November 30: St. Andrew's Day

Well, this will be a big day for me; it's the Commemoration of my namesake, my patron saint. Seventy years ago I was baptized by my father, a Lutheran pastor, on St. Andrew's Day, November 30 in Good Shepherd Lutheran Church. Quite frankly I've always been delighted that I was baptized as an infant because that's always helped me understand what Jesus said to Andrew in the Gospel of John:

You did not choose Me but I chose you [emphasis mine], and appointed you that you would go and bear fruit, and that your fruit would remain, so that whatever you ask of the Father in My name He may give to you.

Being chosen (adopted by God is the phrase St. Paul likes to use in his Letterto the Romans) to be a precious member of the Most Holy Trinity's family as an infant has always been a great blessing for me. As a toddler, little boy, teenager, and young adult, the Church, especially my godparents--Aunt Pearl and Uncle Ward--helped me remember my holy baptism with cards, phone calls, and prayers. Whenever I had a big event in my life, Pearl and Ward were there with me. With the Church they taught me that when we say, "In the Name of the Father and Son and the Holy Spirit" (and perhaps make the sign of the cross on our bodies) at the beginning of worship and in our morning and evening prayers, we are to remember that "we are baptized!" That means we are saved by the grace of God. That announcement means that I always knew I was a child of God--even when I was a "bad boy," a prodigal child. It is Holy Baptism that gives us our family identify as members of the Body of Christ. It is Holy Baptism that clearly reminds us that we are saved by grace--God's choosing us! Holy Baptism tells us that it is the Holy Spirit who creates our ever-growing and lively faith in Christ--from baby-breath to dying breath. Holy Baptism places us squarely and cross-wise into the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ as Paul tells us in Romans 6. In Holy Baptism we are washed to walk in newness of life. So when sin, frustrations, doubts, guilt, and anxieties attack us, we are to say, as Luther so often did, "I am baptized!" That's how the Most Holy Trinity gives us the victory we have in Christ.

So on November 30 when I got my name and was baptized, I'm especially happy to look back over the past seventy years and see how true it has been: "Andy, you did not choose Me; I have chosen you."

Now it's my responsibility and calling to live like my namesake. St. Andrew liked to introduce others, like Peter, to Christ. And that may be my special calling: to introduce others to Jesus. Tradition says that St. Andrew died on an X-shaped cross. The shape of that cross reminds me that I need to put myself on an "X" too: an X to ego, an X to worry and anxiety, an X to sin, an X to everything that keeps me from being a faithful witness to Jesus. So here's the prayer,the collect, that I'll be saying with you on St. Andrew's day:

Almighty God, who gave such grace to your apostle Andrew that He readily obeyed the call of your Son Jesus Christ, and brought his brother with him: Give unto us, who are called by your Word, grace to follow him without delay, and to bring those near to us into his gracious presence; who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever.

A postscript: Because I need to be "on the road" a good bit next week, I may not be posting much for several days, but you can surely count on my sharing the beginnings of Advent with you on the evening of December 1 when I'm back in Richmond, Kentucky.