Monday, July 3, 2017

Almost Everything You Need to Know About Baptism

This Sunday's homily on Baptism: staring the talented trio of St. Paul, Louis IX, and the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod!


13th Sunday of the Year, Cycle A


Today I want to talk about baptism

....Cuz, that's what Paul wanted to talk about today

Letter to the Romans

Amongst other things, baptism


Take out missalette, p. 25

1. Paul's words

2. Infant baptism

3. Cool reflection by a saint on his Baptism. 



Want to look at first part of the reading 

I always have this as the reading at a Baptism the church

Are you unaware that we who were baptized into Christ Jesus
were baptized into his death?
We were indeed buried with him through baptism into death,
so that, just as Christ was raised from the dead
by the glory of the Father,
we too might live in newness of life.
If, then, we have died with Christ,
we believe that we shall also live with him.


We’re like: “Paul, you’re such a downer!"

Baptism = Babies and new life and resurrection! 

And yet Paul wants to talk about death, dying, burial

Feels odd


But Paul is saying what all Christians believed: that baptism was a going down into Jesus' death

And both Paul and the early Christians saw the water as a perfect image for this


We're all used to pouring at a Baptism 

But as you know: Early Church submerged 


Perfect image:

You go down into the water 

And what's it like?

It’s cold, dark, you can't breathe 

It's like you're in the tomb

You've died with Jesus 


And then you come up...

<gasp>

And there's breath, and light, and warnth

It's like a mini resurrection

You've risen with Jesus 


So baptism was this perfect image of dying and rising with the Messiah

And what Paul is saying, here and elsewhere...

Is that once we've died and risen with him, we are **in** him

We are in Jesus 

We are in the Messiah, the Christ


And then everything else we say about us as Christians flows from there:


"God is our Father"

How?

Because we've been put in the Messiah

We are sons in THE Son

What he is to the Father, we are now too:

Sons and daughters of the Father



We say "we're brothers and sisters in Christ". 

Why?

Because of Baptism

If you're in Jesus, God is you're Father...

And I'm in Jesus, God is my Father...

And she's in Jesus...

If we all have the same father, that makes us??

Brothers and sisters 



We are one body of Christ?

Yes because in baptism we all died and rose INTO him


Everything we say flows from dying and rising with the Messiah. 

Point 1: Paul



2) Why baptism infants?

Know there's debate: Catholic, orthodox, Lutherans, Presbyterians, Methodist baptize infants 

Baptists, evangelical, fundamentalist: don’t 

Reasonable argument:

Early church = mostly adults

Going down into the water: adult image


We all agree: Need to believe; Profess faith in Jesus 


A baby getting baptized looks different

Not professing much


Why are we ok with godparents reciting creed; making promises? 

Debate going on in the church for centuries since the Reformation, exactly 500 years ago 

But why then do we baptize infants? 


You know who I really like to steal from on this one? 

The Lutherans

Missouri Synod: Their document on Baptism. FAQ

Incredibly clear and concise answer

Probably have to answer the question more often than us. 

Catholics can get used to just doing what the church does

"We baptize infants, evangelicals don't. Ok."


But Lutherans have Baptist friends asking "Hey Lutheran folk, why do you..."

Had to be ready

"be prepared to give the reasons for the hope that lies within you"

Lines right up with Catholic thought:

Baptism, we believe, [is] the miraculous means of grace [...] through which God creates the gift of faith in a person's heart. Although we do not claim to understand how this happens or how it is possible, we believe—because of what the Bible says about Baptism—that when an infant is baptized God creates faith in the heart of that infant. This faith cannot yet, of course, be expressed or articulated, yet it is real and present all the same. The faith of the infant, like the faith of adults, also needs to be fed and nurtured by God's word.

All of a sudden makes sense

Debates about: having enough free will to choose God; or do we really have faith as infant...

No, you're reading it all wrong

Faith is a gift

At baptism God creates faith in the heart of the baptized... whether a child or an adult

And then grows, nourished...

...Taught and nourished...

Whether a child or adult. 

Bp. Bruskewitz, for 20 years at Confirmation: “ The faith is more caught than taught"


We 100% agree

God creates the Faith—no matter what age we are...

and then it grows— no matter what age we are. 

Point 2: infant Baptism



3) St. Louis IX

KIng Louis of France 

St. Louis named after him

St. Louis IX 

...has Single best reflection on just how big baptism is

We know it's important, but because we were baptized as children we kinda forget 

"I've seen pictures, I was cute, my godparents were a lot younger."


We know it's important but we don't realize how humongous it was

Louis didn't have this problem


Would become king of France in the 1200s

Would have so much power as the king of the largest Catholic nation

So much dignity, 

So much royal regal power

But he  had perspective


Didn't grow up in Paris

Poissy

Years after he been crowned king, as an adult, he was asked why he loved the little chapel in the castle where he a grown-up, compared to Notre Dame in Paris, or the beautiful Cathedral at Rheims where all the kings of France had been crowned for 500+ years. 


He answered: 

In the castle chapel I received the sacrament of baptism, thereby becoming a child of God. In the Cathedral of Rheims, I received the royal crown, whereby I became King of France. I deem divine sonship a greater dignity than earthly kingship. The dignity of kingship I will lose at the time of my death, whereas, as a child of God, I will obtain eternal happiness.


That's an awesome insight.

That's why he's a saint

He understood that, while he might not remember his baptism, and they didn't have photos in the 13th century…

He knew that on that day, in that moment, he became a child of God and he inherited eternal life

He knew that was a far greater things than anything else that had happened to him:

The roses thrown at his feet

The gold placed on his head

The bows and reverence from all of France 

Was nothing compared to what he received... 

As a tiny little infant, in that cruddy little chapel, in that drafty old castle, in Poissy. 

He received everything he could ever want


We need to take that to heart

We need to think that for ourselves:

"I might not know everything about my baptism, 

but that was the moment

That was the KEY moment for my entire life and my eternity:



The moment I was baptized."

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