The Sacrament of Grace

Sermon by James W. Crawford

April 26, 1998

Matthew 28:1-10, 16-20

Baptism. What is it all about? What are we doing? A teacher of mine writing from his perch at McGill University wonders if baptism has not just become a rite of passage in the larger culture. He wonders if it means any more than sending our children off to kindergarten, or getting them ready for their first prom, prepping them for their SATs. He sadly reflects that  baptism for many of us fails to bind us to the roots of our tradition; it no longer reminds us of who we are. His fondest hope? to reclaim baptism's  powerful imagery for the sake of our Christian identity.

So this morning, as we join in the high privilege of baptizing two infants, I want to offer you a sense of what this wonderful rite is all about. And I want to assure you that we deal not simply with little children here, not with just their families and the God parents -- you are in on this too. And your presence here this morning as witnesses and participants is crucial to what draws us all around this font.

I

First of all: we call this a sacrament: the sacrament of baptism. Now, what is a sacrament? Our great Father in the Faith, St. Augustine, calls a sacrament: "The word made visible. . . the Word made visible." Augustine knows that word and action, what we say followed by something we do, speaks more cogently than just something we say. He knows, for instance,  that when we say we love someone, we do not just turn around and walk away; we need to validate the word with an embrace, to ratify it with a kiss, to engage in a demonstrative activity authenticating and bringing our words to life.

Thus, he calls a sacrament: "the word made visible." He means it is the Gospel acted out. Now what is the Word? What is the Gospel? In the case of these two little infants this morning, it is simply this: Aerin Skye, Amanda Grace: God loves you! It is as simple as that. No long theological treatise, no esoteric speculation: God loves you!

In this sacrament, especially with infants, we assert and then demonstrate one of the most glorious features of the love and grace of God. Love and grace come to us at God's initiative. These little children do not know anything about what we do. Indeed, the water may be cold; they may scream and cry, squiggle, tweak my chin, mess with the "mike," but what we say, what we make visible while they remain ignorant of our words and action is this: Amanda, Aerin: you don't know it yet, but God loves you, and whether you respond to that love someday is up to you. You have the freedom to receive and rejoice in it, to ignore it, to be indifferent to it, to utterly reject it as hogwash -- but we say here today, your mom and dad believe it, this body gathered around celebrates it: God loves you from beginning to end, through thick and through thin, forever -- and as we insist here time and again, God will never let you go.

The French Reformed Church, I think, puts this matter in a vivid and striking way: "Little child," it says in its baptismal rite, "Little child, for you Jesus Christ came into the world, he did battle with the world, for you he went through the agony of Calvary, for you he cried, 'it is fulfilled;' for you he triumphed over death . . . For you, and you little child do not know anything about this, but thus is the statement of the Apostle confirmed: 'We love because God first loved us.'"

That is the Gospel. That is the Word. As we engage in the Sacrament of infant baptism we make visible that audacious assertion: "We love because God first loved us."

Now, saying that, we must be clear about something else. When I first began my ministry years ago in a little town north of the Adirondacks on the St. Lawrence Seaway, I called on everyone in the parish. There happened to live there a large cohort of French-Canadian Catholics from Quebec. Now and again I would arrive at a home so crushed by some religious burden I could hardly get the parent to speak. Then it would turn out they had child who may have died before being baptized, perhaps in childbirth or through some other terrible infant illness or catastrophe. That child in this particular Catholic parish was buried outside the Catholic cemetery, in a potters field, excluded perceptually from the full grace and glory of God. This treatment of the deceased child branded it, in the eyes of its mother and father, an outcast, a human being for some doctrinal reason set outside the everlasting arms, a child whose intimacy with God was damaged, whose salvation, if you will, was suspended because of the failure to be baptized.

I still catch my breath at such a doctrine. What parent would not be crushed at such rejection? How could God love the child any less than the grieving parent? If you do not remember anything else this morning, please remember this: In our tradition, as we have just insisted, the love of God bears with us through everything, and hangs onto us regardless of our condition. Should, God-forbid, anyone die -- much less a child, before baptism, should illness, or childbirth, or tragedy take any child before baptism, that child is no less engulfed in the everlasting arms than anyone else, baptized or not. In our tradition, as we try to make clear today, baptism is not necessary for salvation; it is necessary only for proclamation.  What we do today in word and sacrament is not to save these children; there is no magic word or potion or spiritual red carpet to heaven -- No way!  What we do today for them, for their parents and for you is to proclaim the eternal love of God for all of us under all circumstances at God's initiative.  Let me reiterate: What we do this morning is not necessary for salvation. It is necessary only for proclamation. It is tell and show. It is a sermon acted out.

II

So then, Baptism proclaims the love of God for all of us. It illustrates Love's initiative. But what about the water? What is that all about? And what of the "Word" does the water make visible? Well, just as the baptism of an infant demonstrates best the reality of God's initiative, so the baptism of an adult demonstrates best the meaning of water at baptism. The Baptists illustrate it best. They do not baptize infants. They immerse adult candidates. They take them down to the river or they submerge them in a pool. Why? What does this show? What do we proclaim through the use of water?

