My grandfather on my mother’s side was born in 1885 in England.  He was older than my great-grandparents on my dad’s side. He was too old to fight in WWI.  He lived to a ripe old age of 91, dying in 1976. He’d be 138 if he were alive today.

He saw the world change a lot in his lifetime. When he was born, there were no light bulbs or electric appliances in people’s homes; no telephones or radios or televisions. Only the very wealthy had electricity at all. There were no cars; Karl Benz successfully drove the first automobile about a year and a half after he was born. Among his earliest memories, as a small boy, was watching the first electric street lights being installed in London. He was 18 when the Wright Brothers made their first flight.

There were of course other major changes and events, but this isn’t a history lesson. Each of these changes had a long series of developments that led up to them, preparation and discoveries, circumstances that built toward a brink, a moment when the next step changes the world. The Wright Brothers’ wheels left the ground and soon air travel becomes routine. And he lived to see Neil Armstrong walk on the moon. 

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Consider all the challenges children and youth face in our current age. They have all the struggles that people have always had with figuring out who we are and who we want to be, where and how we fit in cliques and awkwardness. All of that is acutely maximized by social media.

Smart phones, which almost all teenagers have, put the world at their fingertips. Some of that is good, bringing knowledge, information and different cultures into view, but also a great deal of stress that comes with heightened awareness of all the strife and struggles people face around the globe. A bus plunges into a ravine in Honduras. Rebels make gains in Myanmar. Ukraine. Israel. We are just beginning to grasp the deeply disturbing effect the lockdowns have had on education and mental health.

I could go on listing problems that affect our kids without taking sides on the issues, but we do take sides and they merit a lot of thought and discussion. But note the added stress that public debate of weighty issues place on young people. It’s quite a lot, and to be fair much of it looks dark. A bright light, then, is precious and influential.

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To help us grasp this opening passage of Mark’s Gospel, I’d like to take us to the particular spot. “Bethany Beyond the Jordan,” present-day Al Maghtas, is the place where John the Baptist was baptizing. It’s a little east of Jericho, far enough from the Judean countryside and Jerusalem to make a significant pilgrimage but close enough that many people can do it in two or three days.

And they did. Mark says “all,” which means a lot, and that they are streaming continuously for John’s baptism of repentance.

We live in a world that is drenched in sin. That is true today. It was true way back then, and as far back as humanity can remember. It tears away at us in every context and institution of our lives. We struggle with it as individuals, in our families, at work and in our communities. We are continually aware of how things could and should be better. It’s like we are slogging through a muddy bog and we just want to be cleansed of it. So please, someone, dump a bucket of clean water over me so I can start fresh. The deep-seated need is very real.

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