A couple of years ago I was watching one of those “funniest home videos” programs on television, and one of the videos they showed that evening took place at the baptismal font of a large nondenominational church. Here’s the setting. The pastor was baptizing, by full immersion, a number of children who appeared to be roughly 12 to 13 years old. One at a time a child would walk into a large baptismal font that was approximately the size of a hot tub and appeared to be roughly four feet deep. The child was baptized by full immersion – and after the first child walked out of the font, a second child would walk in – be immersed – and be baptized.
All of a sudden a young boy who was identified by the announcer as the son of the pastor came running in from the right side of the screen and did a cannonball into the water. Water, of course, went everywhere. When the boy stood up he pumped his arms in victory – much like you might pump your arms if you were to win a race or win an important game. He was laughing, and his father – the pastor – started laughing, too. In fact, the entire congregation could be heard laughing. They laughed very loudly. They laughed for a long time. Some could be heard applauding. They all thought that what this boy had done was very funny.
Now remember that this was on a “funniest home videos” show. At the end of that show, three of the videos shown that night would be voted on by the studio audience, and the one that got the most votes would win a $10,000 prize. I have to admit that I don’t know if this video won the prize, because I was so upset that I switched channels. I was upset because this young boy had made a mockery of the Sacrament of Holy Baptism, and no one seemed to care. He didn’t care. His father the pastor didn’t care. The people in the church didn’t care. The studio audience didn’t care. I’m sure that millions of people who were watching the show at home didn’t care.
To all of them it was funny. But to me – and I pray, to you as well – this video showed just how little Baptism means to so many people today.
Our Gospel lesson this morning paints a very different picture of Baptism. There’s nothing funny, nothing humorous in Luke’s account of Jesus being baptized by John the Baptist. It is a joyful, wondrous account. But funny? Not even close.
I’d like to read again the last two verses, beginning with verse 21, of today’s Gospel lesson. “Now when all the people were baptized, and when Jesus also had been baptized and was praying, the heavens were opened, and the Holy Spirit descended on him in bodily form, like a dove; and a voice came from heaven, ‘You are my beloved son; with you I am well pleased.’” We’re all familiar with those words. But did you notice that something was missing? Did you notice that Luke seems to have left something out? Did you notice that Luke never tells us exactly how Jesus was baptized? In fact, you can go back and read about Jesus’ baptism in all of the Gospels, and you’ll find that none of them gives us actual details – not a one actually says that Jesus was fully immersed by John during His baptism. Many theologians and many Christian denominations teach that the only valid baptism is one of complete immersion – but the Bible never says that.
Biblical scholar R.C.H. Lenski writes that a search throughout the New Testament reveals that the Holy Spirit – who inspired each and every word of Scripture – seems specifically “to have withheld a mention of the mode” of baptism. “If the mode were such a vital thing,” he writes, “then we may certainly conclude that the Holy Spirit would in this most important case, if in no other, have indicated the mode with sufficient clearness; but he does nothing of the kind.” [emphasis added]
So why do well-meaning, serious Christians continue to argue about the question of baptismal immersion? If the Biblical and historical evidence is – at best – unclear about whether or not full immersion is the only true correct method for baptism to be administered, why has it become such an issue? Why does it divide people? Why does it divide Christians? Why does it matter?
When we start interpreting Baptism by the minds of men – by our own thoughts, by our own actions, by our own reason, by our own conclusions and by our own preferences – then we trivialize Baptism. We reduce it from a Sacrament to something that is not very important. Something that – in the overall scheme of things – doesn’t matter all that much. Something that reduces the forgiveness of sins to nothing more than a big laugh if some misguided kid decides to have fun by jumping into the baptismal font.
By definition, a Sacrament is a sacred act that includes three distinct elements. The first is that a Sacrament is instituted by God. Sacraments are not instituted by men. Sacraments aren’t instituted by people who take God’s Word and expand on it or add to it so that we can know not what God says – but what someone thinks that God “really wants us to know.” If a Sacrament isn’t instituted by God and God alone, it’s not now and never will be a Sacrament. Matthew 28: “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit”.
Second, a Sacrament is a sacred act in which God Himself joins His Word of promise to a visible element. In the Sacrament of Baptism, that element is water. Plain, simple water – water like we drink from the faucet, water like we see in the lakes and rivers and oceans. Without water, the human body cannot live. Without water, we thirst – we dehydrate – we die. Water – plain, simple water – gives us life. And when that plain, simple water is joined by God’s word of promise, we have not just human life, but eternal life. In the 5th chapter of St. Paul’s letter to the Ephesian church, he writes: “Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word”.
We conclude our definition of a Sacrament by saying that it is a sacred act by which God offers and seals the forgiveness of sins earned by Christ. In Mark chapter 16, Jesus tells His disciples that “whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned.”
Today too many people and too many churches turn baptism into something that we do for God, never correctly understanding that baptism is what God has done and continues to do for us. In the Sacrament of Holy Baptism, we receive forgiveness of sins. We are rescued from death and the devil. We receive eternal salvation. We are received into fellowship with the Holy Trinity – the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. We receive – God gives. No question about that.
Scripture makes clear that there are no questions to be asked – no doubts to be raised – about the baptism of infants and young children. Search for all you’re worth and you’ll never find a word of Scripture demanding a profession of faith prior to baptism. You’ll never find Jesus or anyone else in all 66 books of the Bible saying that infants and young children can’t have faith – or that they don’t need forgiveness of sins. What you will find are these words of Jesus recorded in Luke chapter 18: “Let the children come to me, and do not hinder them, for to such belongs the kingdom of God.” Last week we rejoiced as Skylar Mary Hicks – the beautiful infant daughter of Tara and Zachary Hicks – was baptized during our worship service.
One of my Seminary professors once said that “one cannot understand the Gospels without first understanding the baptism of Jesus. Jesus now takes humanity’s place to receive the wrath of God against sin. From this moment, Jesus now stands in solidarity with sinful humanity.”
Remember that John the Baptist was “proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins.” He was proclaiming it to sinners. And then Jesus Christ, the sinless Son of God, came to John and was baptized. Jesus had no sins – he had no need for repentance – he had no need for forgiveness. But here he took our sins – our need for repentance and our need for forgiveness – and made them His own. The sinless Son of God needed no baptism – yet in His baptism He places Himself with you and with me and with every sinful human being for whom baptism was created and instituted. Three years later our sins would weigh down on His tortured body as he hung from the cross. Our suffering became His suffering. Our death became His death. And through His suffering, death and resurrection, we are baptized into Christ. As St. Paul so wondrously tells us in today’s Epistle lesson from Romans chapter 6: “Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life. For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we shall certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his.”
Jesus Christ was baptized for us. The Sacrament of Baptism was given – was created – specifically for us. Baptism is a Holy Sacrament instituted by God Himself and should be treated as such. The question of full immersion or no full immersion is not at all – and never will be – a question that ultimately matters. The only questions that matter this morning go something like this. Do you live your life like someone who has been baptized? Like someone who has been redeemed? Like someone who has been saved? Do you thank God that you have been baptized and redeemed and saved? Do you thank God the Father that he sent His Son to suffer and die for our sins – and that the Holy Spirit has brought you to faith?
If you know someone who has perhaps not been baptized – who perhaps does not know Jesus – and who perhaps has not been brought to faith, then what are you going to do next? Those are the really important questions – and thanks be to God, you already know the answers.
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