3-22-26 Baptized Into the Lord (Foundations)

Join Pastor Ken as he continues in our foundation series looking at our views on baptism.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Good morning. We're going to continue our series on the foundations of what we believe as Christians with a deeper look at baptism and some of the things that go into that on this Baptism Sunday. You know, when ministers get together, one of the things that they like to tell are funny baptism stories. And if you've been a minister for very long, you have funny baptism stories. You know, one of the things you learn really quick when you're in a church that immerses people is it's not good for a woman to wear a light-colored shirt because you end up having wet t-shirt contests, church edition when they come back up out of the water. I've learned in a church that baptizes infants and people with a pouring or sprinkling that one of the things you have to do, which I had to do this morning, was there's a little metal bowl that goes into that font, and you got to go to the kitchen and find where it's been used for probably chips or salad or something like that, and retrieve it before you can have a baptism. But my favorite baptism story, I had a friend that told me, you know, we had a baptism kind of booth thing, a pool behind the choir in the church that I was at at DeCal. And a friend told me, get you some of those green waders like the fly fishermen use. Because, you know, I would do a baptism and then I would take the waders off, run back and do the final prayer while the choir sang in between. So I got my waders, and I had the little, you know, they got the little suspenders, and it's going to keep me from getting wet when I walk into the pool and dunk somebody in the water. So I'm ready to go. I've got this woman who wants to be baptized. She was a very large woman. We get in there, and when I go to dunk her, she just goes bananas. Starts fighting like crazy, hands flailing, feet flailing. This big wave of warm water comes over the top of my waders and goes all the way down. Later I ask her, what happened? And she said, Well, I have a fear of water. And I said, Why didn't you tell me? And she said, Well, I thought it would be different getting baptized. So afterwards, I go sloshing downstairs to the men's restroom and I try to take those waders off. That rubber was like shrink wrap. I cannot get them off of my legs. So a guy comes in the bathroom and I'm over there struggling, and I said, Will you help? And he's got one leg and I'm trying to pull the other leg. Then a second guy comes to the bathroom. There's two men, grown men, yanking at these things. Finally, they come flying off, and I am soaked to the skin all the way down. And uh learned a lesson. I had to run up and say a prayer real quick with my uh wet suit dripping all along the way. The problems we get into with baptism. Well, start with Jesus' command. This is often known as the Great Commission, Matthew 28, 16 through 20. And please stand as you are able for the reading of God's gospel. Now the eleven disciples went to Galilee to the mountain to which Jesus had directed them. When they saw him, they worshiped him, but they doubted. And Jesus came and said to them, All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. 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, and teaching them to obey everything that I have commanded you. And remember, I am with you always to the end of the age. This is the word of God for the people of God. Please be seated. Christians have disagreed on baptism. In fact, they have disagreed to the point that some Christian groups call themselves by the name of baptism or baptists. And when you get right down to it, what the differences have been have been centered around several things. Number one, the age of people when they're to be baptized. Number two, the method by which people are baptized. And then third, maybe third and fourth, the necessity and the impact of baptism for Christians. So we're going to take a look at those. You know, I remember reading some military history about Union soldiers marching through Kentucky on the way to the Battle of Perryville, and they got caught in a downpour. And one of the soldiers said, This isn't a Methodist or Presbyterian reign, this is a Baptist reign. Soaks you all the way to the skin. Whole denominations have formed themselves around baptism. Back at the first Reformation, the Lutheran Reformation that started in 1517, there was quickly a group that broke off from both the Roman Catholic Church and the Lutheran Church, and they were known as the Anabaptists, which is literally the re-baptizers. The teaching was if you were baptized as an infant, it didn't count. So you had to be re-baptized in order to be right with God. Now that was not the forefathers of our modern Baptists. They actually come out of the English Reformation when King Henry VIII decided that he wanted a new wife, and the Pope said no, so he said, Well, we're going to start a new church, and I'm the head of it. And Baptist groups broke away from the Church of England, and that became the ancestors of the U.S. and the British Baptists. But then there was a time in, especially the mid-South states, Kentucky, Tennessee, there were the Campbellite movement. And there were churches of Christ that said, you have to be baptized or you can't be saved. And they ended up splitting off from other Baptist groups on the contention of that. So you see these contentions about baptism go way back. In fact, they even go further back than that, about trying to understand what is the correct way to baptize, what is the right way to baptize. But before we get into some more details about that, I want to look at some of the scripture images for baptism, because they're very interesting and they tell us a lot about this sacrament. First of all, in baptism, our sins are washed away. 1 Corinthians 6 11. And this is what some of you used to be. