David Sessions 7-26-26

Good morning, church family.

I am. I am overwhelmed. I feel like I'd be like, hi, hello, hello. Good to see you again. Hello over there.

My family and I got to serve here for six years, and what I'm. What I'm really feeling right now is gratitude.

This church gave us so much. You all loved us well. And I want to say thank you for everything you gave us. But Jeff told me I only have 45 minutes, and this doesn't count.

So let me tell you one thing, the biggest thing that we are grateful for. You have given my children a West Texas accent.

Here's what I mean.

They sound like you.

When I talk to my son about God, I hear Laura Carroll's voice.

When I talk to my daughter about God, she uses words I learned from Suzetta.

You gave them an inheritance of faith, larger and deeper and richer than Kristen and I alone. We will never be done thanking you for that, but thank you. You mean the world to us. We have missed you terribly, and it is good to be here this morning. Would you pray with me?

Great God in heaven, we come before you as the gathered people of God, the family of God, who, as John the Baptist says, are awaiting the arrival of the bridegroom and Lord, like John the Baptist, I pray this morning that I would decrease in the spirit of God and that Jesus Christ would increase, that he would be present in between these humble words I offer.

May the people, God hear the word of God. This morning. It's through Christ's name we pray. Amen. Just 10 days ago, I was standing on a mountain in Colorado with my son and our youth group, and we were at about 13,000ft with 360 degree views of the Colorado Mountains.

Colorado mountains. And it's just breathtaking. It's just gorgeous. Those mountains go on for miles and miles and miles. And I had the same sensation standing there that I have when I stand in front of the ocean.

I feel small, and that feels good. Sometimes when we feel small, it feels like we're flying free. That God can be God and that we don't have to be. Sometimes feeling small feels like being free. Other times, not so much.

There's a lot written about our text today. There's a lot of things to know, and I want us to focus on one thing.

John the Baptist is leading a new thing here. He's doing something new, and it's a threat to the religious leaders.

And so they come and they try to make him feel small.

Baptism. John's baptism. Like I said, it's a new Thing we know that Jewish religion has this cleansing ritual. In fact, I brought a picture. So could we look at this picture of a mikveh?

This is a mikveh by the Dead Sea. It's an archaeological discovery. A mikveh would be something maybe like in the basement of a home or to the side of a home. And regularly, daily, weekly, Jewish people would walk down into this mikveh, which was like a big bathtub with steps, and they would wash themselves. And there's a lot of different reasons why you would wash yourselves.

Men would wash themselves, for one thing. Women would wash. I'm not going to get into it, but there's a lot of different reasons to go enter the mikveh. One of them was to be pure enough to go to the temple, where or the synagogue, which is where God lives.

Regularly, daily, weekly, Jewish people were washing themselves to be able to experience an encounter with God. And John comes along and he says, I'm going to wash you, but I'm going to wash you not regularly, not many times, not over and over. I'm going to wash you once and for all. Not so that you would be ceremonially clean, but that you would be prepared for an event, that you would be prepared for an encounter that was going to change everything forever. Well, that was a problem for the religious leaders.

Setting people free means they are no longer dependent on the Temple rituals, they no longer have to pay the temple tax to enter. John's baptism is robbing the legalism of. Of the Jewish faith that keeps people from encountering God. And so the Jewish leaders, they come to him that day, they approach him and they say, you know, John the Baptist, this thing that you're doing that is kind of like your whole identity, do you know that Jesus is doing it also? In fact, did you know that more people are going to Jesus?

Wasn't he your student? Can you see what they're doing? They're trying to make him feel small. They go to him at a time when he's surrounded by people. The crowds are large.

They're maximizing his humiliation. And they say, isn't he doing it better than you? Isn't he more successful? It's a good strategy. If you're trying to cut into a movement that is undercutting, you develop some inner turmoil, some jealousy among leaders.

John says, that's okay. That's okay. He must become greater and I must become less.

And while we all probably find that inspiring and rhetorically brilliant, do we believe it?

Is that inherently a Good thing that we would become less.

