I thought I’d diverge a bit and talk about four baptisms, three of which weren’t. Or to call up shades of Daniel: “two were but were not, one is but is not, and one is, and is still to come.”
About thirty-four years ago some guy in a collar got my forehead wet. I don’t remember whether this was a problem for me, as my first actual memory was at least two years later. I was baptized a Lutheran, because that’s what my family did. I suspect that my family believed that this was the first, and most important, step toward membership in that group called “people who will go to heaven.” I am guessing that the previously mentioned “guy in a collar” believed that by faith (whose? I don’t know. His? My future faith? How can I trust any of those things?), the Word of God (which he believed commanded that babies get their heads wet in solemn ceremony) combined with the act of obedience to bring about a holy result, that is, the wiping away of my original sin. Of course, almost no Lutheran would suggest that all baptized babies result in people who go to heaven, or even all babies baptized in a confessional Lutheran church. That’s why they call the later step in life “confirmation,” after all — to confirm in the life of a functional adult what really took place when the forehead glistened that morning.
Oddly enough, I do stand justified in Christ. But not because some guy got my forehead wet. Faith is produced in me because I am in Christ, because He fully and specifically atoned for my sin, and that salvation is appropriated by me through the faith which He grants me as a gift. I am saved by grace through faith. Making a baby’s head wet has nothing to do with that, Scripturally or logically. But if you’re looking for a moment in time when that justification actually resulted in regeneration… that was when I first had faith. And that was a lot later. Regeneration does precede faith… but not by that much.
(If you’re one of my few Lutheran readers and my oversimplification of Lutheran sacramental theology frustrates you, well, give me a few days. I am an equal-opportunity frustrator, and I have three baptisms yet to describe. You’ll probably get a moment or two to chuckle at somebody else’s expense, never fear.)
Loading ...