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and in the Spirit of our God. A second image is that we are buried with Christ in baptism and raised to new life afterwards. Colossians 2 12. When you were buried with him in baptism, you were also raised with him through faith in the power of God who raised him from the dead. Third, when we are baptized, we are born again by water and the spirit. John 3.5. Excuse me, I'm about to sneeze. I got allergies. Jesus answered, Very truly I tell you, no one can enter the kingdom of God without being born of water and the Spirit. We're reclothed in Christ. The filthy rags of our sin are taken off, and we are made a part of the body of Christ in baptism. Galatians chapter 3, verses 27 and 28. As many of you as were baptized into Christ have clothed yourself with Christ. There is no longer Jew or Greek, there is no longer slave or free. There is no longer male and female, for all of you are one in Christ Jesus. In baptism, we are renewed in the Spirit. 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. 1 Peter 3, 20 to 22, who in former times did not obey, when God waited patiently in the days of Noah, during the building of the ark, in which a few, that is, eight lives, were saved through water. And baptism, which this prefigured, now saves you, not as a removal of dirt from the body, but as as an appeal to God for a good conscience, through the resurrection of Jesus Christ, who has gone into heaven and is at the right hand of God with angels, authorities, and powers made subject to him. In baptism we are made into the very people of God, the family of God, with a future in God's kingdom. 1 Corinthians 12, 13. For in the one spirit we were all baptized into one body, Jews or Greeks, slaves or free, and we were all made to drink of one spirit. Baptism is also seen as an entry into the people of God. It's an initiation rite, like circumcision in the Old Testament, where a child was circumcised to become part of the children of Israel. And finally, we are sprinkled by the blood of Christ as the sacrifices did. Hebrews chapter 10, verses 21 and 22. And since we have a great priest over the house of God, let us approach with a true heart in full assurance of faith, with our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience, and our bodies washed with pure water. Can you see how rich the symbolism is of baptism? I mean, next to the saving death of Christ, which is also incredibly rich in all the different ways that we are to understand it, baptism is probably the second richest image, symbol, understanding in the New Testament. So what is the big deal with baptism? All Christians are called upon to practice it, and yet we have differed in many different ways. We've differed over the time of baptisms. Baptists and groups that believe in what's called believer baptism say you need to wait to the point where a person has decided to believe in Christ, only then can he or she be baptized. There has to be a choice of the person who is being saved. There's an obedience after you're saved that has to have a volition. So you don't baptize babies because in this idea their baptism doesn't really count. And they will often argue that the New Testament only has baptism of believers, only has baptism of adults that are shown there. Other groups, in fact, most Christian groups, Roman Catholics, Lutherans, Presbyterians, Methodists, and such, baptize infants on the basis of the parents' commitment to raise them in the faith. The fact is, the New Testament never tells us at what age somebody should be baptized. And there are places, such as Acts 16, 33, let's look at that. At the same hour of the night, he took them and washed their wounds, and he and his entire family were baptized without delay. This is the Philippian jailer who is converted to Christ by the miracle and the actions of Paul when he is in jail. And there are other places that talk about whole families being baptized. And the argument is if Jesus only wanted the adults, why wouldn't he have said that? If the early church believed it should be only the adults, why wouldn't they have specified that? The chance that a whole family wouldn't have some children is very small. This idea of baptism is that baptism is especially about God's promise, that kids need also to be included in that, that it is a ritual of birth like circumcision, which is one of the images that's used of it, which was done on the eighth day for Jewish males, like other rites that bring people into the group. So, how does this work out practically in the world? Well, as you know, I've been a part of churches that believed only in believer baptism, and then I've been a part of churches like here that practiced a variety of ways of baptism. What I saw in Baptist churches is yes, the person being baptized needed to agree to it. But I also saw kids at age five or six being baptized, that I wasn't sure if they even understood fully what they were getting into. Whether they were doing it to please their parents or to please others or just because some other child had done it, or whether there really was a focus on that. The other thing that you had to watch for is that some parents were really good about involving their kids in the church, taking them to Sunday school, getting them an education of the faith, but you didn't have a put into place required training when they got older in those kind of churches. Now, what you see in churches like the Methodist tradition is children are baptized sometimes as an infant. Sometimes parents decide to wait till they're older to baptize them, but you also have in place confirmation. Confirmation is a multi-week time where kids, when they get to sixth, seventh, eighth grade, when their mind is developed so they can understand abstract concepts, they can understand theological things, study the religion, and then they make their decision about whether they want to be included in the faith or not. So it is a focus upon at a time when they can really understand better whether this is something they want to follow up with. What we allow, following the Wesleyan tradition, is for parents to decide. If you want to have your child baptized, you can do that. If you want to have your child dedicated, where it's basically the same kind of dedication but without the water, you can do that. If you want your child to decide, you can do that. Or, you know, you can wait and see what they decide on their own. The point is we believe the promises of God are valid. We believe that not only the parents, but the church should play a role in helping young people, children, to come to