Everything we do today to develop young people into mature adults, everything that we are sold on in media or social media is designed for you to enlarge yourself. Self actualization.

If you're not standing out, who are you really? Do you even know?

There are some shallow ways of this social media thinking that the true American is the self made person. As though that were possible. There are shallow versions of it. But I'm not trying to have us look down on developing a sense of self today. It's critically important.

We know that when young people develop a loving sense of themselves, a positive self image, they are far less likely to suffer from things like depression. Adults and young people alike who have a strong sense of self, and I would add, particularly one founded in an identity in God, are far less likely to do risky behaviors, to abuse, drug and alcohol.

A sense of self. A sense of self rooted in God is critically important. Discovering who you are and what you love empowers you to be a disciple of God. Because when you discover what you love and you can commit yourself and your service to that thing, you fall in love with part of God's world. You serve that out of a sense of self.

It's liberating, it's empowering. So churches need to be careful. When we tell young people or other marginalized people, you need to deny yourself, you need to become less. Because we need to ask, have they had time to develop a sense of self that they might deny?

In his book the Gifts of Being Yourself, the developmental psychologist David Benner says, we cannot surrender a self we have never possessed. Sounds obvious when you say it that way. So we need to be careful. Sometimes being made to feel small is liberating. But if we're not careful, we can imprison people unintentionally by making them feel small, by asking them to deny themselves.

So what do we do? What's the difference? What's that space between these poles, these seemingly polar opposites? I think this is maybe why John the Baptist tells the story that he tells. Part of me wishes he had just stopped with, he must increase, I must decrease.

It's perfect. It's tight. Like rhetorically, it's like, you know, the positive, the negative. It's like the same words on each side of the comma. What?

Don't ruin it. But he adds this strange story about a wedding. It's important for us to remember that it's not till like 300 years ago that people got married because they loved each other. In the vast History of humankind, people being able to choose who they marry. And the main reason you're choosing who you marry because you love them is pretty novel and recent.

When John is telling the story about a wedding that is coming, he is talking about an ancient wedding ceremony. And ancient wedding ceremonies are not primarily about love. It's great if the two involved can love each other. But primarily, an ancient wedding ceremony is about the peaceful unification of two families. Two families becoming one family.

That's what a wedding is about.

And so they come and they try to make John feel small. But he says, that's okay. I know who I am. I am not the bridegroom. I am the friend of the bridegroom.

I must decrease so that he can increase. There is a procession happening as John is speaking. The family of God is on their way and in some ways has already arrived. They are on their way to pledge their love and devotion and faithfulness to the family of people. And when the bridegroom comes and he makes his promises to be faithful, to deliver, to protect, to suffer on behalf of the bride, he will make good on his word and heaven and earth will be one.

There's a wedding that's about to happen.

And if I know who I am. Since John the Baptist knows who he is, there is a freedom in saying, I'm not as big as God. Hallelujah. I'm not as big as God. Something bigger and better than me is coming.

Hallelujah. This encounter does two things. Number one, it is intended to welcome all who prepare themselves for the event. Everyone who prepares themselves through the washing of baptism is welcome at the wedding feast, period.

That means the religious leaders cannot gatekeep this encounter if someone is willing to say yes to John's baptism. And now we might say Jesus Baptism. They belong. The end. They are our sisters.

They are our brothers. They are part of our family that is being wedded to the family of God through the bridegroom's life loving generosity.

That means church has to be a place where people can come and form their identity. That means if they are willing to be a part of the baptized, this must be a place. My church that I am a part of must be a place where people are allowed to and we are being patient with them to develop who they are. There is no denying themselves if they haven't.

Baptism was never meant to be legalistic. That's the great irony in this tradition. It was never meant to be legalistic. It was meant to do away with religious legalism and shallow, repetitive ra religious rituals. That never meant anything I should say, stopped having their meaning.

Baptism is supposed to help people discover who they are as an invited person to this encounter with the bridegroom. But the second thing that this means is that all who say yes, all who prepare themselves through the ritual of baptism, all who belong are simultaneously invited. Come and die.

