Dearly Beloved,
How does a weary world rejoice? This has been the question that we have held at our center this Advent season and into Christmas. And we have found ways, we have made ways to rejoice. Acknowledging our weariness. Claiming our connection and proclaiming our role as peacemakers. We have gathered in community and found joy. And we have sung songs of hope -- and played violin, organ, bells, cello, guitar, bass, and piano. We have lit candles and collected socks. We have grounded ourselves in ritual and we have drawn the circle wide and wider still.
This Sunday, we come to the place that, for me, is always the beginning: we remember that God names us each beloved. This Sunday, we remember the magi's journey and gifts, receiving star words to journey with us in this New Year. And we hear the story (very short in Luke's telling of it) of Jesus' baptism. And we remember our own. We remember that God names each of us beloved -- we were named that from the beginning, but that naming is solidified in a new way in baptism. It is proclaimed to us and in the face of community.
I love how Luke's telling of Jesus' baptism begins with a crowd, a gathered community: When everyone was being baptized, Jesus also was baptized. Jesus isn't baptized by himself or in a way that is set apart. He's baptized along with everyone else. In this moment, he is one of the crowd.
There is something profound about being named beloved along with others. Something that you know -- for it is something we experience each week. We are reminded of our belovedness every Sunday. And I, frankly, need it on a weekly basis. I need that reminder. And there's this beautiful thing that I see happening: as we are regularly reminded of our belovedness, we cannot seem to help but extend that message to others -- to those around us, to friends and children, neighbors and strangers.
Beloved IS where we begin.
This week, I invite you to live into that belovedness. To claim it. To look for signs in the world of that belovedness and God's presence with you. To extend that belovedness to others. As we live together in the belovedness that is the reality of being God's children, I daresay, we find a deep and abiding sense of belonging together. And there, there, my dear ones, there is great joy!
With love and joy,
Thandiwe