faith and in developing their faith so it's strong. Just getting baptized at a very early age and not following up on that leads to all kinds of issues, and it often leads to people not really understanding what the walk of Christ is about and falling away. Secondly, Christians differ over the method of baptism. In one corner, we have the idea that you have to do it by immersion. You have to put the person all the way under the water. It connects to that Greek word baptism, which means or baptizo, which does seem to mean immersion. Some of the symbols we looked at, being buried with Christ, being washed clean, definitely connect with that idea. And the other corner is the idea that you can pour or you can sprinkle water, which connects to some of the other symbols. The sprinkling of the blood, the aspect of Christ providing the sacrifice for us. Now, if you're in a church that baptizes babies, I'm not going to dunk a baby, all right? Let's just be clear on that, right? You know, when I joined the Methodists, the thing that scared me the most, I didn't have trouble with the theology because I had really studied this stuff. The thing that scared me the most was handling babies. Because I'm deadly afraid of dropping one or hurting the baby. So you pretty much got to do sprinkling or pouring if you're going to have infant baptism. But it's interesting because I've also been in situations where it was not a baby that you needed to use those methods. The Southern Baptist Church that I pastored last before coming to the Methodists, we did a proxy baptism at one point. We had a man that had some severe medical issues. He could not be in water because of a risk to him. He was in a wheelchair. It was very difficult to even get him out. So we had somebody else baptize on his behalf with his ascension and participation. I've also more than once gone to a hospital, to a nursing home where somebody is at the point that they're no longer able to even come to the church and be baptized, and we had a baptism there. That they'd come to faith, that they wanted to be baptized, that maybe it hadn't happened before. And in a situation like that, you just don't have the option of immersing somebody. And so again, the Methodist Wesleyan approach is to be flexible about it, to give people the choice. Do you want to be immersed? Do you want to be sprinkled? Do you want to have it poured on your head? Third, Christians have split over the necessity and the impact of baptism. We know there's a difference between when a baby hits you in the face at two or three months old and when a teenager hits you in the face at 14 or 15 years old, right? There is a time when people become accountable for their actions. They can understand right from wrong. It's not an accident, it's not just trying to figure out the world around them and flailing around. And we know that all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. It's right there in Romans. We've experienced it in our lives. That we as humans need the salvation that Christ provides. We need that for our own sins. But what you find in the scripture and in Christian theology is also this idea that as humans, as a body, as a people, we have participated in some way in the rebellion against God that started with Adam. That there is an aspect of human nature, that image of God has been tarnished, we have fallen, and because of that, we need Christ's salvation, even if we've not particularly sinned on our own, although all of us eventually do. That we also need that because of that. That is the idea between baptizing babies that have been stillborn at the hospital, which the Roman Catholic Church does. The idea that that original sin is there and baptism is required to wash it away. Now we don't follow through on the theology that it's necessary to baptize babies. We really focus on the saving of grace that God does through Christ's sacrifice. We look at it more as an obedience to Christ. He told us if you're going to follow me, be baptized. It's one of the first actions we do to show that Christ is important to us. And it is a means of grace, it's a way of experiencing that invisible grace that God saves us through the cross. We believe that that's that grace, not the baptism that makes us right with God, but that it's an obedient action. Now, those who argue that you have to be baptized to be saved have a hard time explaining the thief on the cross, who says, Remember me when you come into your kingdom. And Christ says, Today you will be with me in paradise. The guy is hanging on a cross. There's no baptism that could be involved at all. He has no option to be baptized. He cannot be obedient in this. And yet Christ promises him salvation. So most of the broad expanse of Christian churches say, it's by grace we are saved. Baptism is important, but it's more an obedience. It's a command that we are to follow. It's one of God's ways, like communion, that He helps us to see that invisible grace at work, that that water experience brings home to us what God has done for us in Christ. Another question that came up that you maybe haven't even thought about, but was a big question in the early church. If you sin after you're baptized, can you be forgiven? Does it wash away your sins, and then if you sin after that, you're in trouble? The Emperor Constantine, the first Roman emperor to come to faith, waited until he was on his deathbed to be baptized because he wanted to make sure all of his sins were washed away. That was not an uncommon practice in the early centuries of the church. That fear of sin after baptism and losing out because of that, it led to that medieval system of penance through pilgrimages, through saints, through holy relics, through giving money to the church that Martin Luther's Reformation was against. And basically the idea that we hold to is that baptism is a step of obedience. It's a beginning step. It doesn't mean you're not going to be forgiven for failures after that. God's grace continues to work in your life, He continues to forgive us for our sins. We confess. And turn to him, he continues to supply that grace. But we're reminded by the early church that we should take sin seriously. When somebody in the community committed a sin that hurt themselves, hurt others, was a rebellion against God, they