparing himself to prepare the way for Jesus by teaching and exhorting people to repent of their sins, then providing the ritual washing to affirm it.

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Today is a feast day, the Feast of the Holy Name of Jesus. That raises the issue of what’s in a name? But before we get into names, let’s start with the ways we use language to make sense of, well, everything. For example, you are all sitting in pews. We could say seats, we could say benches, but the most accurate word in English is pews. That’s true whether someone knows the word or not, if we were in another country with another language we’d need to learn new words and/or find people who understood ours.

Being a pew, its meaning goes deeper. It’s not just a place to sit, it’s a place specifically set aside for prayer, for hearing God’s word, for exchanging God’s peace and on and on. Some objects, some places are special. The layers of meaning can go very deep and frame our lives.

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