But I Am Baptized [pt2]

So...I was doing good keeping up with sermons for a minute...

Part two of this will be coming (hopefully in the not too distant future).

But I Am Baptized [pt1]

This past Sunday, while continuing our Shaped By Worship sermon series, we considered the issue of baptism.  But before we even get directly into baptism let me ask two questions: 1) What has shaped you to this point in your life? and 2) By what do you desire to be shaped from this point forward?  While both questions are valid, they are certainly not equal. 

Question #1, "what has shaped you?" can (LET ME BE CLEAR - it certainly does not have to) lead to a victim mentality.  E.g., "Well I did ______ because of ______."; or "Two years ago _____ happened and so now I ______."
Now, I am certainly not so naive as to say events and circumstances of our past have no impact on us.  This would obviously be false.  Yet we cannot ignore the reality that "has shaped" is a passive phrase.  In other words, the focus is on something external to us which has impacted us in such a way that we are "just this way" now.  Obviously this is a simplification and my intention is not to minimize life-shaping and even life-altering events.  Yet I do want to move our focus to... 

Question #2, "by what do you desire to be shaped?" can (again it will not automatically) lead to an overcomer mentality.  E.g., "I know ______ happened, but I am a child of God and so I am to imitate Him; therefore I will _____." 
If we desire something that puts us in an active role.  Once again this is a simplification and I do not want to be read as indicating we can "take the world by the ears" and become whatever we want.  Yet the reality is, to a large extent, we are in the driver's seat when it comes to things which shape our life. 

So how does this relate to baptism?  Well, before we get into that we need to briefly look at the actual word.  There are a handful of things we need to note...

1. It is a transliteration of a Greek word.  What this means is instead of taking the meaning of the word and bringing it over into English, the Greek letters have been brought directly (or correlatively) into English.  This should be clear when we see the Greek verb βαπτίζω close to the English "baptize".  This happens frequently in the Bible and a major drawback is words are then open (even moreso) to interpretation.  In the case of baptism it not only leads to confusion about how it is done (e.g., sprinkling, pouring, immersing), but it also leads to a loss of some significant nuances in the word...
2. The Greek word(s) related to baptism are full of violence.  E.g., Josephus uses the verb for "baptize" to describe ships that were sunk in the Mediterranean Sea, Herod the Great drowning an "enemy," and even for a sword being plunged into another's body.  As I said, much violence surrounds this word...as well as death.  These historical realities seem to be a "missing link," if you will, in understanding baptism today. 

With that (abbreviated) bit of background done it seems clear to me that baptism involves 1) being plunged under water and 2) death.  Yet it seems Christianity cannot even agree on these basics... 

In my "church heritage" (i.e., the Stone-Campbell Movement) a large emphasis has historically been placed on baptism.  After all, the leaders of the movement (which desired to unify all Christians, in whichever sect (basically denomination in our verbage today) they found themselves, in order to evangelize the world - cf. Jn17:20-23) desired to follow the New Testament Church as closely as possible.  I certainly applaud that intention...but we all know it is difficult (perhaps some of those difficulties will be a future post). 

In order to shorten this post I will quickly cut to the chase and end part one.  Often those in the heritage of the Stone-Campbell Movement (e.g., Christian Church, Chuch of Christ, Disciples of Christ) have focused on Acts 2:38, "Repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins, and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit."  While I think it is admirable to do this, unfortunately due to differing Theological perspectives (e.g., Reformed, Arminean, Openness, etc.) there is a great deal of disagreement on a text which seems very clear. 

I am not going to focus on v38 because what flabbergasts me about this text is not what Peter says so much as the response to what he said.  In v41, "So those who received his word were baptized, and there were added that day about three thousand souls."  That is amazing.  Yet a question that must be answered is "Why the response?".  Perhaps if we focused on the answer to that question the contention around baptism would dissipate and we would be able to utilize it as the tool/resource that it truly can be (and I believe was intended to be). 

Oh, you can read Galatians 3:23-29 as well as Matthew 21:23-27 to prepare for the next post.

Remembering...

This past Sunday we did something a bit different at New Life.  What did we do?  We remembered our baptism.  In part this meant reflecting on events surrounding (leading up to and after) the personal immersions (baptisms) of people at New Life. It could be described as ‘testimony’ time, but there was more to it than that…

There is too much to explain for a succinct summary. I had thought about posting the whole service on-line at www.nlccoe.com (it consisted of praising God in song, confessional readings, confessional prayers, teaching on baptism (biblical and historical), "remembering" our baptism, the Lord’s Supper, etc.), but due to the personal nature of some stories shared during the "remembering our baptism" part of the service I will not.

Sitting and listening to the stories of others I was struck that this needs done more often. What is “this” you may ask? Well, a better (more holistic) understanding of baptism is one. Yet another is remembering it (how has it shaped you; how should it shape you; etc.), which necessitates remembering and telling your story.

Hearing the stories of others is a part of living in community (to which Christians are called). This is so helpful because we may hear someone who (heaven forbid) had it “worse” than us and God saw them through the time; therefore we have a new found hope. In addition to that, we all know people; someone we know may be in a similar spot to a brother/sister in Christ and we only know that because of knowing their story. What then is the responsibility of the “story-bearer” (i.e., the Christian to whom God was faithful)? To share what God has done with the person who now finds himself/herself in a similar situation. It may in fact be the last thing needed for a commitment to a King and His Kingdom to take place.  

Oh yeah, and please do not make the mistake of thinking your story is "too much" or "too little" for others to hear.  God is bigger than everything; nothing is insignificant.  Let me clarify what I mean by “too little” - it is the false notion some may have that their story “isn’t any good because I grew up in Church and followed God then and still do now…”  THE TRUTH IS WE SHOULD ALL HOPE FOR MORE OF THOSE STORIES!!!  (I.e., people who have done their best to be faithful to God their entire life and never “walked away" from church or anything like that.)  There is power in someone who “gets it” at a young age…and continues to “get it” (in increasing measures) the rest of their life. 

What do you remember about your baptism? How has it shaped you? How should it shape you?