LCMS Convention Proceedings St. Louis, Missouri — 1962, Page 26

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26 DOCTRINAL-DEVOTIONAL ESSAYS

over . . . it is most solemnly and strictly commanded
that we must be baptized or we cannot be saved... .
For it is of the greatest importance that we esteem Bap-
tism excellent, glorious, and exalted, for which we con-
tend and fight chiefly, because the world is now so full
of sects clamoring that Baptism is an external thing
and that external things are of no benefit. But let it be
ever so much an external thing, here stand God’s Word
and command which institute, establish, and confirm
Baptism. But what God institutes and commands can-
not be a vain but must be a most precious thing, though
in appearance it were of less value than a straw. .
For to be baptized in the name of God is to be baptized
not by men but by God Himself.”

Perhaps the most difficult feature of Baptism for
human reason to comprehend is the benefit or blessing
of Baptism. Here our Lutheran Confessions stand alone
as a true declaration of the doctrines of Holy Scripture.
What has Scripture to say? Listen to the clear and
simple words:

“Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit,
he cannot enter into the kingdom of God.”

“Be baptized, and wash away thy sins.”

“Be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus
Christ for the remission of sins, and ye shall receive
the gift of the Holy Ghost.”

Christ gave Himself for the church “that He might
sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the
word.”

“Baptism doth also now save us, not the putting
away of the filth of the flesh, but the answer of a good
conscience toward God.”

“As many of you as have been baptized into Christ
have put on Christ.”

“God our Savior... according to His mercy...
saved us by the washing of regeneration and renewing
of the Holy Ghost .. . that... we should be made
heirs according to the hope of eternal life.”

“Know ye not that so many of us as were baptized
into Jesus Christ were baptized into His death? There-
fore we are buried with Him by Baptism into death.”

“He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved.”

No wonder Luther answered the question “What
does Baptism give or profit?” with the words “It works
forgiveness of sins, delivers from death and the devil,
and gives eternal salvation to all who believe this, as
the words and promises of God declare.”

Again, the believing Bible Christian must stand
amazed at those who in spite of these many simple and
clear words permit their mighty but sinful reason to
hold sway over Scripture and call Baptism nothing
more than a solemn rite of initiation into outward com-
munion with the church, or a mere sign or symbol of
the cleansing from sin, a beautiful symbol of edifying
thoughts but, as only a symbol, actually conveying
nothing.

Some theologians claim that Baptism is a sign or
symbol of our willingness to assume the responsibilities
which God imposes upon us in Baptism.

Others, especially existential theologians, claim, for

example, that we must deduce the impotence of Infant
Baptism from the fact that in so many churches the
majority of adults give no evidence that “an event oc-
curred” at their Baptism in infancy. Such “an event”
could not take place, they say, in Infant Baptism, be-
cause the children are unable to answer the questions
addressed to them and are therefore unable to express
their willingness and readiness to assume the obligations
imposed in Baptism.

Others teach that a baptized person is first implanted
into the church, or, as they call it, “the new humanity,”
and then through membership in the church he obtains
forgiveness of sins.

Such are some of the many vagaries which have
been promulgated for centuries, which are promulgated
still today, many of them only in more philosophical and
perhaps less understandable terminology.

But Scripture uses words so clear and simple that
even a child can understand them. When, for example,
God’s Word says, “Be baptized for the remission of
sins,” then it is clear to every believing Christian that
Baptism is not a mere outward ceremony but a divine
means of grace, which seriously offers and imparts to
him forgiveness of sins. Again, when God’s Word says
Holy Baptism is a “washing of regeneration and renew-
ing of the Holy Ghost,” then it is clear to every believ-
ing Christian that Baptism is a divine means of grace
which is a rebirth which works the very faith that ac-
cepts the forgiveness of sins. It saves, because “Baptism
is not simple water only, but it is the water compre-
hended in God’s command and connected with God’s
Word”; there is connected with this divine washing the
Gospel of Christ, which “is the power of God unto sal-
vation to every one that believeth.” To be saved implies
nothing less than to be delivered from sin, death, and
the devil, a deliverance to achieve which the great God
gave His only-begotten Son; the Son laid down His
life, and the Father and the Son sent forth the Com-
forter, the Holy Spirit. To be saved is to come into the
kingdom of Christ and to live with Him forever. This
is what Baptism accomplishes,

Is Baptism then a mechanical operation? Does it
save automatically, by a sort of magical power?

Again Scripture is clear, “He that believeth and is
baptized shall be saved.” Therefore Dr. Luther says,
“It is not the water indeed that does [these great things
in Baptism], but the word of God which is in and with
the water, and faith, which trusts such word of God
in the water.” This is again where human reason ad-
mits an impossibility, especially with regard to the
possibility of faith in infants.

Says Dr. J. T. Mueller in an essay in The Abiding
Word (Vol. Il, p.407): “But how (we ask) can little
children have faith which trusts such word of God in
the water? Believing adults, of course, by faith trust
the baptismal Gospel promise. But how can infants
have faith? Here, again, the fact that Baptism is es-
sentially Gospel helps us understand the problem. The
Gospel, on the one hand, is the object of faith, that is,
the foundation upon which our faith rests. Our faith