Immersion demonstrates the most wonderful and powerful thing about the Christian life. The water itself symbolizes a tomb. Going down, we die to the old; coming up, we rise to the new. We say by this action: "Love has come into my life. Grace infuses it. I am a new person. My old life is cast away. I feel as if I have been born anew."

In a few minutes we are going to sing "Amazing Grace." You know the story of John Newton who wrote that hymn. A boy virtually abandoned at sea by his family, beaten and degraded so he welcomed a transfer to a British slaver. For years he labored as the first mate on the evil ship "Harwich," transporting Africans to slavery in the new world. Newton  lived, he tells us, a terrible life. Who knows what happened to him. But John Newton changed. He shed his old life as a slave trader and entered a radically new life. Remember his self-designed epitaph? "John Newton, once an infidel and libertine, a servant of slavers in Africa, was by the rich mercy of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, preserved, restored, pardoned, and appointed to preach the faith he had so long labored to destroy."

 Immersion signifies a dying to the old; a rising to the new. It makes visible the kind of life we know can be ours if we would just stop trying to be somebody, or prove ourselves, or worry if anybody likes us -- and surrender to the love of Christ.

Now we are not going to immerse these children. I am just going to touch them with water from the font. But it means the same thing. It illustrates Christ's promise of new life belongs to them. They do not know it yet. But the questions I ask their mothers and fathers in preparation for this act, the promises and commitments they make to bring their children up in the light and life of the church, enables these children when they are of age,  whatever it might be -- 13, 18, 25, 50 -- to confirm - to confirm -- the promise and possibilities of what we say and do here; it makes possible the child's response to the grace and hope we proclaim by word and make visible in the sacrament.

III

But there is more. Today we welcome these little children into the family of faith. We say "hello" to them as brothers sisters in Christ. Now, we know where their family genes and chromosomes come from. We know to whom they are legally attached. But today, we say, "Welcome Aerin Skye, welcome Amanda Grace, welcome into this family rooted and grounded not in your genetic history, not in your genealogy, not in your social class or race, not your nation or your official papers. This gathering surrounding you in this room this morning comes here because finally they consider themselves children of God, brothers and sisters of Jesus Christ, men and women whose hope for a world where love issuing in justice and peace finally reigns, whose trust in the One who loves you woos them here too.  This is your new family: worldwide in scope; with perhaps others standing by you whom we call "God parents," representing a larger sphere, transcending the immediate and intimate attachment to your legal parents, representing a realm beyond limits of your nuclear family.

And yes, standing with you as well, will be the Sr. Deacon of this congregation, John Weingartner, representing all of us here, saying by his presence that, in a way all of us are your God parents, your God sisters and brothers, and we celebrate your arrival among us. Welcome home.

IV

And Amanda and Aerin, if I may continue to speak to you, do you know why we celebrate this sacrament here, in this room, among all these people?  Well, of course it is, as we said, because we welcome you into the family of Jesus Christ. But it is also because, as old and as experienced and as faithful church people as we may be, what we say and do for you, we say and do for ourselves too. We do this act not only for you and for your mom and dad, we do this for the sake of this whole congregation. Each person here -- every one of us -- stands in the same relationship to God that you do.  What we say and do for you, we say and do for them. Does God love you?  Has God loved you from the very beginning? Before you even knew there was such a thing? Well, each person here exists in exactly the same relationship to the love of God you do -- and each of us here needs to hear that, see it ratified and absorb it no less so than you -- and perhaps by this time in our lives, perhaps a lot more than you do. Each of us wants to know the grace of God can break into our lives and carry us through the worst, make us new, perhaps change us in such a way we feel we have died to the old and risen to the new. We hear it is true. We know those who testify to it. We need and we want to hear it and see it again and again. We want that Word madevisible for us. We need be reminded that just as God loves you two children, so God loves us. And we rejoice in being here with you so we too may share the Gospel power.

V

And lastly, you are being baptized in a Church known as The Old South Church in Boston, a congregation of the United Church of Christ. It is a wonderful church family. But here is the beauty part: This sacrament is the universal sacrament. You are not being baptized Protestant or Catholic, not Congregational or Episcopalian, not UCC, Baptist, Methodist or Lutheran or anything else. You are being baptized in the name of the Triune God who breaks down all denominational barriers, whose love for you is not contingent on any particular dogma or polity, whose efficacy is not the prerogative of bishops, or priests, or ministers -- indeed, you can be baptized by anyone in this congregation. You are God's child -- not the child of any religious line or creed. And just as it is with you, our beloved little ones, so it is with us; it is on God's breast all of us live and die -- sons and daughters of the loving, gracious God of Jesus Christ, brothers and sisters in the Divine family.

So we come to this sacrament this morning asserting God loves these little children; God loves you - me. We come confident of the grace that can engage and recreate our lives, as if dying to the old, rising to the new.

We come gathered as a family exercising love and grounded in the faith and hope revealed in Christ Jesus.

Friends: that is the Word of God; the Word of grace. We proceed now to make that Word of grace visible.