Baptism and Mother Kirk

I've written four posts now on the church, making the case that the visible church is far more important to the Christian's life, even their salvation, than most evangelicals assume. But who is in the visible church? Those who go through a membership class? Those who attend on Sunday? What serves to connect someone to the visible church?

Baptism.

I believe it is baptism that inducts us into membership in the church visible and thereby connects us to the visible body of Christ.

I'll make a case for this over the next few posts, but let me start here quoting several important confessions of faith on baptism, union with Christ, and membership in the church.

Scottish Confession of Faith: We assuredly believe that by baptism we are engrafted in Christ Jesus, to be made partakers of his justice, by the which our sins are covered and remitted; and also, that in the supper, rightly used, Christ Jesus is so joined with us, that he becomes the very nourishment and food of our souls

Westminster Confession of Faith, 28.1: Baptism is a sacrament of the New Testament, ordained by Jesus Christ, not only for the solemn admission of the party baptized into the visible Church; but also to be unto him a sign and seal of the covenant of grace, of his ingrafting into Christ, of regeneration, of remission of sins, and of his giving up unto God, through Jesus Christ, to walk in the newness of life.Which sacrament is, by Christ's own appointment, to be continued in His Church until the end of the world.

39 Articles, Article XXVII: Baptism is not only a sign of profession, and mark of difference, whereby Christian men are discerned from others that be not christened, but it is also a sign of Regeneration or New-Birth, whereby, as by an instrument, they that receive Baptism rightly are grafted into the Church; the promises of the forgiveness of sin, and of our adoption to be the sons of God by the Holy Ghost, are visibly signed and sealed, Faith is confirmed, and Grace increased by virtue of prayer unto God. The Baptism of young Children is in any wise to be retained in the Church, as most agreeable with the institution of Christ.

Heidelberg Catechsim Question 74: Are infants also to be baptized? Answer: Yes: for since they, as well as the adult, are included in the covenant and church of God; and since redemption from sin by the blood of Christ, and the Holy Ghost, the author of faith, is promised to them no less than to the adult; they must therefore by baptism, as a sign of the covenant, be also admitted into the christian church; and be distinguished from the children of unbelievers as was done in the old covenant or testament by circumcision, instead of which baptism is instituted in the new covenant.

And from a couple theologians I appreciate:
Edmond Clowney: "Baptism is recognized as the mark of membership in Christ's church by those outside it...in baptism we are numbered amongst the children of God, receiving the name of our Father, written, as it were, on our foreheads. To be sure, the washing of God's regenerating grace is accomplished by the water of the Spirit, no that of the font, but the outward sign functions precisely because it is outward; it is the Lord's visible seal of his invisible grace."

John Frame: "It is baptism that gives us the right to be recognized as Christians, unless or until we are excommunicated. Thus, it gives us the right to be part of the great work God is doing through his church"

More soon.

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Learning about Mystical Union from a Leadership Book

The staff is reading a book called A Failure of Nerve: Leadership in the Age of the Quick Fix, by Friedman . It's a leadership book.

But I read this today, "In any age, concept of leadership must square with the latest understanding of the relationship between brain and body…Recent findings suggest that to a large extent we have a liquid nervous system. The brain turns out to function like a gland. It is the largest organ of secretion, communicating simultaneously with various parts of the body, both near and far, through the reciprocal transmission of substances known as neurotransmitters. In other words, the head is present in the body!” - Friedman

You better believe that's showin up in my discussion of our mystical union with Christ. One of the metaphors Paul uses to describe this union most often is that of the body. We are members of the body united to Christ our head.

While it's clear the head is distinct from the body (and remains Lord over the body), the life of the head pulsates through the body. "The head is present in the body."

So awesome.

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Mother Kirk 4

Last week I said I'd continue this stream on the church and the importance of the visible church. This will be the last post in this till I round the bend and begin to think about how baptism relates to the visible church and how all this connects to the issue of apostasy.

Two main points became clear in my last post (at least to me). First, God has given us the church, the visible church, and all her ministries because we absolutely need them. We need preaching. We need discipline. We need the church as an anchor for our doctrine. We need the spiritual food we receive at the Table. Without them, there is little hope we'll survive in the faith. Second, Paul threatens those who persist in error - whether teaching lies or living in persistent sin - with excommunication. This is cutting off from the people of God, the visible church, is tantamount to 'handing them over to Satan'. The Church is Christ's spiritual kingdom. For the time being, the world outside is Satan's realm.

I want to push this discussion in a slightly different direction - a more Christocentric one. So far, I've argued the church is necessary for us. But I think there's more to it.

