Today was called "Baptism of the Lord." I suspect that for most United Methodists it is the name of a Sunday they don't fully understand. I mean before all this liturgical reform that was brought about by Vatican II way back in the 20th century, no less, Methodists did not celebrate it, much less ever hear about it. I'm sure to some people, the title of the day sounds like some vestige of a "Catholic" thing.
Oh, well.
So how did we celebrate it at my church? I didn't do much with it at our 11 a.m. service. That's a non-traditional service anyway. But at the 9 a.m. "relaxed" traditional (as they like to call it--whatever that means, I have yet to find anyone who can clearly describe it to me) service, we went whole hog and celebrated the Baptism of the Lord by doing as much of the Covenant Renewal Service as I could find in three different worship resource books. On top of that, we had a congregational renewal of the Baptismal Covenant.
The Anglican priest, the Rev'd. John Wesley,M.A., that basically started the United Methodist Church very strongly believed that the members of his classes and bands and societies should once a year enter upon a great covenant with God. We had something like a 14 page bulletin. One of the pages was for people to sign their intent to keep the covenant.
It was like a step back in time, yet the language was arresting and sobering. It's a good service to use once a year to make you think about your relationship to God. Just where do you stand in that relationship?