took it very seriously. They often had a group of penitents that would spend time kind of examining their hearts and crying out to God and being in repentance before being fully accepted back in the church where they could take communion with the rest of the church. So you see, there's been disputes in baptism. So let me let me kind of summarize by giving you a Wesleyan embrace of baptism. First of all, baptism is an initiation into the Christian walk. It is a step of obedience. Christ says, baptize them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, make them disciples, teach them what it means to follow me. It moves us from being a part of the world, sinful in rebellion against God, to being a part of God's family, God's community, those who have been saved by Jesus Christ, those who have forgiveness, those who have new life, those who have the Holy Spirit in them, those who are cleansed, those who are clothed in Christ, those who have a future with the people of God have been buried to their old life and raised to a new life. It should be taken seriously and reverently. Secondly, it is a means of grace. It's God's promises that we stand on in baptism, God's action that saves us. And those promises can be received at all ages. They are a means of God showing us in the symbolism of the water, the feel of the water, the physicalness of baptism, that his invisible grace is at work in our hearts, transforming us from the inside out. Third, it is an act of obedience and commitment. It's not fire insurance. You can't get baptized and then never serve God again, never respond to God again, go do your own thing and ignore every other commandment. It's meant to be a start on that journey of taking up our cross and following Him daily. It's a part of that commitment to the people of God and their commitment to us to be a part of a community, a people of God. It should be done and remembered no matter what the age. And I always thought it was interesting that, you know, even when a child has been baptized at a young age, they're told to remember your baptism. Remember your baptism. You know, my grandfather, on my dad's side, my grandfather Hutchins died when I was two years old. And my parents have told me the story of when I was a little child that he would say, hand me my slippers, and I would get his slipper and throw them at him, and he'd throw them back at me, and we would laughingly throw them back and forth. That's one of the memories that I feel like I have of my grandfather. Now, I'm not totally sure that that wasn't created by them telling me about it, right? That they reminded me of that memory at an age where I was so young, I don't remember much of anything at all. When a child is baptized early, the parents in the community remind them of their baptism. They remind them of its importance. They help them to understand that this was a pledge of God to them, and we can stand on the promises of God. This was a pledge of their parents to raise them in the faith. This is a pledge of the church community to be there. One of the disservices that people do with their kids is they want to get them baptized and then they never take them to church again. No, no, no, no. This is about continuing in the journey, about taking that very serious. Now, I believe strongly, and I differ from the United Methodist Church on this a little bit. I think they're kind of splitting hairs that there are times in your life where you need to reaffirm your baptism by maybe going through it again, maybe experiencing it a different way. If I go to the Jordan River, I'm going to get dunked in there. I'm just telling you guys right now. There are times when we need that reminder. It's not that God's promises didn't count anymore. It's our need to experience that. And, you know, you can, the Methodist rules were you can say that's remembering your baptism and you can use water in it, but it's not getting baptized again. Well, that's kind of split in hairs. I think there are times when we have changes in our life that we need to mark that. We need to, in a sense, celebrate and embrace that. And that's okay. God knows our hearts. He wants us to be obedient, he wants us to be close to him. And if that helps us to get close to him, that's great. Which brings me to the final point. Baptism is a gift of God made possible by the sacrifice of Christ to show us how much he loves us and how much he wants to include us in his kingdom, how much he wants us to trust his promises, how much he wants us to be his loving, obedient people, how much he wants us to look out for each other and be there for one another and encourage one another, how much he has done for us, how much he wants us to respond to him. I'm going to close with another verse. This is where Philip the evangelist comes across an Ethiopian official, an Ethiopian eunuch, and the man's reading Isaiah, and Philip shares with him about Christ and what has happened very recently in Jerusalem, the cross, the resurrection. And let's look at his response, Acts 8.36. As they were going along the road, they came to some water, and the eunuch said, Look, here is water. What is to prevent me from being baptized? Of course, the answer is nothing. If you are ready, if you are giving your heart to Christ, if you are willing to take that step, if you're ready to claim the promises and the love of God, nothing prevents you from being baptized and beginning that journey. Will you pray with me, please? Heavenly Father, thank you for your incredible love and for all the ways you show it. Most of all, in our Lord Jesus Christ, who died for us that we might live for Him. Thank you for this incredible symbol, sacrament, experience of how you take ordinary water and you show us your incredible grace at work in our hearts and our lives. That you remind us that you love us so much you sent your son to die for us. That you remind us you love our children and our babies even more than we do, which is hard to even conceive of. When you remind us that we are a community born of water and the Spirit, born because Jesus Christ is our Lord. Thank you for your gift of baptism. May we always take it as something that's wonderful and great and the beginning of our journey with you that continues on into eternity. We pray that in Jesus' name. Amen.