Baptism personalizes the gospel. Baptism puts your name into the promises of the gospel. Baptism turns, “for God so loved the world…” into “for God so loved Rich…” Baptism makes the gospel yours. Baptism makes God *your* God. Baptism makes the church *your* family.
The call to “remember your baptism” is precisely the call to remember the gift God has given to you. It’s a call to remember the promises God has applied to you. It’s a call to remember your status as one who is dead to sin and alive to righteousness in union with Jesus. It’s a call to remember who you really are.
Martin Luther once said, “When you wash your face, remember your baptism.” Luther was not telling us as Christians to merely remember the *fact* of our baptism but what our baptism *means.* In baptism, God has claimed you and made you his. The whole Christian life is built on the foundation of baptism. To forget your baptism is to forget who – and whose – you are. Especially in times of doubt, Luther would urge us to cling to our baptisms as a tangible way of clinging to Christ.
Calvin says (slightly paraphrased), “We must realize that at whatever time we are baptized, we are once for all washed and purged for our whole life. Therefore, as often as we fall into sin, we ought to remember our baptism and fortify our mind with it, that we may always be sure and confident of the forgiveness of sins.” When Calvin calls on us to remember our baptisms, he is telling us that when we sin, when feelings of guilt prick our consciences, we should fortify our faith and reclaim our assurance by remembering God made a perpetual promise of cleaning and renewal to us in the water. Calvin is pitting baptism against the false Roman “sacrament” of penance. The way to deal with post-baptismal sin is not through the work of doing penance, but recalling the absolution that is ours in Christ. Indeed, for Calvin, the pastor’s declaration of absolution in the weekly liturgy is a remembrance of baptism.
And so I’ll say it again: baptism particularizes the promises of the Word. The baptismal formula includes the name of the one baptized. Baptism takes the general promises of the Word and makes them yours. This is the point of baptism: God does not just forgive; he forgives YOU. God does not just adopt; he has adopted YOU. God does not just love; he loves YOU. That’s the benefit given to us in baptism.
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The whole ministry of the church is on behalf of and directed towards sinners.
The gospel is for sinners; it addresses none but those who know they are wretched and broken, in need of forgiveness and empowerment.
Baptism is for sinners; baptism is a washing, and as a washing it presupposes our filth.
Communion is for sinners; it is the Father’s weekly party for returning prodigals, though instead of eating the fattened calf, we feast upon the Passover Lamb.
Absolution is for sinners; we hear a word of promise and love to bring us needed comfort and assurance.
The only qualification for living in the Father’s house of the church is that you admit your need and that you rest in Christ alone by faith. If you know you are a sinner, the ministry of the church FOR YOU!!
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“The child of a Christian parent is presumptively a Christian and an heir of eternal life … Christian nurture beginning in infancy is the divine instrumentality of the salvation of the church’s children … [and] the primary method appointed for the propagating of the church … I do not hesitate to claim that far and away the largest part of the Christian church at any time or place — excepting that historical moment when the gospel first reaches a place and a people — are those who were born and raised in Christian families and that this is true whether one is considering Christendom as an outward phenomenon or only the company of the faithful followers of Christ … The biblical paradigm is for covenant children to grow up in faith from infancy.” — Robert Rayburn on covenant succession
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