A book titled ‘Freckles’ by Gene Stratton Porter was one of my all time favorite books when I was growing up. It’s about a young man who lives in the Timberlost of Michigan. He has red hair, was raised in an orphanage, and one of his hands is missing. He has no idea where he came from, who his parents are and why his hand was missing. Once he is too old for the orphanage, he goes to apply for a job and the man who owns the company, Mr. McLean asks him "What is your name? The young man replies, "Freckles." Mr. McLean laughs and says that’s good enough for everyday but indicates that he can’t just put Freckles on the company books. So he asks again, “What is your name?” Freckles replies, “I haven't any name."

This exchange between the young boy applying for a job in a lumber camp and his potential new boss expresses the common theme of identity that we wrestle with all of our lives.

Who am I? Where do I belong? To whom do I belong? Why am I here? Who are these other people and what is my relationship to them?

These common questions which come to us in adolescence and young adulthood never really go away and there are as many different answers as there are people in the world, because each one of us is uniquely different, a one of a kind creation.

So, from a time we cannot really pinpoint, we are wondering who and whose we are and we are constantly receiving answers, sometimes from the wrong sources: our roles, our work, our accomplishments, our acquisitions.

When I lived in MIchigan I knew a woman named Cindy who was adopted. She had searched for her biological mother only to find that her mother had died. But she found she had several siblings who lived in Tennessee. Now Cindy had been raised in the upper society of Michigan. She was the President of the Jr. League, Senior Warden at the church, mother of two over-achieving children, and wife of a successful businessman.

Her world consisted of high-powered events, nights at the opera, and vacations abroad. Her newly found relatives had never traveled far from home and bowling was the norm for their social outings. I wondered how they would get along. Cindy went to visit them and this is what she said, “For the first time in my life I was accepted for who I am…not because I am President of the Jr. League, or Senior Warden or somebody’s mother or wife. I was accepted and loved for just being me.”

Ultimately what we need, what we are searching for is to hear how God gives us identity and value, for being who we are.

In my case, the story of Freckles has been and continues to be a source of strength for my own faith. I am adopted, and although I was given a name by my adoptive parents, like Freckles, for years I had no idea what my birth name was or under what circumstances I was born. So the Isaiah passage came to have great meaning for me personally: "I have called you by name, you are mine." That book always spoke to my situation even before I understood why.

Freckles asks Mr. McLean to give him a name. Mr. McLean says, “I will tell you what we will do, my lad, my father was my ideal man, and I loved him better than any other I have ever known. If I give to you the name of my nearest kind and the man I loved best, will that do?" Freckles was silent. McLean said, "All right, I will write it on the list, James Ross McLean." "Thank you mightily," said Freckles. "That makes me feel almost as if I belonged, already." "You do," said McLean. "Until someone armed with every right comes to claim you, you are mine.

And this little vignette puts me right there with Freckles. And I hear what he hears, except it is God who is saying, "You are mine." God is going to hang on to me forever because I belong to God.

This past Wednesday night at our evening service we talked about our names, where they came from, if we liked them, what they meant. We talked also of our dreams, our passions in life. This belonging and being called by name is crucial to our well being, to our living in wholeness.

When Jesus joined the crowd at the river he got in line with everyone else. People were there because they were hurting from a world where living was hard and harsh and they were seeking a new beginning. Jesus joined them at his baptism. He identified with those who were in need of God, of love, of acceptance.

At his baptism the scripture tells us that Jesus was praying, maybe giving thanks, maybe asking for guidance, when the heavens opened up and the Holy Spirit in the form of dove came upon him. A voice declared that this is my beloved in whom I am well pleased. In that brief moment Jesus was given a name we all yearn to hear – beloved - you are my beloved. You might say his real life really began at that moment.

Beloved - that is how Jesus treated others – as his beloved. His baptism led him to a deeper understanding of his relationship to the people around him, those who felt alone, and those who were on the fringes of society.

