Referencing Pagan Christianity by Frank Viola and George Barna
Barna, Tyndale House, 2002/8
8
Baptism and the Lord’s
Supper: diluting the sacraments, (Pagan Christianity, chapter 9 title)
It is generally accepted that the Catholic Church recognises
seven sacraments: baptism, eucharist, confirmation, reconciliation, anointing
the sick, marriage and holy orders. Most
other church traditions recognise just two: baptism and the Lord’s supper (the
eucharist).
But just what is a ‘sacrament’? The ‘ment’ at the end of the word, due to a
quirk of the English language, basically turns a verb into a noun. The ‘sacra’ bit at the front derives from the
old French sacrer meaning to make
holy, consecrate, anoint, dedicate. The
result is that a sacrament is a thing made holy as the result of a
process. The “process” involved is
whatever is chosen by the relevant authority as the means of consecration or
dedication. Often a part of that process
is the application of oil in what is termed anointing.
It is also fairly widely accepted that the New Testament
Greek equivalent of sacrament is musterion – much like the English word mystery only
with a wider, deeper meaning. Since the
new testament original is Greek, that is the word one would look for.
Apostle Paul knew this mystery. Indeed, he didn’t simply ‘know’ it, it was
given in grand detail to him specifically as a ministration of the Holy spirit
– I believe while he was in ‘the wilderness’ for three years after Jesus
arrested him of the road to Damascus (Acts 9).
It was in his blood; and to use a more modern analogy, it was in his
DNA. He could no more evade, avoid or
abandon this mystery than we can evade, avoid or abandon our parental DNA. It shaped everything he believed, said and
did. It was the heart and the substance
of what he “preached” – taught, debated, agonised over, declared, etc.
And I believe it is all those things and more, for us, for
today, for the present and the future we all long for on this earth and in the
life hereafter. I also believe it both
explains and gives the deepest substance to and ‘fences in’ what we call the
sacraments we seem to hold so dear, whether the number of them is 2 or 7 or
whatever number you pick. But what is it.
Let me give you a sample of the concept of this mystery (all
from Paul) off the pages of the new testament letters Paul wrote (in the NASB) :
Ephesians 6:19
and pray on my behalf, that utterance may be
given to me in the opening of my mouth, to make known with boldness the mystery of the gospel,
Colossians 4:3
praying at the same time for us as well, that
God will open up to us a door for the word, so that we may speak forth the mystery of Christ, for which I have
also been imprisoned;
1 Timothy 3:16
By common confession, great is the mystery of godliness: He who was
revealed in the flesh, was vindicated in the Spirit, seen by angels, proclaimed
among the nations, believed on in the world, taken up in glory.
Ephesians 5:32
This mystery
is great; but I am speaking with reference to Christ and the church.
But the key that unlocks the revelation of the truth of this
amazing mystery is this:
Colossians 1:26-27
that is, the mystery which has been hidden from the past ages and generations,
but has now been manifested to His saints, to whom God willed to make known
what is the riches of the glory of this mystery
among the Gentiles, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory.
While ever the old
covenant was in force, the mystery (the true sacramentum) would remain
“hidden”; few would perceive or comprehend it; even the prophets of old
struggled to grasp it despite ‘seeing’ it, like in the dim light or a fractured
mirror; God’s Spirit would not reveal it until the time was right.
But note that, in Paul’s explanation, God “willed” to make
it known at that point in history and forever to be known – no longer
hidden. In the new covenant, there is to be no more sacramentum; no more hidden mystery
to be ministered by special people, dressed in special clothes, at special
times, within special buildings, using special rites, mouthing special words,
enlisting special forms of speech and delivery.
