Baptism, An Exploration: The Need for a Rite

People need rituals. God doesn’t so much, but people do.

Love

Consider a young couple. The young man embraces his girl friend and for the first time says, “I love you.” She hugs him, smiles, kisses him passionately, and the evening ends.

Later he discusses the evening with a friend over coffee. The friend says, “Wow, it’s great that you have a girlfriend who is so affectionate! Can’t you see in her eyes how much she loves you?”

“Yes, I know she loves me,” the young man says, “but I need her to say that she loves me. In fact, if she won’t say it, I don’t think I can continue in this relationship.”

Is he right to consider her reluctance to express her feelings a barrier to their relationship? Why not travel on her body language and behavior? Why are the words so important?

And, you know, the words really are important — not because of tradition or his inability to perceive her emotions. They are important because his girlfriend has to make a decision. She may feel love for him very much, but saying that she loves him changes their relationship and it changes her. It forces her to admit to herself that this is how she feels — and once she admits that, it changes her life. As soon as she admits her love, she has to make a commitment and be willing to make sacrifices.

Moreover, once he hears her words, he’ll behave differently. He’ll see her as a companion. No more will they just be dating. They’ll be bound to one another in a way that’s radically different from before. The words matter. And if she never says the words, their relationship will not progress much at all. In fact, it will end.

So when did she fall in love her boyfriend? When she first felt those feelings? When she started imagining what it would be like to be married? When she found her dreams filled with him? When she says the words?

Well, she fell in love over time. For some, it takes a few weeks. For others, it takes years. But true love is never at first sight. It always takes some time.

When did their relationship change? Well, it changed incrementally, a bit here and a bit there. They were strangers, and then two people on a date, and then they were a couple, and then they were a couple in love.

When do they become a couple in love? Well, not until they admit it to themselves and then to each other. The words matter. The words change everything. The words change both lives forever.

But, of course, many couples say, “I love you” and don’t mean it. The words only matter as between honest people. Lies happen.

And then there are some couples, not many, who fall in love, get married, have children, and grow old together never having said “I love you.”

Is it essential that you tell your boyfriend that you love him if you want to one day be married? Yes. Well, almost. Relationships don’t always follow the rules, but the rules are the rules for a reason. They matter.

And Tevye eventually insisted his wife avow her love because the words matter.

Confession

It’s become popular to argue that faith is a process, and it is — obviously. But there has to be a moment when the first inklings of faith mature to saving faith. When does that happen? Well, not before I’m willing to confess my faith. It’s not that confession is a magic sacramental thing that empowers God to save me. Rather, it’s more that faith isn’t really faith until the believer is willing to confess it. If the believer won’t even tell the church that he believes, it’s just not enough faith to save. It’s not really what the Bible calls “faith.”

(Rom 10:10 ESV) For with the heart one believes and is justified, and with the mouth one confesses and is saved.

Now, if we avoid the sacramental, Plan of Salvation understanding and, instead, see confession as the moment when faith becomes real — real both to the church and the believer — Paul’s teaching makes perfect sense.

(Luk 12:8 ESV) “And I tell you, everyone who acknowledges me before men, the Son of Man also will acknowledge before the angels of God … .”

Words matter. A willingness to say the words, to admit to yourselves and others that you’ve made the decision to be a believer, takes faith from a possibility to a reality.

(And as I said already, the words aren’t enough. They aren’t so much sacramental as a necessary consequence of actual saving faith.)

Baptism

Why does God want believers to be baptized? Well, actions matters, just as words matter.

* The requirement to be baptized forces another requirement — confession. I can have faith and keep it a secret. But when I confess my faith to others, wonderful things happen.

First, I admit my faith to myself. I make a decision: my faith matters enough that I’m willing to admit it to the church. That’s a big deal because faith too weak to be admitted is faith too weak to matter.

