Baptism
When I was a child, perhaps 8 old, my parents to my sister and I on
holiday with them to Italy. We went
to Naples and Pompeii. Close by
there was volcanic crater called Sulphartara. I remember it being up a short track
from the main road, a small valley, like a small quarry, with a flat floor of
yellow earth, and a terrible stench of rotten eggs.
A
guide showed us around. He took us
into the middle of the little valley and stamped his foot. The floor rang like a bell. We were standing on a thin crust over
the volcano, and underneath it was hollow.
You could hear the hollowness when he stamped. Then he took a piece of newspaper out of
his pocket, rolled it into a taper, scrapped a bit of yellow earth aside with
his foot and put the paper into the small depression he had made. In a moment it caught
fire.
All
these things took time to complete.
We had been there a while by the time we had discovered the insecurity of
standing on a thin crust, over a live volcano, that was very hot, and by that
time I had become used to the terrible stench of rotten eggs, to the point where
I hardly noticed the smell anymore.
I had been breathing the sulphurous air for long enough to have become
accustomed to the smell of rotten eggs.
The smell had faded into the background, rather than being in the
forefront of my awareness.
It
is my experience that something similar happens in our life as Christians. What happens to us when we become a
Christian becomes part of our life, and we cease to be conscious of it, because
it is naturally there all the time.
Some years ago I wanted to know Christ more. I wanted to be conscious of his presence
in my life. I wanted gifts and
abilities to serve him. So I asked
for and received the laying on of hands for the fullness of the Holy Spirit to
be in my life.
It
was a bit of a let down. I wanted
something like St Paul had on the road to Damascus. But I had no internal fireworks at
all. At the time I was
disappointed. It seemed like a
non-event. I asked myself if it was
all hype and self-delusion.
However, further on in time I was able to look back to that point in
my growth as a Christian, and I recognise that in asking for the laying on of
hands, I had taken a major step forward in my spiritual progress. The asking was in itself a step
forward. As a shy person I tend to
be reserved. For me to go and tell
someone of my spiritual needs was a step in humility. It was part of the change to my
character that Christ was making in me.
Because the change was slow, and not sudden, because there was no
fanfare on a celestial trumpet or fireworks, there was no obvious making of the
event and change was not something I was consciously aware
of.
At
Sulphartara I became accustomed to a really horrid smell, and ceased to notice
it.
As
a Christian, I had became accustomed to a really wonderful privilege, and ceased
to notice it.
I
became so accustomed to having been given the gift of the companionship of the
Holy Spirit, that I ceased to notice his presence in my life.
Because his presence is normal and I am accustomed to his presence, I
would only have been conscious of the difference if the Holy Spirit went out of
my life, for then I would notice the gap.
Because we are given this gift through baptism, and for most of us
that was a long time ago, we are often not conscious that we have the presence
of Christ in our lives, because it is a presence that is there all the time, and
for most of the time we do not taste, smell or feel the difference his presence
is making in us.
However, there are also special times when we are more sensitive to
the miracle of God’s presence, and we become more aware, we become lifted up
from our routine, into an extra closeness for a
while.
It
is when we have these little ‘extra’ moments that we appreciate the glory that
is so near us.
Frankly, we would also better appreciate the glory that is already
ours if we lost it occasionally.
However, thanks be to God, his grace doesn’t come and go like
that.
Because we have this gift, and because we cannot remember what it was
like not to have this gift, we sometimes fail to appreciate just how significant
our baptism was in our Christian journey.
Baptism is important to our understanding of the Christian
experience. John the Baptist says
that his was a baptism of repentance, in water, but that the baptism of Jesus is
with the Holy Spirit and fire.
There is something important to notice in this text.
The
people who’s hearts are touched by John are inspired to try to rectify their
lives, and they make an outward demonstration of the sorrow and change they want
to achieve, (what Christians call repentance) by going into the River Jordan to
be baptised by John. It is
something they choose to do for themselves, to get right with God. But the getting of the Holy Spirit is
not something we can choose to get; it is a gift that is given by the grace of
God. However much we might want it,
we cannot get it. The Holy Spirit
comes to us as a person, as a gift by the grace of
God.
When I was a child there used to be country fairs and for sixpence
you could try the Lucky Dip. The
Lucky Dip was a barrel filled with sawdust and in the sawdust there were
gifts. You had to dig down into the
sawdust and feel for a present, but they were wrapped up so you couldn’t tell by
feeling what each gift was. For
sixpence everyone was a winner, some got things better than others, but everyone
got something.
Adults who seek baptism or laying on of hands often go into it like a
child digging into the lucky dip barrel, seeking a special gift. I know that is what I did. And that is why I felt let down by the
experience.
We
have to learn that we don’t dig our hands into the grace of God and take
whatever gift takes our fancy.
Instead, we submit ourselves to baptism or laying on of hands, because we
are willing to accept and apply what God chooses to give
us.
For
the first thousand years of Christianity, initiation into Christ through baptism
was understood to mean to be received fully into Christ, and the split between
baptism and a later confirmation and communion did not exist. This split is often described as the two
parts of an outward and inner conversion into Christ. But the split can sometimes cause us to
loose our understanding of just what we have been
given.
We
think, we have chosen baptism and we have chosen confirmation, so we elected to
make happen whatever it is that happens at those two events, because we chose to
do it.
It
is not so. God makes it
happen. Without God, what we are
doing is little different to red Indians dancing to make it rain. Cause and effect don’t work that way in
the dominion of God.
God
works his purpose out through us, and our submission to the ritual of initiation
through baptism and confirmation, simply makes us more usable for the purpose of
God. In the context of how he wants
to work his purpose out, he gives us gifts, some for a time, some as permanent
attributes of our Christian life.
In the Bible the sequence of conversion is
1.
Proclamation of the risen
and exalted Christ,
2.
Followed by conversion,
3. Followed by baptism by water and the Holy
Spirit into the full community of gospel believers.
For
many of us, this means we need to recover and bring back into the forefront of
our consciousness what we have already got!
Just like my experience at Sulphatara, where I became accustomed to
the smell and began not to notice it.
We have been given a divine fragrance in our lives, but because it has
been given to us permanently, we cease to notice it and so we fail to act upon
it.
We
lack confidence in the words of God in our life. We doubt ourselves and so we begin to
doubt him.
When God created this world he did so with order and purpose, so that
it has balance and each part has a relationship with each other part; the moon
and the tides, the seasons and lives of living creatures. And He made you and I in just the same
way. We are created for purpose and
relationship.
We
must ask ourselves what this purpose of God is in our life.
By
baptism we have been given the companionship and guidance of the Holy
Spirit. Ask him what is your
purpose. I expect he will bring to
mind what each of us is good at, and he will ask if we are giving that gift to
the fellowship for the glory of Jesus Christ.
We
are baptised into water, the Holy Spirit and fire, for such is the baptism
brought by Jesus. Luke 3. 17 ‘He (Jesus) will baptise you with the
Holy Spirit and with fire.’ So
shout Alleluia! Cry out Amen! Praise the Lord! Fan the flame of the fire given to you
long ago, and be warmed by the passion of His love!
This year may our resolution be that we are
set alight by God, that he may glorified in our lives! Amen!