Father Randy Koenigsknecht
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Following the Feast of the Baptism of the Lord, Father Randy reflects on the deeper meaning of Jesus’ mission: to forgive sins and baptize us with the Holy Spirit. This teaching explores repentance, sacrificial love, and the call to ongoing immersion in Christ through prayer, confession, and the Eucharist. A practical and inspiring invitation to live a Spirit-filled life marked by joy, holiness, and evangelization.
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Father Randy:
So last week, as you may recall, we celebrated the Feast of the Baptism of the Lord, and we heard about that moment of Jesus’ baptism. This week is more or less Baptism Part Two—what happens afterwards. Remember that the baptism is one of the most crucial moments of Jesus’ life. It’s the moment that his saving mission actually begins, as he moves into his public ministry of teaching, healing, and gathering disciples around him.
While those are the most obvious external things Jesus does, none of them on their own actually constitute his ultimate goal. Jesus did not come simply to be a teacher or a miracle worker. Those things are corollaries to his true mission, which we see laid out in the Gospel through John the Baptist. John tells us that Jesus is the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world and the one who will baptize with the Holy Spirit.
Fundamentally, those two things are why Jesus came: to free us from our sins and to give us the Holy Spirit. Sin is an offense against God—against our neighbor and against ourselves. It is a failure in our responsibility to love, either by doing something directly contrary to that call or by failing to love through inaction.
The reasons we choose to sin are varied. Love is hard. It requires sacrifice, and sometimes we simply do not want to pay that price. Other times, we convince ourselves that half-hearted attempts or good intentions are enough. Often it is not even malicious; we simply act without thinking. Sometimes we think sin will satisfy us. But the reality is that we all fall short. We fail to love in countless ways, and we can be very creative in avoiding responsibility. That is precisely why Jesus came.
He came to forgive our sins and to give us the power, through the Holy Spirit, to be free of them and to live holy lives—to become saints. John the Baptist calls Jesus the Lamb of God, the one who takes away sins. For us, lambs may seem cute or harmless, but for the people of Jesus’ time, lambs were animals of sacrifice. During Passover, hundreds of thousands of lambs were sacrificed. So when Jesus is called the Lamb of God, it reveals immediately that his plan is to lay down his life for us, to love us to the end.
Where we have failed to love God and neighbor, Jesus loves perfectly. His sacrifice is an act of love so great that it compensates for all the offense of our sins. It is the love our wounded hearts could never offer on their own. Christ’s love, poured out on the cross, reconciles us to the Father.
The key for us is to receive that gift. We must allow him to be our Savior. That is what repentance means: turning away from the old way of life and committing ourselves to following Jesus. This is the symbolism of baptism and what happens every time we go to confession. This is also where the second part of Jesus’ mission comes in—to baptize us with the Holy Spirit.
The Holy Spirit is power. He convicts us of our sins while also revealing the Father’s eagerness to forgive. The Spirit gives us the strength to live out the demands of love, to follow Jesus with sacrifice and with joy—not as a burden, but as the fullness of life. This is how we are meant to live: united with God and with one another.
As we live more fully in the power of the Holy Spirit, we are naturally led into ministry and evangelization—sharing the joy and freedom we have found so that others may experience it too. But getting there takes work. It requires ongoing encounters with the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit through prayer.
Jesus wants to baptize us with the Holy Spirit—not just once, but continually. Baptism literally means to immerse. A quick dip is not enough. Our lives must be immersed in Christ so that we are gradually transformed.
That immersion begins with prayer—asking for the Spirit and giving God permission to change us. Sometimes that means asking others to pray with us. Opportunities like adoration, prayer teams, confession, and the Eucharist all help us renew our commitment and open our hearts to God’s transforming grace.
If we continue leaning into prayer and trusting in the slow work of God, we will be changed. And through us, others will encounter Christ. Like John the Baptist, we will be able to point him out and say:
Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world—the one who baptizes with the Holy Spirit and with power.