What was that point in history that made all the difference
in the world? The answer is in the
scriptures – in Romans 1:
Paul, a bond-servant of Christ
Jesus, called as an apostle, set apart for the gospel of God, which He promised
beforehand through His prophets in the holy Scriptures, concerning His Son, who
was born of a descendant of David according to the flesh, who was declared the
Son of God with power by the resurrection
from the dead, according to the
Spirit of holiness, Jesus Christ our Lord; through whom we have received
grace and apostleship to bring about the obedience of faith among all the
nations for His name’s sake, among whom you also are the called of Jesus
Christ;
Resurrection! Note
Paul again in his first letter to the Corinthians:
Now if Christ is preached, that He
has been raised from the dead, how do some among you say that there is no
resurrection of the dead? But if there
is no resurrection of the dead, not even Christ has been raised; and if Christ has not been raised, then our
preaching is vain, your faith also is vain.
Moreover we are even found to be false witnesses of God, because we
testified against God that He raised Christ, whom He did not raise, if in fact
the dead are not raised. For if the dead
are not raised, not even Christ has been raised; and if Christ has not been raised, your faith is worthless; you are still
in your sins. Then those also who
have fallen asleep in Christ have perished.
If we have hoped in Christ in this life only, we are of all men most to
be pitied.
How
can this possibly be? It’s in the words
from Paul (above) in his letter to the Colossians: CHRIST IN YOU. The ‘mystery’
– the sacramentum – is the living reality that under the old covenant, God’s salvation,
righteousness, redemption and justification would remain available but external
and ministered via a human priesthood.
Whereas, under the new covenant, they become internal – matters of the
soul and spirit and of imputation – ministered via the Melchizedek priesthood
of Jesus who lives forever and remains the
High Priest of the new covenant forever.
In this series, I’m going to stick with the Protestant
pattern of two sacraments. However, the
principles I put here apply to however many sacraments there might be perceived
to be.
And this is the emphatic central point of my argument: the
resurrection of Jesus delivered to the world the possibility, the means and the
reality of CHRIST IN YOU. And CHRIST IN
YOU is our salvation, our righteousness, our redemption and our
justification. Therefore whatever
‘sacraments’ (‘mystery’) we want practise and administer, they spring forth
from this one crystal clear well: CHRIST IN YOU, THE HOPE OF GLORY.
For me, the Missio Dei
(God’s mission on planet earth’) is “God was, in Christ, reconciling the world
to Himself.” He has accomplished that by
unveiling His ‘mystery’ long kept secret that CHRIST IN YOU is our one and only
HOPE OF GLORY. Everything we need to be
face-to-face with God “in freedom and confidence”, without fear, is found in
this one profound thing: CHRIST IN YOU.
Baptism and the Lord’s Supper then become open, glorious,
spectacular, expressions of our human participation in this truth. They are no longer ‘mystery’; they are no
longer ‘symbol’; they are no longer ‘special’ to a caste or clique or clan.
And when ‘church’ takes them back, hides them under a veil,
re-surrounds them in mystery, consigns them to a ‘clergy’ class and charges
people a tithe to access them, they have profaned the mystery and dishonoured
the Christ who suffered to deliver them to us and whose greatest longing from
his throne is that we come out from under the strictures of the old covenant
and fully enjoy the sunlight.
Baptism is the real “sinner’s prayer”; the Lord’s supper is
fellowship meal of the baptised believers.
But we do indeed have a problem. Perhaps the best way to see that problem is
to read, and re-read, Acts 19. Where
there is faulty and deficient teaching, what people ‘receive’ is the product of
that deficient teaching – witness the Ephesian disciples who were the product
of Apollos’ deficient teaching. And
witness the difference in those disciples when Paul taught them the whole
gospel of the Kingdom and the truth of the Holy Spirit. And witness the efforts of Aquila and
Priscilla to augment the knowledge base Apollos was working with.
My experience over 50-plus years is that an enormous number
of the “disciples” I meet are just like those Ephesian disciples: deficient in
the knowledge of the full gospel and especially the bit about the Holy Spirit.
