You have probably heard by now that Bob Puckett and Carl Burke really hit the jackpot this past deer hunting season. Seems they were out in the woods, wearing their little red plaid hunters jackets and those hats with the stupid-looking ear flaps, when they spotted a big buck. I'm not sure which one it was who dropped the deer, but one of them did. And it was a prize, with a huge rack of antlers. So Bob and Carl took up the deer's hindquarters and started dragging it back to the car.

This was very hard work, of course, and it was made all the more difficult by the fact that the antlers kept getting caught up in the brambles, and the roots and the saplings along the trail. Two hours went by, and they were still a long ways from the car. Both Bob and Carl were sweating profusely, and cursing each other under their breath for not just hiding in the car and waiting for a deer to come along hitchhiking.

Well, about this time, another hunter showed up, and he took one look at Bob, Carl and the deer, and starting laughing. "Have you been pulling the deer like that all along?" he asked.

Bob and Carl both pointed fingers at each other saying, "It was HIS idea."

But the hunter only laughed all the more. Then he said, "You know, it'd be a heck of a lot easier if you just pulled that deer by the antlers!"

Well, Bob and Carl looked at each other as though they'd just had a major epiphany. Quickly, they dropped the hindquarters and picked up the deer by the antlers and started dragging. It slid along through the forest almost as easily as a knife through butter.

Well, about an hour later, Carl smiled at Bob and said, "You know Bob, I'm glad that fella came along. It's a LOT easier pulling the deer this way!"

"Yeah," Bob smiled in agreement, "only trouble is…we keep getting further and further away from the car!"

I don't know about you, but there are times in my life when I find myself simply and completely lost. Either snagged in the brambles of life, or spun around until I'm dizzy and don't know which way is up. Sometimes its in the midst of a major crisis - when I'm facing a problem that is simply larger than I am; other times, its when I get caught up in the everyday details of human life.

How about you? Do you sometimes find yourself feeling a little bit lost and overwhelmed?

Up in the northeast corner of our state, people are just now coming to grips with the terrible devastation and loss of life inflicted by the flash floods of this past week. In a Knox area school, the family and teachers of a seven-year old first-grader are trying to figure out how and why the boy brought a loaded gun to school. Statistics tell us that, in this very moment, a significant number of people in our own community will be wrestling with issues like divorce, or alcoholism, or depression. And all it takes is a brief conversation with friends and neighbors to realize that life - even when its at its best - is at the very least difficult and confusing.

Today's Scripture lesson is aimed at people just like us. In the early Christian Church, there were no superheroes. There was no such thing as the perfect person with all the answers or all the resources needed to overcome life's challenges. Like us, the early Christians were moms and dads, husbands and wives, young and old. They were pretty ordinary people doing their best to make it through the same struggles of life that you face everyday.

These are the people the New Testament was written for.

I think its fair to say that the purpose of the text this morning is to teach us the basics of how to negotiate the rocky terrain of life as Christians. It’s the story of the baptism of Jesus, and as Fred Craddock says, this story helps us see more clearly the meaning of becoming God's child.

It goes without saying that Jesus himself did not need to be baptized - a point emphasized by John the Baptist in Matthew's version of the story. The baptism serves instead as an illustration of what happens to us when we are baptized and that provides the basis for beginning our journey as children of God.

If you look closely at the story, you'll note that three things happen:

First, heaven is opened.

Second, the Holy Spirit descends.

Third, God creates a relationship of love.

If I never believed in miracles, I would have become a believer when I witnessed the birth of our children, Peter and Bethany. What beautiful sunrise or sunset could even compare to the way a newborn child turns from grayish blue to bright pink in just a few seconds of post-labor screaming? What lovely mountain overview projects the kind of wondrous peace that happens when a newborn is first folded into its mother's arms?

The birth of a baby is a beautiful miracle.

And it is not unlike the birth of a child of God.

Child development experts tell us that babies are born into a very small and limited world. The need for sleep, and to be fed, and held, and changed are the territory within which a newborn dwells.

But that tiny territory begins to get larger as the child grows, soon including the presence of parents and maybe siblings and a growing awareness of other sights and sounds and sensations.

Within months, that world has opened even wider to include other children, and the outdoors, and more and more complicated toys and relationships.

At every turn of life, the world is opened wider to us, and if we are to continue our growth and be healthy persons, we have to step into and adjust to each new environment. To not do so results in a mental illness called transference which impinges a person's ability to successfully negotiate life.

Notice then that Luke describes one experience of Christian birth and growth as the unveiling of a new world.