I want to tell a story about a moment early on in my time here. It was back there in the living room, and the elders of this church invited all of the staff and all the ministers to a meeting to talk about a potentially contentious issue. And we all sat around in a circle, and Dickie Porsche was the timekeeper. And everyone had two minutes to say what they wanted to say. And let me tell you, Dickey did not give anyone 121 seconds.

He's a good man.

And I thought I was listening. Well, I thought I was behaving well. A couple people said things that bothered me.

We all got done and it was good. We all understood where we all stood. And then a loving, trusted mentor who I will not name came up to me and said, hi, David. And I said, hi, David.

Could be anybody.

He said, I gather you didn't agree with all the things that were said tonight. And I said, how'd you know? He said, you have a terrible poker face. You really need to work on it. He said, I didn't either.

I didn't either. But I need you to know two things.

He said, I have come to learn unity is as important as truth, not more important. That the drive to unity would shut down truth, but not less important.

Truth and unity have to be equal values in the family of God.

The other thing he said was, I have come to trust the spirit of God in that room. If we listen to God, we will do what's right.

Which was really humbling for me because I was pretty sure that God wanted what I wanted.

We'd even talked about it.

I had a hard time understanding that a group of human beings could eventually get around to trusting that we could hear from God and do the right next thing. I thought, no, that's not how things happen. That's not how progress is made. You have a point. You argue better than the other person.

You make it known, and then when they don't understand, you say it again.

That's not how things work. When the bridegroom is on his way when the bridegroom is on his way I have to decrease and I think pretty highly of myself sometimes. It's a problem.

When the bridegroom is on his way he must be increasing. And the only way that the bridegroom can increase in my life is and in this world is for me to take a back seat.

I wanted to say that to you today because that's what you taught me, because it's blessed my life and my ministry and my family's life. Since that moment, this church has loved us well and taught us about the bridegroom who is coming. So I just wanted to say it back to you. It's so important.

Church has to be a place where people belong and are able to discover who they are. And when they do, the invitation is to come and die. Decrease that the one who is powerful to make all things new might increase in our hearts and in our lives and in this church and in this city.

There's a difference between being made to feel small and being set free. They tried to make John the Baptist feel small that day. And he said, you're right. How great is it that Jesus baptism is taking off? That's what.

What I'm here for.

I think church should be a place that acts like John the Baptist, that invites people simultaneously into belonging and into identity discovery and in discovering that they are part of the family of God that is being wedded to the family of people that is being wedded to the family of God.

God wants us all to be free from bondage. And the good news this morning is that there is a procession of the family of God that is on their way to meet us again.

And when they come, they pledge themselves to us again. And heaven and earth will be one and all will be set free.

Have you had time to discover who you are?

Are you ready to let it all go?

I have found that when you do, you're set free. And that feels really good. I want to close by doing something, saying a prayer here together that you taught me. A prayer that effectively says he must become greater and I must become lesser. There's a lot of different forms of this prayer.

It's called the prayer of holy indifference. This will be our way of blessing each other and sending each other. This will be our benediction. Today. I'm gonna read the first line.

I think there's three stanzas. I'm read the first line, and then we'll all read each line together. Sound good? Church, would you stand?

You kind of can't really see it, but that first line is italicized. That's the one I'll read. Well, I'll read it everything after that. If you read when I read it, it's not that big of a deal. I'm not that big of a deal.

I must decrease. There we go. As a way of reminding ourselves of the freedom we have in Christ, the freedom we have of letting go. Pray with me, Lord Jesus Christ. Free me from every attachment that keeps me from you.

Free me from my need to be noticed, my desire to control my desire loss, my hunger for the needs of others. Teach my heart to desire only what leads me closer to you. Decrease whatever in me with you, your name, my pride, my self rejection, my need to be right, and even my desire to build my own name. May I be content to point and heal myself, finding my joy not in these, but in seeing you instead. Make me like John who rejected the here person's voice.

Let my deepest ambition become his simple confession.