Yesterday at church I got the opportunity to baptize one of our Junior High students. It was the second student we've baptized in the last couple weeks and I have got to perform both the baptisms. It's been pretty cool. But anytime I see a baptism in church it gets me thinking about what that represents...The pastor at the church I grew up in used to have a certain saying when he would take someone under the water. He would say "Buried with Christ in baptism, raised to walk in a new kind of life." I always here pastors, preachers, and professors talk about how we believe that baptism is a symbolic act. That there is no special power in the act itself or the elements involved, but it is simply an outward symbol of an inward change, being our choice to begin a relationship with Jesus Christ.
Here's my deal, I guess. I know that baptism is biblical and that Jesus' modeled it. But aren't there some "bigger" ways to outwardly show our relationship with Christ. Any time a student is hesitant about getting baptized soon after their profession of faith in Jesus, many adults, pastors, parents, etc, begin to put undo pressure on them to "be obedient in the first thing that Jesus calls us to do." Now, I agree that it is a good thing, a thing Jesus modeled, and something we should do. But what if we, as the church, leaders in the church, and pastors, were as adamant about people outwardly showing their faith by the way they live as we are about whether or not they outwardly show their faith through baptism. What if people in the church were encouraged and challenged to let baptism be the smallest act of obedience in their walk with Christ? What if we put more emphasis on living a new kind of life and looking like Jesus in our daily life instead of just emphasizing one act of obedience? I wonder if church membership and numbers on the roll weren't influenced by baptisms if it would be that big of a deal?
So I guess my rambling is this: I want to challenge myself and others not simply to live out and call others to live out simple acts of ritual as obedience. I want to live a lifestyle that reflects Christ in all I do and challenge others to do the same. When all is said and done, I don't want people to be "suprised" that myself or those I lead have been baptised because that is the only symbolic act of obedience we have ever done. Following Jesus and His way is not about walking down an aisle, going to church, or getting dunked in water. It's about being raised to walk a new kind of life...One that looks like the Master.
2 comments:
I honestly think that we screwed up a tradition that we should have left alone and now we don't know how to fix it, baptists that is. I believe that baptism was originally set up as the public confession in the first century, thus the constant link to repentance. Letting it slip from that important place is like letting go of the Eucharist and it's full meaning, (also a public confession, really). So I think that we just don't know what to do with it. Tell me this, if we are so bent on baptism as a symbol, why are we such a stickler about form? And if form matters in baptism, why not have wine instead of welch's for communion. I despise inconsistent belief systems. Bleah! I bet Leonard Sweet would say that we need to reclaim baptism and use it fully in this age. We try to do that but haven't mastered it yet.
I've had the same thought and discussion with people several times about the Lord's supper issue...Why is it that we are adamant about following the what we feel the Bible says to the minute detail in one area but in the other we have more freedom to change and interpret the symbolic act? I think it has to do with what we as a people bring to the text as we interpret it....
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