Our celebrations tell a story, the fuller story of Christmas.

After preparing in Advent for the birth of Christ, we have adored him in the manger. Like the shepherds, the Magi, Joseph and Mary, we too have pondered this beautiful thing—the birth of Jesus—in our hearts. In the feast of the Holy Family we marked the small wonderous beginnings of our redemption, that it all began within the arms of a mother and the care of a father, amazed that God would inaugurate so vast a salvation within a family so small. At the Epiphany, we learned that though small, this child nonetheless bears cosmic significance, that although an infant, he’s also king and God of everything and all.

Which brings us to the celebration of Jesus’s baptism. Here we see at least two things revealed. First, in his baptism Jesus is revealed Son of the Father, that upon him the Spirit has come down. That is, he is revealed to be of the Trinity, or as we say in the Creed, “God from God and Light from Light.” Such is how we interpret the dove and the voice of the Father, giving new meaning to the royal psalm, “This is my beloved Son.” This feast celebrates the divine confirmation of what the Magi suspected, that this is a king indeed but more. That he is God as well, adored by all creation.

But Jesus’s baptism also reveals how God has drawn near. John’s baptism was preparatory; the baptism Christ inaugurates is sacramental. That is, in baptism Christ unites himself to us. In the Collect for the feast we pray that, having been adopted in baptism, we may remain faithful to Jesus so that we too may be “well pleasing.” The point is that in baptism we find Jesus, God and man, and this is how we truly accept what happened at Christmas: in living the Christian life in the sacraments and in following and obeying Jesus no matter how hard the road to Calvary may prove.

So, don’t forget to cross yourself in and out of Church, and by that little gesture, remember and renew your own baptism. And know that’s how we can see him, how we can truly come to know Jesus, and how we can begin to be faithful in a world in need of faithful people. By meeting him in the sacraments and listening for his voice.