St. John’s Episcopal Church
Tallahassee, FL

Amos 7:7-15
Mark 1:4-11

This sermon was part of The Year of the Bible—a yearlong initiative in which all sermons, classes, and formation for all ages followed a parish-wide journey through the entire Bible. With the bishop’s permission, we used a custom lectionary: two readings drawn from that week’s section of Scripture, plus a psalm and the regularly appointed gospel of the day.

Today is a unique intersection
of multiple things in the life of our parish.
First, it is the Feast of the Baptism of Our Lord Jesus Christ—
a feast that happens every year
on the first Sunday after the Epiphany.

It is one of those quieter feasts
that may not seem as flashy as Christmas, Easter, or Pentecost,
but every year on this day,
we hear about Jesus
being baptized by John the Baptist
in the River Jordan.

It is also a day when we baptize new members
into the household of God,
and lucky us—
we have two baptisms coming up in just a bit.

More on that in a moment.

Meanwhile,
in our Year of the Bible,
we have finally made our way
to the prophets—
those sometimes willing,
sometimes reluctant,
always kind of ornery
truth-tellers of God.

So let’s take a moment
to review where we’ve been,
just to make sure we see
how it all hangs together.

In the beginning:
God created the heavens and the earth,
and people to fill it.
But people, as you know,
were a bit of a hot mess from the very start.

So God chose Abraham,
then Isaac,
then Jacob,
and said:
“You’re not perfect,
but I’ve got to choose someone to reveal myself to.
It’s going to be y’all.
Congratulations.”

From Jacob came the great nation of Israel.
They ended up in slavery in Egypt.
Moses led them out,
and through the Red Sea,
into freedom.

Once they were free,
they had to figure out what it meant to be a nation.
They looked around and said,
“They have a king, and they have a king—
we want a king!”

God said,
“I am your king.”
But they said,
“No, we really want a regular king.”
And so,
they got kings.

Some were good.
Most were terrible.

And that’s where the prophets came in.
When kings went off the rails—
falling into idolatry,
false worship,
child sacrifice,
general nonsense and hubris—
God raised up prophets
to tell the truth when truth needed telling.

That’s where people like
Elijah,
Elisha,
Hosea,
Obadiah,
and Amos came in.

In our readings today,
we heard about Elijah and Amos.
I’ll talk about Elijah in Sunday School,
so for now,
let’s focus on Amos.

But first,
a little show-and-tell.

Now I want you to know
that I was recently described by a parishioner
as “surprisingly handy,”
which was mildly offensive—
I don’t know why it had to be a surprise.

But yes—
I am handy.
I have tools,
and I know how to use them.
I once worked at Home Depot.
I wore the orange apron.
I know how to install crown molding,
and I am really good at it.

When my wife’s grandfather, Paw Paw, passed away,
I inherited many of his old tools.
Some were big, powerful, and modern,
but my favorite ones were the old ones—
the simple things people have used for generations.

So let me introduce you to two such tools.

First: a level.
This helps you check
if something is straight and true
on the horizontal plane.

Second: a plumb line.
This is just a string
with a weight at the bottom.
But for thousands of years,
it has been the tool used
to determine whether something is upright and true.

People still use them today—
even in places where we do mission work,
like Ecuador and the Dominican Republic.

So, when we meet Amos in today’s reading,
he has a vision of a plumb line—
not set against a building,
but in the midst of the people.

It is as if God is saying,
“Amos,
my people are crooked.
They are bent out of shape.
It is time to straighten up.”

That has long been the job of the prophets:
to hold up the plumb line
and name what is crooked in the world—
our injustice,
our oppression,
our selfishness,
our greed—
and to say:
“Straighten up.”

John the Baptist
was the last of that line.
He appeared in the wilderness
calling people to repentance.
“Come be baptized,” he said.
“Turn your life around.
It’s time to get right with God.”

And then—
across the water—
comes Jesus.

John is out there,
yelling like Amos,
dressed in camel’s hair and a leather belt,
plunging people into the waters of the Jordan.

And Jesus walks right up
and says:
“Me too.”
“I want to be baptized.”

We should pause and ask ourselves,
“But why?”
Why did Jesus need to be baptized?

The trick is—he didn’t.
At least not in the usual sense.
He was without sin.
There was nothing to be washed away.

So why did he do it?

I believe it was because
he wanted to enter fully into our humanity—
right there in the water with us.

Think about bath time with kids:
playful, joyful . . .
but then you drain the tub
and think,
“Ew. Where did all that grime come from?”

The River Jordan must have looked like that,
spiritually speaking.
So many sins, regrets, and burdens
washed into that water.

And where does Jesus want to be?
Right there.
Right in the middle of it.
Not because he has to,
but because he wants to.

You see, with Jesus,
the whole building project changes.
It is no longer about meeting impossible standards
or being compared to a perfect plumb line
we can never match.

No.
With Jesus, it becomes something else.

Some say Jesus is the plumb line—
the perfect measure.
But I say,
he is more than that.

Jesus is the Architect.
The Building Inspector.
The Carpenter.
The General Contractor.
The Scaffolding.
The Bones of the Building
that is your very soul.

And he does not fix us with force.
He rebuilds us with love.

He works from within us
to smooth out the rough edges,
to raise us up straight and true—
not with hammers and nails,
but with grace and compassion.

With his Spirit at work in us,
we begin to see
what is crooked in this world—
the injustice,
the oppression,
the war,
the greed—
and we are compelled to do something about it.

Which brings us to what we’re about to do:
the baptism of Jack Mannheimer and Marie Kontas.

We are not baptizing them
to hold them to an impossible standard.
We are baptizing them
to welcome them into the household of God—
into the ongoing building project of love.

We are inviting them
to be part of this holy community,
where the Architect
is still at work,
rebuilding,
supporting,
and holding us up
from the inside out.

So to all of you
who have already been baptized—
congratulations.

This faith we share
is not about perfection.
It is about transformation.

And thanks be to God,
Jesus is still building
in you and in me.

He works not by force
but by love.
And that is our way, too.

Amen.