Second. when I admit my faith to the church, my relationship to the church changes. I go from being a visitor to family. From outside the body to inside. Of course, these things happen when I’m baptized, but confession and baptism cannot be separated. I confess so I can be baptized. I’m baptized because I confessed. It’s the confession that starts the process at the human level. Before then, my faith is between me and God only — and not much of a faith. Not really.

Third, when I confess, the church knows to baptize me. They may botch the ceremony by teaching bad baptismal theology or by not using enough water. But the church invites me to bring my faith to fruition by taking a simple, easy action based on my confession.

But, of course, properly instructed, baptism is no simple, easy action at all! Baptism is into the death of Christ and into his body and into his Kingdom. It’s a pledge to live a different kind of life by different values. No, baptism should be scary because Christianity done right is scary.

Now, can you confess without being baptized? Yes, if you don’t understand God’s intentions regarding baptism. And it happens every day, because of some bad theology that’s crept into Christianity. But it’s not the design.

Can I be saved without baptism? Well, yes, if the church botches its instructions to you. God won’t damn you for that any more than you’d have the right to divorce your wife because the wedding certificate was improperly signed.

Marriage

Imagine that two devout Christians get married, with the preacher, bridesmaids, the whole works. They later have two children. Ten years later, the husband discovers that the preacher forgot to sign the wedding certificate. A lawyer tells him that his marriage is legally invalid (wouldn’t be true in Alabama, but assume it’s true wherever you live). Would it be sin for the man to abandon his “wife” and children, and then go marry a pretty young thing?

Well, to a heartless legalist, the man would be leaving a relationship of fornication and entering into the holy estate of matrimony. But most people would see it as God surely would — as sin. He made a commitment and he needs to keep it. Even though the ceremony was done wrong, he’s bound to his commitment.

Nor can he abandon his children because the ceremony was wrong, no more than he can abandon his wife. You see, the commitment is vastly more important than the rite.

It’s not a perfect analogy, but hopefully it shows the danger of treating baptism in a legalistic fashion. What really matters is the commitment made and the resulting relationship. He’s confessed his love for his bride and declared his intention to be married to her. She did the same. Technically right or not, in their hearts they were married, and in God’s eyes, they became bound to each other.

No, he cannot leave and marry the pretty young thing. In fact, to do so would be a grave sin.

The normal case

And so, yes, baptism matters. Indeed, baptism is normally, by design, the moment when faith is confessed, commitment is made, the body in joined, and the Kingdom is entered — all by the power of God, due to the faith of the convert. This is when the Spirit is received. Normally.

A defective baptism does the same thing. Obviously, botching the baptism is a serious mistake by the church, but for the convert, it works well enough. God does not damn because a Baptist minister baptizes a convert to obey an ordinance because of salvation already received — all in a Baptist baptistry in a Baptist church.

The baptism takes and the mistake is not all that serious in the grand scheme of things. You know, we tend to exaggerate how terrible these things are because we’ve been debating the topic for over a century. But debates often distort the importance of the issue.

(My oldest son used to debate in high school. He learned that to win, he had to “prove” that his opponent’s position on DDT, EPA emission standards, or whatever would inevitably result in nuclear holocaust! We in the Chruches of Christ tend to debate at about that level. That’s why we sometimes teach that every mistake damns. That’s how people try to win debates — at a high school level.)

An arranged marriage

One more story. A couple is married at the age of 8 days. They are from a province in India where the parents arrange and make marriages for their children.

Many years later, when the children are of age, there’s a ceremony designed to confirm the marriage. According to the law, either one could refuse to confirm the marriage, but rarely does anyone do that. Rather, they remain true to their upbringing and voluntarily go through the confirmation ceremony.

The boy and girl, now 21, have never met and may well have never confessed their love for each other. But they are genuinely committed to the marriage. Indeed, these marriages have a better success rate than Western marriage built on romantic love and the passions of the young couple.*

In God’s eyes, is the Indian couple married? If so, when were they married — according to God? When their parents declared them married, with the parents making vows for their children? When the ceremony was held when they were babies? Or when they confirmed that decision? And does it matter all that much?