Nevin approaches the necessity of the visible church differently. He writes, “The life of Christ in the Church, is in the first place inward and invisible. But to be real, it must also become outward…the Church must be visible as well as invisible. In no other way can the idea become real.” He draws a parallel between man and the church: a man’s body is not the sum total of the man – there is a soul to be considered also; yet, without a body there is no real man. “Humanity,” writes Nevin, “is not a corpse on the one hand, nor a phantom on the other.” So, the inward life of the church and the outward form must go hand in hand – “Religion must have forms, as well as an inward living force.”  Nevin contends that the church outwardly manifests the inward life of Christ which animates her, and apart from this outward manifestation, no life can truly be said to exist. The invisible church, argued Nevin, can have no proper existence apart from the visible. DG Hart explains, The church, in other words, was the manifestation in the natural world of the resurrected Christ, literally and supernaturally the body of Christ.”

Our first, knee-jerk response may be that Nevin is pushing the body image too far. I don't think so. Schweitzer writes, "Thy Mystical Body of Christ is for Paul not a pictorial expression  nor a conception which has arisen out of symbolical and ethical reflections, but an actual entity." Certainly the body image with all its members is metaphor, but it's metaphor based on an ontological reality - Christ's life manifested outwardly in the church.

What does this mean to us practically?

First, to cut oneself off from the visible church is to cut oneself off from the church, from the people of God. As members of the body, we are connected to the life that flows from our head ONLY by being connected to the body. Self amputation is not a good idea.

Second, we ought to consider carefully the easy abandonment of one body in favor of another. Calvin writes convincingly (and convictingly - is that a word?), "there is no excuse for him who spontaneously abandons the external communion of a church in which the Word is preached and the sacraments are administered." Among these non-excuses he included minor doctrinal differences (though, when the gospel is destroyed a church ceases to exist), hypocrisy, and sin in the church (even by large portions of the church). Those things don't mean the church ceases to exist or isn't still worthy of our reverence. Only when those doctrines that are central to the gospel are perverted.  How radical does this sound to us who live in a church culture where people leave because they were offended by a joke, don't like the song selection, find a better kids thing somewhere, etc.

In summary, the visible church matters - on so many levels, for so many reasons, it matters. But who belongs to the visible church? That's where we're going next in the upcoming posts about baptism.

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Disciples Casting Out Demons

I've run into a lot of weird stuff in ministry - including vampires! Yep.

One thing I haven't run into, at least to my knowledge, is clear cut demon possession - not of the kind that Jesus' disciples encountered when he sent them out.

Why?

I've always attributed it to the fact that we are not (I am not) as attune to the spiritual realities as the disciples were (and there's certainly something to that). I'm not saying it's correct, but we've come to rely on scientific/medical explanations for what may be demonic.  

Jonathan Edwards raises another possibility in a sermon from 1736. It's a sermon he preached for a young pastors ordination based on the passage in Luke 10:17-18, "17 The seventy-two returned with joy, saying, “Lord, even the demons are subject to us in your name!” 18 And he said to them, “I saw Satan fall like lightning from heaven."

In his explanation of the passage (Puritan sermons were often broken into three parts: Explanation, Doctrine, and Uses or Application) Edwards comments, "In those days when Christ was on the earth, there were multitudes in the land possessed with devils, which seems to have been so ordered to prepare the way for a glorious triumph of Christ over the powers of darkness in casting them out."

When you look at the Old Testament you see no clear examples of demonic possession. The troubling spirit sent to assault Saul may be the lone exception (1 Sam 16:14). During the intertestamental period we do have accounts of Jewish exorcists, especially from within the Essenes sect and also in other pagan religions. Then, all of the sudden, a flurry of activity around Jesus' ministry, continuing on to some degree in the early stages of the church (though not with nearly the frequency in Acts as you see in the gospels).

Edwards point makes sense to me on two levels. First, Satan knew of the coming Messiah and his attacks and activity were intensified in the period around Jesus' coming. Second, this was according to God's plan so that Christ might display his power and the inbreaking of the kingdom in awe inspiring ways. Standing there watching possessed pigs run off a cliff you couldn't miss a) demons destroy,  b) they fear Jesus, and c) he could destroy them any time he wants. 

Conquering King indeed!

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"Fear Thou Not," Jenny and Tyler

I don't have much to say about this song other than I love it. Reading now through the book of Revelation with the boys at night and being a part of the miniseries at Connexion on the same book, this song seems to capture the essence of it - Fear Not, I am with Thee. Wonderful lyrics, great tune. Well done! You can get this song and more from their new album at Noisetrade.

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