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Grace, mercy, and peace be to you from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen. Brothers and sisters in Christ, the text for this morning comes from the Old Testament reading, the prophet Isaiah. You may be seated.
Without exception, every single one of us loves the story of an underdog. We love to see the little David triumph over the giant Goliath. The despised and marginalized little boy defeating the glorious giant. The problem with you and me is that we love the story. We just don’t want to be the underdog in the story. And yet, that is what we are. When you were baptized, you were baptized into the name of Christ Jesus, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen. You were baptized into the underdog of all. And so by you being baptized into the underdog and joined to him, you yourself have now become the underdog.
That’s a struggle because you and I love the story of underdogs, but to be a part of the story, to be the underdog in the story, we don’t like because the underdog is always on the outside, isn’t he? He’s never on the inside. Right? He’s always on the outside looking in, never a part of the group. We are always on the outside. We’re always going to be viewed as the scourge because we’re not like the rest of the world. We’re different. We’re set apart. Remarkably, we look like the rest of the world because we still sin, but we are markedly different because God claims us as his own.
We’re laughed at. We’re the butt of the jokes of the world. And we never shine brightly, ever, except in the final battle, the battle when we finally are brought into glory in our death. So our entire life is spent in this underdoggedness of being a baptized child of God. And being the underdog, though the story, we know ends great. David slays Goliath. Through Christ we slay sin, death, and the power of the devil. But in the meantime, we have to live out the life of the underdog. And it’s not always so fun. It’s not glorious. It wasn’t for him. It’s not for you and me.
You see, our glory is always hidden as his glory was hidden. The world doesn’t see a difference between you and they. They look upon you and say, “You’re just like me. You’re no different than I am.” And yet you by faith know you are different. You by faith know you are set apart, but your flesh, you know your flesh as we read in the epistle reading, we have to die daily to ourself and that’s the underdog. We don’t get to glory in anything but our ingloriousness, if that even makes sense.
Hence the Old Testament reading this morning. The Old Testament reading is God defining his people. In your baptism, when your mommy and daddy brought you to that font, or when you came as an adult, you were defined not by who you are, but you were defined rather by whose you are. It’s very clear in the Old Testament text. God says, “I created you.” Though your mother and father may have planned for your birth, or maybe they didn’t, you were the surprise. God created you in your mother’s womb. Your mother and father did not. The text says, “I formed you.”
Whether you struggle with eyesight or not, whether you have health problems or not, whether you are tall, short, whether you struggle with anything or with nothing, you were formed by God. You did not form yourself, and no matter what kind of vitamins your mother may have taken for prenatal care, you are formed by him because he formed you. The text says clearly. He’s defining you as to who you are. Not as to who you can become, who you might become, who you think you are, but who he says you are.
“I have called you by name. I have made you mine.” We struggle, and as parents, we struggle too. When we were growing up, we struggled to make that separation between ourselves and our parents. Though they did say, “I named you, you are mine,” but yet then we become someone else’s when we marry, don’t we? We become someone else when we break apart from our parents, and yet we’re still joined to them. Not with God. You are his. You are defined by whose you are. He says, “I have called you by name.” That never changes.
“I have made you my child.” That never changes. “I have redeemed you, not with gold or silver, but with my holy precious blood and with my innocent suffering and death that I may make you my own. That you may live under me in everlasting righteousness, innocence, and blessedness.” That’s God defining you. Now, we hear those words, we receive those words, and our faith cries out, “Yay and Amen!” But then we’re connected to the ultimate underdog, Jesus.
And we live a life in this world as an underdog. And it’s not easy, is it? All of our life, we struggle to be accepted by other people. We struggle to get our parents’ approval. It is the same with you and I, no matter how old or young we are. We do want certain people to love us. We cannot say, “I don’t care whether they love me or not,” about every single human being. There are still those one or two or more that it means the world to us what they think of us. And as the underdog, sometimes we even have to disappoint them, and that’s not easy.
I am God’s. So are you. We are not our own. The Father’s will for us is that final victory. Where by grace and a decrepit aged body or a young youthful body, regardless of when death comes, we win. That is the underdog story that we all love. But between now and then, we live this life of faith as an underdog in a world that we’re on the outside looking in, brothers and sisters. We’re not a part of it.
