Walking on the boardwalk in the mornings affords me the opportunity to think about water. I see water – a lot of water – in the bay as I travel the length of the boardwalk on my morning “constitutional.”

Water is indispensable to our lives on Planet Earth. This world is approximately seventy- percent water, and our bodies are made mostly of water. We use it to keep ourselves clean; we use it to prepare our food. Most of us need to be reminded that we should drink at least eight eight-ounce glasses of water in order for our bodies to function optimally, and most of us in the United States think of water as so common a thing that we use it carelessly.

We know that in some places in the world insufficient water causes death and destruction. When the rains do not come, crops, animals, and people die. When the rains return to these areas, life returns as well, as the plants of the ground and the inhabitants of the land receive the life-giving benefits of water.

In Holy Baptism, our Lord uses water to bless us and to bring us life. At the time of our baptism, water is poured over us in the name of the triune God. This water with God’s powerful Word blesses us and raises us to new life, eternal life in Christ, and we are forgiven and cleansed. Luther says this: “Thus we see what a great and excellent thing baptism is, which snatches us from the jaws of the devil and makes us God’s own, overcomes and takes away sin and daily strengthens the new person, and always endures...Therefore let all Christians regard their baptism as a daily garment that they are to wear all the time.” Baptism is something that God does for us, and it is something that we live each and every day. In our walking wet by repentance and daily dying and rising through the water of baptism, we find abundant life and fullness of joy in Christ through whom God created water and us.

Next time you wash your face, get a drink from a fountain, or see the waters of our beautiful Chesapeake Bay, give thanks to God for the gift of water, and the gift of Holy Baptism.

Vicar Patti