Baptism and the Lord's Supper -- Part 2

Baptism and the Lord's Supper go together. There is an essential relationship between them. They make the perfect pair, given to believers by God for their benefit. In a previous meditation I used this analogy to express one aspect of how they fit together: baptism as new birth is related to the Lord's Supper as natural birth is related to eating. We need weekly sustenance in order to maintain the spiritual life received in our new birth.

A second analogy is related to the New Testament image of the church as the bride of Christ. Baptism is related to the Lord's Supper as a marriage ceremony is related to marriage anniversaries and other acts of remembrance and renewal. At the ceremony, vows are said. Throughout the years that follow the vows are remembered and renewed repeatedly in simple rituals.

In a man's proposal and a woman's positive response both are saying "yes" to each other. But they haven't really said yes finally and completely until they say it in the vows of the marriage ceremony. Baptism corresponds to this. 1 Peter 3:21 says, "baptism now saves you," and then calls it, "the pledge (or vow) of a good conscience toward God." Baptism is our pledge, our vow, our "yes" to God. It brings us in that covenant relationship called the church, the bride of Christ.

We realize, of course, that saying "yes" in a marriage ceremony, and in baptism, is only the beginning. It is intended to happen only once, and then to be lived out and renewed in acts of loving faithfulness throughout the marriage. Furthermore, marriages that strengthen and deepen over the years develop simple and repeated rituals that remember and renew the initial yes.

Anniversary celebrations do this. Sometimes couples go to elaborate ends and great expense in anniversary celebrations. But they can also be very simple. I remember once on our anniversary that our kids thought it funny when our big night out was spent going to the public library.

Even more than yearly remembrances a variety of repeated, simple rituals help us to remember and renew our vows. One, for example, is the weekly date that many couples have. They may not say it out loud but when the set aside this time for each other they are in effect saying, "I remember and I renew my vow to you." They are saying "yes" to each other again.

And this is what we do in the simple weekly ritual at the Lord's Table each week. We remember and renew the vow to God that we first made in our baptism. It may be simple and the routine may be all too familiar but it reminds us of who we are as the bride of Christ. Once again we say "yes" to him as we confess our faith, eat the bread and drink from the cup.

Baptism and the Lord's Supper -- Part I

Some things are meant to go together. As someone said, "Like meat and potatoes, salt and tomatoes, we make a perfect pair."

Likewise, baptism and the Lord's Supper make a perfect pair, they were meant to go together. They have a vital, even essential connection. Baptism and the Lord's Supper are recognized universally as the two ordinances, or sacraments of the church, given by God for the benefit of His people. While we often consider the meaning of each one independently, it is also important to see the essential connection they have.

Let me state it first this way: baptism is related to the Lord's Supper as birth is related to eating.

Baptism is part of the process of being born again. In John 3 Jesus told Nicodemus, "Unless one is born of water and the Spirit he cannot enter the kingdom of God." The obedient act of faith in baptism and the work of the Spirit results in new birth, or being born again.

Titus 3:5 also speaks of new birth when it says, "He saved us ... by the washing of regeneration and renewing by the Holy Spirit." The phrase, "washing of regeneration" could be literally translated as the "bath of new birth." One commentator explains it this way: "the process of washing in baptism produced a rebirth of which the Spirit was the origin" (Quinn, Anchor Bible, 219).

The connection between the sacraments can be put this way: baptism as new birth is related to the Lord's Supper as natural birth is related to eating. How many times are we born? Only once. How many meals do we eat? Many. Why? What happens if, after birth, we eat for a time and then say, "this is too much trouble," or "this is getting old," and so we stop eating? We die, of course.

John 6 is often seen as a spiritual interpretation of the Lord's Supper. In John 6:53 Jesus says, "I tell you the truth, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you." At the last supper Jesus held the bread before his disciples and said, "This is my body given for you." Not in a literal sense, of course, but in a mysterious and real way, by faith, we partake of the body and blood of Christ, the bread of life, at this table. If the life given to us in our spiritual rebirth is to continue we need to eat regularly.

Baptism and the Lord's Supper go together. They are the perfect pair, essentially connected. New life comes through new birth and is sustained at the table.