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Baptism - A Meaningful Act
El Dorado UMC April 10, 2005
1 Corinthians 12:13 - "Through the Sacrament of Baptism we are initiated into Christ’s holy church.
We are incorporated into God’s mighty acts of salvation and given new birth through water and the
Spirit. All this is God’s gift, offered to us without price."
United Methodist Hymnal Baptismal Covenant
The story is told of a preacher who was fond of preaching on baptism. Week after week he would preach about
baptism. Finally in desperation, the leaders of the church requested that he allow them to pick his scripture
text for the following Sunday’s message. He agreed, and they assigned him the text Genesis 1:1. "There",
they said, "let’s see him get a sermon on baptism out of that verse."
When he got up to preach the next Sunday, he announced the agreed upon text. His opening sentence then followed,
"In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. The earth is two-thirds water. Today’s subject is
Water Baptism." Before I’m done, some of you may think that I’m spending too much time on baptism.
However, you’ve asked me a lot of questions about baptism, and beginning today I hope to answer as many of
them as possible. In my next sermon I’ll try to answer your questions about how we baptize, and after that
I’ll deal with your questions about who we baptize. Today I want to begin by looking at the questions you
gave me about why we baptize: Why do United Methodists believe as we do about baptism? Do you have to be
baptized to be saved? Why do some preachers refuse to baptize after a profession of faith if the person
was baptized as an infant? It seems opposite of what is taught in the Bible concerning baptism for the
repentance of sins. What does baptism mean? I will warn you now: this series of sermons will be both
difficult and challenging, and may not begin to make sense until we get to the end.
The first thing I want to say today about baptism is that it is about what God does, not what we do.
Ezekiel 36:25:26 "Then will I sprinkle clean water upon you, and you shall be Clean: from all your
filthiness, and from your idols, will I cleanse you. A new heart also will I give you, and a new spirit
will I put within you: and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and I will give you a heart
of flesh." Unfortunately, when we speak about baptism we too often start with us, not God. For the baptism
of an infant or child, we often speak first about the parent’s faith, promises, and commitment. For the
baptism of a youth or adult, we often speak first about that person’s decisions and understanding. However,
this only focuses on the wrong thing, and causes great misunderstandings about baptism.
Let us understand that baptism is not primarily about our faith. The chief sign of our faith in Christ is
confession. The chief sign of our entrance into God’s family, and the great gift of God’s love is baptism.
The chief actor in baptism is not the parent or the child or the adult, but God. In baptism, at whatever
age, God acts to enlarge his family by adopting, claiming, and naming us as his children. We cannot join a
new family; we must be adopted. We join the church, the family of God, in much the same way. Through baptism
we are joined to the church as we recognize God’s saving grace in our lives, grace based on God’s overwhelming
love for us.
It is easy to forget this truth about our faith. It is so easy to believe that we can earn God’s love through
right actions, or right beliefs, or right decisions, or right feelings. But this is not the good news of the
gospel. "For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith - and this not from yourselves, it is the
gift of God - not by works, so that no one can boast" (Eph.2:8).
We are God’s children, not because of who we are or what we have done, but because of who God is and what God
has done. When baptism is presented as something we do, based on something we decide, the result of some
good work or faith of ours, then baptism, particularly the baptism of infants, becomes meaningless. Obviously,
little babies cannot decide, think, feel, or do things which would qualify them for such blessings. But when
baptism is understood as the sign of God’s gracious gift of grace to us, then infants can surely be the
recipients of that gift.
The second thing that I want to say about baptism is that through baptism we are brought into a very special
family. "For we were all baptized by one Spirit into one body - whether Jews or Greeks, slave or free - and
we were all given the one Spirit to drink" (1 Cor.12:13).
When we were born, we were given our family name. On the day of our physical birth we had no idea what that
name meant, what it included, what responsibilities and traditions it might entail. Nevertheless, we were as
much a member of our family then as we would ever be. What remained was for us to grow, day by day, in our
awareness of what that name meant for us and for our life.
Over the years we learned what our name meant as we shared meals with our family, were instructed in family
traditions and values, and observed older members as they went about living their lives. In a thousand large
and small ways we grew into our families, increasingly accepting for ourselves what had been given to us at
birth.
In much the same way, when we are baptized, at whatever age, we are given the name Christian. We are reborn
and
recognized as full members of the family of God and made heirs to God’s gracious gifts in Jesus Christ. The
child cannot know all that the name Christian implies or demands. Most adult converts don’t completely
understand it either. Still, at our baptism we are given everything we will ever need to be God’s beloved
child, no matter what our age. What remains is for us to grow, day by day, into an increasing awareness of
what this name really means for living the life of faith.
For that reason, because we understand baptism to be based on God’s work and not ours, God’s promises and not
ours, God’s grace and not our faith, we do not administer baptism to an person more than once, for what God
does for us once never needs to be repeated. Whether you remember the details of your baptism or not, God’s
promises to us in baptism are steadfast. We may need to renew our baptismal vows, but God never needs to redo
our baptism!
Brother Polk preached a series of sermons on baptism you may enjoy by following these links.
Baptism - A Meaningful Act | Jump Right In - the Water is Fine
A Paper on Infant Baptism | Infant Baptism?
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