On many Sundays I find pastors telling me “Remember your baptism!” Sometimes water is poured into the font. Sometimes there is a bit of liturgy.
But what do we remember, really?
I hang around Presbyterian churches. Most of the people around me were baptized as infants. How many secretly respond
Nope! Can’t remember a thing about it.”
Even in a church where members are baptized only after making a commitment to live as disciples, some might quietly reply
What about it?”
The point is not our conscious recall of the event. We are to remind ourselves of the fact that we have been baptized. This is something I know on excellent authority, from my parents. I’m asked to call the fact to mind, to consider its significance as a grown up Christian. But again, what about it?
Reformed theology emphasizes God’s role in baptism–far more important than our own faulty declaration that we will be faithful. God is the reliable party. In baptism, as in the Lord’s Supper, God declares the promises we call “gospel”: the good news of love, and forgiveness, and new life that come to us in Jesus Christ.
As I’ve previously written, Reformed theologians look for the promises in the nature of the words, the material elements and actions of the sacraments.
In the case of baptism, water is the element. Just as water washes dirt from our bodies, in baptism we are promised that Christ’s blood and Spirit wash us of our sins. They talk in comparisons:
as surely as”
just as”
as much as”
But, if we are going to call this promise to mind, we need to figure where it comes from.
The Heidelberg Catechism (the 450 year old Reformed summary of biblical Christianity that I blog about unrelentingly) poses that question directly.
71 Q. Where does Christ promise
that we are washed with his blood and Spirit
as surely as we are washed with the water of baptism?In the institution of baptism, where he says:
“Go therefore and make disciples of all nations,
baptizing them in the name of the Father,
and of the Son
and of the Holy Spirit.”“The one who believes and is baptized will be saved;
but the one who does not believe will be condemned.”This promise is repeated when the Scripture calls baptism
“the water of rebirth” and
the washing away of sins.
The first quotation, from the “great commission” (Matt. 28:19), simply establishes that Christ instituted baptism, commanding us to baptize those who become disciples — no promise yet.
The second quotation (Mark 16:16) shows Jesus emphasizing importance of baptism by linking it to salvation — in a way often taken to support only adult baptism, but that’s another post.
There is a promise here, perhaps. But it still doesn’t do that comparison thing, telling us how we are washed by Jesus as surely as our bodies are washed with water.
Though this comparison is the whole purpose of the question, the answer becomes clear only in the last three lines. The writers say “the promise is repeated” in various other passages. They want to encourage a broad and deep engagement with the Bible, and searching out the topic would be a good exercise, but they give us two excellent example:
One is Titus 3:5 where Paul tells his young colleague,
…he saved us, not because of any works of righteousness that we had done, but according to his mercy, through the water of rebirth and renewal by the Holy Spirit.”
The other is Acts 22:16, where Paul, the former persecutor, recounts the words of trembling Ananias:
And now why do you delay? Get up, be baptized, and have your sins washed away, calling on his name.”
When we remember our baptism, we are remembering that these promises were declared over us, to us personally. We remember that God is faithful to his promises. He does not go back on his word to us.
Most of us today undervalue our own baptism. We would be wise to remember it — to call to mind the promise given us in Christ that in those waters we were reborn, renewed, and washed of every sin.
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I would love to hear from you in the comments! Do you call your own baptism to mind? What kind of role does that play in your faith?
Dr. Hansen, I do recall my own baptism it occurred when I was 11 years old. However, more telling than my own personal baptism is a story I’d like to share with you that will forever be ingrained in my mind. When an infant is baptized you will recall the pastor asks the congregation to make a vow, and that is a vow to teach this child in the way of the Lord. Well, here’s the story: A good friend of mine whose father was our retired pastor (in fact his father married my wife and I 32 years ago). My friend lost his wife to cancer at an early age (late 20’s). He had two children, who were both very young. At her service, he (my friend) got up to speak to the congregation and with tears flowing down his face, he said to the crowd, did you mean it? Did you really mean it when you vowed to teach my children at their baptism, because if you did then I need you now more than ever. This to me was one of the most moving moments I can recall at church and it reminded me that when we make a vow that maybe, just maybe we ought to take it seriously!
Dr. Hansen, I was baptized as a child and have no memory of it and for years have silently wished I did, but not any more. Your blog and your comments and the indepth reading I have done in the Book of Confessions during your class, it has all helped me realize I have been focusing on the wrong things,,,I do not need the memory, I need focus, lazar focus on the promise I received as a child, as a child of God, and obtain my comfort and reassurance from that. I was being “childish” and selfish wanting to remember the ceremony or even to have had a more active part in it, I have been marked as Christ’s all this time and that is what I need to remember, thank you for helping me to do that.
Sid, you are so welcome! What a wonderful message to receive this morning. Thanks tons!
Blessings,
Gary
I remember my Baptism with resentment. I was coerced by a fear monger minister who said I wasn’t saved and it was an act of disobedience. I was 12 years old and being raised in an alcoholic, abusive home. I was afraid not to be baptized. Nobody bothered to tell me I could have refused. Nobody told me it involved being held under the water either. I went down shaking and crying and came up shaking and crying. Children view God the way they view their fathers. I saw God as a Great No Show, distant, drunk.And I had an even less favorable view of all ministers after what that preacher did to me when I was a child. God has a lot to say about someone who misleads a child. They’ll have a millstone tied around their neck and be thrown in the sea. It wasn’t until I had my first child that I had to rely and trust on God. Psalm 118:8 brings me comfort. I’m 58 years old and I want to follow in believer’s Baptism. My Methodist minister just drove a stake in my heart and stands firm that he won’t do it. He said 2nd Baptism is forbidden by the Mehodist church because it implies God didn’t keep his promise the first time. That’s unfair and unjustified to deny someone a genuine Believer’s baptism, when the first one was done without proper immersion in the Scripture before immersion in the water. Jesus never denied anyone water who needed it. Paul rebaptized 12 men who had been baptized by John the Baptist. So far no one has shown me any scripture that forbids a 2nd chance Baptism, only their opinions on the subject. My baptism is supposed to be my testimony and witness that God claims me as His child and that I’m keeping my promise to Him. There is no commandment in the OT and nobwords in red that Jesus spoke forbidding anyone to be Baptized in His name. A minister has no right to deny God’s gift of grace to another, neither does he have the power to condemn somone who wants to honor God’s call on their life. My minister closed the door on me, so I sought out a God fearing Wesleyan minister who will honor what God has laid on my heart. Thank God for two Wesleyan ministers who support me in my spiritual need.