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When I sit down with a couple
for the big moments in family life, I often ask a question like, “Is this an
event we are having or is it part of something bigger?” Whether it is marriage,
or baptism of a child, or confirmation of an adolescent is this just an event
or is it a part of something bigger? So then, let me ask you, when it comes to
your Baptism, was an event or a did it start a process?
Many will struggle to choose
one or the other, when in fact, I perceive that it is both. Baptism is an
event, through which people are responding to what I see and the prompting of
the Holy Spirit in their lives to make this step in their lives and in the
lives of their family members. Where things tend to fall a part, is following
through on the promises that are made in the service, both on the part of the
parents and Godparents/Sponsors and moreover, on the part of the Church to
uphold these people in their lives in Christ. The Church, meaning here the
Anglican Church of Canada has not done a good job of teaching new believers.
When we are baptized, we
receive a whole new identity – we leave the old life behind and begin a new
one. We are dead to the old life, it’s idolatries and attending sin, and to
death itself. We are alive to God the Father through Christ by the workings of
the Spirit in our lives. We are, as new creations, called to live a life that
is directed towards Christ and his coming kingdom. As a professor mine used to
remind us, we are directed to live out both Christ’s death and resurrection in
our lives, even if that means we die and rise again daily.
Something else that is important
to all of this is the need to persist in this life after the Baptism itself. Sure.
There is a moment and it is sacramental, maybe even sacerdotal. There is
entrance of the newly baptized into the priesthood of all believers and into
the community of the Resurrection that is the Church. It is within the
community that we need to continue to grow, to be fed and to know the presence
of the Lord Jesus. I say this because there is something that the Church needs
to realize: until they belong to Christ, they have no part in us. Like when
Peter, after refusing to allow Jesus to serve him discovers that if he does
not, he will not be to participate in what comes next, so we need to invite
people to come in and be served, then learn how to serve in Christ’s name.
I find it striking that none of
the apostles demanded that the Church make disciples or that the Church fulfill
the Great Commission. St. Paul for example, encouraged people to pray and give
thanks to God and to make the time to cultivate the interior of one’s life by
contemplating the inexhaustible mystery of Christ. The Church today needs what
Robert Cardinal Sarah would call a ‘heart to heart conversation’ with Christ,
in terms of conversion. Without such a
conversation, there is no ability to remain under the discipline of the Master.
Renewal of the people in their
faith leads to the revival of the community in the Spirit. If you want to see
God move in your life and that of the Church community that you live in – then
maybe you need to get out of the way. Jesus must increase, and we must
decrease. As disciples, as followers of the Master, we are to be taught and to
listen. We are to listen and to learn from him and one another. Then we are
sent, and we are to go doing and teaching as we have been taught. In the going we are to raise the sight level
of people by sounding like, looking like and acting like Jesus. People need to
see the family resemblance. And in coming together for worship, we should
endeavour to re-enter into the presence of the Almighty God and the worship
which is constantly ongoing, not just seek to reproduce experiences in which we
feel good or great.
It is not about how wet you get –
but how you live and proclaim your baptism that matters. What matters
is declaring who Jesus is for you and making him known where you are to
whomever you know. Let us live it well in Jesus’ name and for his sake.
Jason+
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