The Normal Christian Birth: How to
give new believers a proper start in life (Hodder & Stoughton, 1997) was written by David
Pawson in the UK. The book was the
product of the same searching he was doing at the same time as I was doing it
here: what is missing that leaves so many with stunted spiritual lives and
knowing virtually nothing of the new covenant experience Jesus and the first
apostles were at pains to deliver to the world?
A deficient, mostly old covenant message of religion without the baptism
of Jesus and the power of the Holy Spirit.
So, one thing we need to do is to correct that deficiency
for those disciples who have, like these disciples in Ephesus, only received
the baptism of John – the baptism of repentance. They need to hear and receive the baptism of
Jesus: the Holy Spirit. The other thing
we can do is stop peddling a deficient gospel: those spreading the gospel need
to first experience for themselves the full gospel and the baptism of
Jesus. Then when they give away what
they have, it will be the full gospel and the baptism of Jesus.
A litter earlier I referred to a migration of German
Baptists to Australia many years ago escaping persecution in Europe. Why were they being persecuted in
Europe? In Europe, they were called ‘Anabaptists’
– ‘ana’ meaning again: they believed, lived and taught adult believers baptism
and so baptised people again as adults.
The church hated them.
Paul is very clear that there is “one body, one Spirit ...
one hope ... one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all – who
is over all and through all and in all.” (Ephesians 4) And for all those who participate in this
‘one-ness’ through Christ in you,
there is one family meal for us to participate in.
The ‘one baptism’ is not the baptism of John. See Matthew 3 for example: John himself is saying “I baptise you with
water for repentance, but after me will come One more powerful than I, whose
sandals I am not worthy to carry. He
will baptise you with the Holy Spirit and with fire.” And what the baptism of the Holy Spirit
delivers is Christ in you.
And Christ in you
is the “currency” of the new covenant kingdom of God in this world until the
end comes, whatever and whenever that is.
Christ in you is not only the
means
of exchange, it is what we exchange. Christ in me delivers gifts and blessings for
the world; Christ in you does likewise; but we are all different and we ‘trade’
with each other to achieve what Paul wrote about to the Ephesians:
Now to each one of us grace has been given
according to the measure of the gift of Christ.
This why it says [Psalm 68]: ‘When He ascended on high, He led captives
away, and gave gifts to men.’ ... in order to fill all things. And it was He who gave ... to equip the saints for works of ministry,
to build up the body of Christ,
until we all reach unity in the faith
and in the knowledge of the Son of God, as we mature to the full measure of the stature of Christ.
That is simply not possible without Christ in you; which is not possible without the baptism of the
Holy Spirit; which is not possible without the full gospel of the new covenant
kingdom of God; which follows the pattern of Romans 10:14-15
How then will they call on Him in whom they
have not believed? How will they believe
in Him whom they have not heard? And how
will they hear without a preacher? How
will they preach unless they are sent? Just
as it is written, ‘How beautiful are the
feet of those who bring good news of good things.’
Drug users hate it when suppliers deliver them “bad shit”;
we need to develop a similar aversion to the “bad shit” delivered to us by
religious people wanting to keep us in the ways of the old covenant, taking
over what is properly the work of the Holy Spirit. (See Acts 15)
Baptism and the Lord’s suppers are not mystery (sacramentum)
anymore; they are two expressions of the living reality of participation in
Christ: baptism >>> participation in his death and resurrection
>>> Christ in you as fact;
Lord’s supper >>> participation in his salvation, righteousness,
redemption and justification and participation in the his ‘body’ (ekklesia) >>> Christ in you as currency.
Baptism marks a complete break with the past and full
entrance into Christ and the ekklesia;
Lord’s supper marks the non-hierarchical ‘brotherly’ sharing of the whole
family around the family table, with the host and ‘MC’ being Jesus Christ
himself.
Note to self: Remember, baptism and the
Lord’s supper are about ‘Christ in you, the hope of Glory’ and live that each
day you’re alive and with each breath you take until the last one.