Well, what if the couple refuses to go through the confirmation ceremony? Is that a divorce in God’s eyes?

Well — you know what? — I’m not sure I know the answer. But this much I know: if they confirm the marriage, they’re married — even though the ceremony is contrary to the marriage practices we read about in the Bible.

Infant baptism

Now, I’m glad to say that I oppose infant baptism. I think it’s an unhealthy practice for the body of Christ. After all, in nations where infant baptism is nearly universal, the church is extremely weak. Evidently, the church does a very poor job of making confirmation a real confirmation. It can easily become too much ritual and not enough substance.

But, of course, Churches of Christ have sometimes so focused on baptism that more than a large percentage of the teens who are baptized do so out of social pressure and not a real commitment to God. Yes, we can do the rite exactly right as a matter of form and get the heart of the rite entirely wrong. Of course, you can also do the rite wrong and get the heart wrong. And God certainly wants the rite right and the heart rite. But the heart is the thing that matters ultimately.

(1Sa 16:7b ESV) “For the LORD sees not as man sees: man looks on the outward appearance, but the LORD looks on the heart.”

Conclusions

But, on the whole, I think the original design of baptism is not only God’s design, but the best possible design. God’s wisdom in providing for a confession followed by baptism of a believer is how churches ought to act. Words are necessary, but words can be cheap. Asking for an action as evidence of faith helps confirm in the heart of the convert that faith requires certain behaviors. It’s not just words.

And baptism powerfully illustrates what God is doing. It’s a death, burial, and resurrection, and it’s a cleansing from sin. The symbolism is powerful.

Moreover, the convert is baptized by a believer, who hears his confession. The baptism therefore symbolizes the believer’s admission to the Kingdom and the congregation.

And the baptism forces an admission: that cleansing is required and that a death is needed. It matters.

But merely getting the form of confession and baptism right is pretty useless unless you also get the heart right. And this is where many confirmation practices and many baptismal practices err. You see, if the goal is to get a child through a ritual so the parents can sleep at night, that’s the wrong goal. Our goal has to be for our children to become disciples of Jesus — not merely students but students who desperately want to be just like Jesus.

And, sadly, most of our baptisms don’t do this. But that’s a topic for another day in the not too distant future. Just to say it succinctly: the goal isn’t baptism. The goal is discipleship — which will include baptism and a host of other things. But baptism no more makes you a good parent than physical birth makes you a good parent. The real test is what comes later.

But baptism, done right, is a powerful way to be introduced into the Kingdom. It’s an act of submission. Think about it — the convert’s life is in the hands of the person doing the immersion! For a moment, buried in the suffocating, cold water, the believer is truly helpless, with no way out except the embrace of the immerser. If ever you have to trust someone with your life, it’s when you’re being baptized!

And in this sense, the immerser symbolizes Jesus. When we go under the water, we submit ourselves into the hands of Christ just as we yield to the hands of the immerser. We decide to rely entirely on the hands and strength of Jesus for breath and life, just as we rely on the hands and strength of the immerser. Baptism is truly an act of faith!

The improperly baptized

Does God save the improperly baptized? Yes — we can rest assured that, despite our poor baptismal teaching and even our denial that the Spirit enters the convert at baptism, God saves our imperfectly baptized converts, just as he saves imperfectly baptized converts in other denominations. That’s what God does. For those with faith, he forgives our sins and overlooks our errors.

(Gen 15:6 ESV)  6 And he believed the LORD, and he counted it to him as righteousness.

_____________________

* Not as unrealistic an example as you might imagine. Until the last century, child marriages had been practiced in India for centuries, and remain practiced today in a few places. After the government imposed a law requiring that the couple be at least 18 (bride) and 21 (groom), previously made marriages would have become illegal and so would require confirmation when the participants reach legal age. I make no claim of any expertise in Indian marriage law. I’m just saying the example is well within the realm of possibility.