Through the ages scholars have surmised the identity of the servant in Isaiah 42:1-9. Two interpretations have emerged; one identifies the servant with a heroic individual, and the other with the collective Israel. Contemporary readers, inclined toward the latter interpretation, might substitute the collective Israel with the LGBT communities of our respective contexts. We might ask then with Israel, how do we understand ourselves as chosen by God, as delight to God’s being (the Hebrew nephesh has a more wholistic meaning than the translation “soul” suggests) and endowed with God’s spirit (Isaiah 42: 1)?

There is much joy in this passage, joy found in struggle. A female-identified God takes a female “you” by the hand (verse 6). Gender boundaries have become fluid.  The goal of the struggle, namely to “establish justice on the earth” is all that counts — justice for all everywhere (verse 4). Such a universal promise offers hope, even though some might find God’s impartiality (see also Acts 10:34) hard to bear because it means that God is impartial to LGBT people as well. There clearly remains a tension between God’s universal promise and God’s choosing a particular people.

Chosenness has long been understood as entitlement that has resulted in violence and terror for many. What would it mean if we instead understood chosenness as belovedness? Such theology offers rich possibilities as it takes the emphasis away from the supposed qualities of those who are loved and emphasizes instead the gracious gift of love itself.  Still the idea of choseness raises serious questions as to who is left out of choice and left out of love. The Isaiah passage adds an important criterion: the bringing of justice – leading us to claim that if we love, we make justice.  Feeling loved leads to more self-esteem and consequently a better ability to act justly and to extend love beyond the confines of a chosen few.

	What does baptism mean to you?  In what ways might it connect you with others or separate you from others?

Among the current lectionary passages, Matthew 3:13-17 offers the connecting thread. Baptism is introduced as the equalizer. Within a Christian context this ritual functions to initiate and promote bonding.

On the other hand in interfaith and inter-religious contexts, baptism is sometimes seen as placing barriers on who can belong.  Psalm 29 was chosen in the lectionary for how it links with the baptism of Jesus.  In the passage, as with Matthew’s account, “the voice of God is over the waters” (verse 3).  Yet the psalm’s powerful words over the waters do not call out one individual as blessed, but rather demonstrates God’s power, majesty, and blessing over all creation.   What is God intending in all this water work?  What does baptism, a rite that marks inclusion into and exclusion out of a community of choseness, imply about those who do not enter its water?  How do we express openness to other faiths? What rituals might affirm God’s working outside of the community of the baptized?

The gifts of the spirit of God and divine love are the ritual outcomes of Jesus’ baptism. As a result we too become agents of God’s spirit, mercy and justice in the world – part of the baptismal covenant we often don’t remember. What difference does our lives of faith look like when we truly live our baptismal covenants?

As baptized LGBT people of faith, we are called not to shrink from our baptismal covenant.  Even though there are those who attempt to push us outside the community, we are the community of the baptized, we are beloved.  Our baptisms call us to work for opening up the blessings of baptism for all within Christ’s body.  Such blessings, it seems, include marriage and ordination for LGBT people who are called to, but denied these rites.  At the same time, we are called to look beyond our own chosen community to live in love and justice with God’s children of all religions and faiths.

	If you are not baptized, what about this conversation encourages you to seek baptism or to turn away from it?  What difference might baptism make in how you see others or act in the world?