This opening of heaven is what happened, you see, when Noah found himself living in a time of great darkness and despair. All around, society was crumbling. Families were coming apart at the seams. The whole world, it seemed, had turned its back on God. Violence was everywhere. Man's inhumanity to man was constantly evident. Things were so bleak that the author of Genesis can only describe it as a time when total destruction loomed near.

What would you do if you lived in such a time? How would you save your family? How would you find your way through the confusion?

Here's what happened to Noah.

Noah found that he could turn to God for guidance. God could help him see this problem not from a human point of view but from God's point of view. God could give Noah a plan for dealing with the difficulty in a way that would glorify God, bless his family, and provide a new beginning for humanity.

Build an ark, God said.

A strange thing to do when you live in the middle of a desert! But you know the rest of the story.

Our lives are filled with many challenges, some that rise up to the level of Noah's problem. And what is so important for us to know is that heaven is opened to us! There is guidance to be found. There is a higher perspective to be gained.

Same sort of thing happened a short while after my dad gave his life to Christ. He was the comptroller of a large corporation. His mind was focused on detail, and numbers, and statistics. But one day, one of the secretaries in his office was looking a little glum and he said, "Ann, what's the matter?"

She burst into tears. Then Ann told my dad how she was going into the hospital the next day for cancer surgery. She looked very, very frightened.

I suppose there were a lot of things my dad could have said, but he was just learning to step into the larger world of God's Kingdom. Silently, he asked God for the words to say, and what popped out was, "Ann, my wife and I will be praying for you."

Afterwards, he wished he'd had something more eloquent to say to the woman. But that was what came out. And clearly, it was more than enough.

Ann says that, as she went under the anesthesia the next morning, my dad's words echoed in her mind. She had no family, was all alone in the world, and was simply overwhelmed by the thought that someone cared enough to pray. And somewhere during the course of the surgery - which was very successful - Ann experienced an encounter with Jesus. And it changed her life.

Here is a God who can reveal to you just the right words you can say to a person in need. Here is a God who wants to show you just the thing you need to do to find your way through a difficult place or relationship. Here is a God who wants to reveal every detail of how to build a happy and meaningful life, a solid and productive marriage, a healthy and nurturing family, a loving and life-changing church, and a righteous society in which the hungry are fed and the poor are set free.

But like little children teetering on the brink of their first steps, you and I have to muster up some courage and a decision to step into this brave new world.

So God adds a second gift. God sends us the Holy Spirit.

One of our Stephen Ministers touched my heart this week when she shared a story about an experience she recently had. She was facing some minor surgery, and was pretty nervous about it. Funny how there's no such thing as minor surgery when its happening to you! How very normal to be a bit jittery.

Well, she turned to God and prayed for his presence and protection, and as she prayed, she felt what seemed to be the touch of a hand on her shoulder. Of course, there was no one else in the room. And with the touch came a deep sense of peace. She knew that the Lord was with her all the way, and with that strength, she faced the surgery.

Now, I can't explain such experiences, but one thing I do know is that the Bible constantly assures us that God never asks us to take up any endeavor in life without providing us the power of his own presence.

The Holy Spirit descended, Luke tells us. Not only does God open to us the new world of his kingdom, but provides us the power to respond to it.

How can you take hold of hope, and love for others, and faith in the future when the doctor says you only have a few months to live? How can you forgive a person whose sin against you has bruised you to the very core? How can you commit yourself to love and be faithful to a husband or wife you've fallen out of love with? How can you follow God's principles for living when you've spent your whole life living out your own human principles? How can you give up a pattern of living that is contrary to God's will, and take up a moral standard that is higher than anything you've ever imagined?

The answer is that we cannot do any of these things by ourselves.

But we should know there is a hand on our shoulder. An unseen Spirit that has been given us to make it possible to respond to the new world of living as a Christian.

"You are my beloved!" God says.

Now that our kids are back in Massachusetts, Sandy and I can start eating junk food again. The other night, we ordered pizza from Domino's. After swallowing several pieces, a smile of contentment swept across my face and I said, "Honey, I LOVE Domino's pizza!"

And I do.

But I don't have a relationship with it!

Don't sell out your love for God or God's love for you by thinking of it as sheer enjoyment, or admiration, or a source of joy and contentment. Don't love God like you love pizza.

To be God's beloved is to spend time with God, to share your hopes and fears with God, to hold hands with God and walk through life together.

No other religion in the world dares to propose this radical thought: that what God wants from you is your friendship, and that what God wants to give you is Himself!

So this morning, why not make a new beginning? Tell God you want to take a crack at this friendship thing, that you want to discover the power of His presence, and that you're ready to step into the new heavenly world He's opened up.

Ecclesiastes tells us there is a time for everything.

Today is a time to be born…as children of the living God.