Entering into a life which follows the teachings of Jesus is not for the faint-hearted. It takes courage, determination, and discipline. We need to be reminded that we are beloved and precious in God’s sight because often the world, and yes, even the church, give us a different message.

William Booth, the founder of the Salvation Army, spent many years reaching out to the poor and needy on the streets of London. At Christmas, London churches sent representatives to the streets to invite the poor to Christmas celebrations. Crowds gathered to partake of this annual outpouring of generosity. The Anglicans began by announcing, "All of you who are Anglicans, come with us." The Roman Catholics followed: "All who are Catholic, come with us." Then the Methodists, the Lutherans, and all the other denominations announced, "Whoever is one of us, come with us." Finally, when all of the churches had made their invitations and left, a large crowd of people would still remain. At that point, William Booth would step out of the crowd and shout out to the people, "All of you who belong to no one, come with me!" He was echoing God’s voice – you are my beloved.

God does not really care to what denomination we belong because really, at the deepest level of our lives, we all belong to God. Christian, Jew, Muslim, women, men, children, gay, straight, differing abilities, sane or slightly akilter – we all belong to God who will never let us go. We are all God’s beloved.

This past Wednesday night at our evening service we talked about our names – what they meant where they came from if we like them or not. It reminded me of a story out of one of the sessions from Living the Questions, a curriculum I have used before.

Dr. Heather Murray Elkins, An associate Professor of worship at Drew Theological School and an ordained elder of the Methodist Church, was describing a retreat for pastors that she had conducted. Toward the end of the retreat she told the group to look through scripture and find what name applied to them or what Scripture belonged to them. When they were ready they sat in a circle of chairs, with one chair in middle. Each person took a turn sitting in the middle chair and they would hear each other pronounce their names. She said it was going very well and was quite powerful. Then a very young man, young for the ministry, sat in the chair. He didn’t say anything. The group was getting uncomfortable, people looking at watches. Dr. Elkins asked “Is there some name, some story, you wish to share?”

He didn’t look at group, only looked at his hands. “There are names I wanted, I looked for three days but none of them were strong enough to replace the name I have the name I have, I was given. I was given this name when I was young and it was repeated to me. My father gave me this name.” Dr Elkins asked if he would be willing to share what the name given to him by his father. He said, “my name is ‘not good enough’, that’s my name, my father gave it to me, and then he began to cry.

Dr. Elkins said, ”We were watching him, like he was drowning right in front of us, a room full of lifeguards and we didn’t know what to do, how to break the power of that name. Then the Spirit began doing her work almost like a gush of wind. The group got up, all at once, and went to the chair where he was sitting, weeping, and we laid hands on him and then it wasn’t just one voice but all our voices came together at once saying, ‘you are my beloved son, in you I am well pleased.’ We just paused and let the blessing rest and we all sat down. As we packed to go home, Dr. Elkins went over to the young man. She said, “I need to know will that make any different to you?” He replied, “I don’t know. I feel as if something here was broken and it isn’t now. But I promise that every time I put my hand in the water to name another human being in front of God I’ll remember who I am.”

This is the secret of Baptism. Yes, we become part of a community. Yes, we make a covenant with God to behave in a certain way. But the real secret, the real message is the one of absolute love that God says to each and every one of us “You are my beloved. I am the Lord your God. You are precious in my sight, and honored, and I love you." Expressing that affirmation of life - you are beloved and blessed – through our words and actions is the best way we can follow Jesus, live out our baptismal vows and express our love to God.

At this point I moved to the Baptismal Font at the entrance of the church- filled the font with water and blessed it using the words in the Baptismal Service. I reminded people that during liturgical reforms the altar was moved away from the wall so people could have a sense of actually gathering around a table and that the font was placed at the entrance of the church so whenever one came into the church they could always remember their own baptism. Often people dip their fingers into the water and then cross themselves – as a reminder that they are marked as Christ’s own forever.