And yet, we have to remember that this victory did not come by some little divine fiat; it came as a sacrifice. Now Jesus sacrificed, and we’re all willing to say this, Jesus was sacrificed for my worst sins, and we’re willing to say that Jesus was sacrificed for my ugliest sins. But are you willing to say that Jesus was sacrificed for your best work, for your most beautiful achievement in this world? Are you willing to say that Jesus died for that as well? Or did he only die for part of you and not all of you?
You see, Jesus to die for you and redeem you, he could not just redeem a part of you. The ugly part you don’t like, the heinous part that you’re ashamed of, he has to die for every ounce of you, the part of you that you even think is not that bad, not that ugly. Or otherwise, he didn’t redeem all of you. Or otherwise, you’re saying, and I’m saying, that the prettiest thing we have in our life is prettier than that. The most best work we can do in our life is even better than that.
Jesus redeemed you, the worst of you and the best of you, so that on your best day, you still say, “Jesus called me his child.” That’s all that matters. And on your worst day, “Jesus called me as his child.” That is all that matters. Because we’re good at puffing ourselves up, and we’re good at tearing ourselves down, aren’t we? And the only thing that matters is what the Father speaks over us.
You’ve been baptized into Christ, the underdog. And what was said of this underdog? The Father said, “This is my beloved Son.” Not just my Son, my beloved Son, and with him I am well pleased. You remember the times when you vied for your parents’ approval, and they gave it to you, and you thought you had achieved the greatest monumental achievement in your life because you also remember when you tried so hard and you did not appease them, you saw their disappointment and you felt crushed.
You know when your husband or wife says to you how wonderful of a job you’ve done or how loving you are or how kind you are, you can take on the world. But when you’re not told that, a feather can knock you over because you’re the weakest, pitifulest person in the world. Your God says to you, “You are my beloved Son, you are my beloved daughter. With you I am well pleased.” Not because of your worst works for which I died, but also for your best works for which I died. Not for the things of which you are ashamed only, but also those things for which you are very proud of. Did I die? I had to. Or otherwise those things of which you’re very proud are more important than me and the great work that I accomplished for you?
God goes on in Isaiah’s text saying, and he tells you how you appear to him in his eyes. Just as the Father’s voice spoke from heaven and said, “You are my beloved Son. With you I am well pleased.” So in the text this morning does God tell us how we stand in his eyes. And that’s what matters. How we stand in his eyes. He proclaims us as being precious.
“Precious in my eyes. Honored in my eyes. Precious.” He even adds, “I love you.” Do you remember the time those three words came out of your lips? Not when you said it to your mama or your daddy, not when you said it to your sister or brother. I’m talking about when you said it to that little girl or a young woman or that little boy or that young man. And you had no idea, nor did I have any idea of what those three words meant. I knew that they were important and you knew that they were magnanimous, but what did they really mean? And it’s only as you and I have grown older do we realize what those words mean.
And it’s only as I’ve grown older with my woman do I know what those three words mean. I still don’t know completely and neither will I until I die. Your God has spoken those words over you: “I love you.” Which means the very thing that he said about his Son: “You are beloved.” You are beloved. Beloved. With you I am well pleased. I’m not well pleased with your best and finest. I’m not well pleased with your worst and ugliest. I’m well pleased because you’re baptized into my Son who is well pleasing, who is beautiful, who has paid the price. He was the greatest sinner and he was the greatest man. All in one. That is in whom you’ve been baptized.
But that glory, as you and I know, is an underdog glory. It is not revealed, and it is not seen so easily, and it is not comprehended so well by our faith. We struggle. Abide in your baptism, for it is where God calls you his beloved. It is where God claims you as his child. It is what God tells you about you, how you look, how you are, to him. Hear the words that have been spoken over you. Hold them dear to your heart. Grow in the knowledge of what it means to be beloved of God, to be God’s child.
Remain in the womb of his word, where he holds you and feeds you and protects you like only a mother’s womb can and gives birth to you into heaven when you die. In the name of the one who is calling us his beloved, our Father, his Son, and his Holy Spirit. Amen. The peace of God which passes all understanding. Keep your hearts and your minds on Christ Jesus to life everlasting. Amen.