A Means of Grace
The Lutheran Reformers, recovering the Bible’s central authority after centuries of medieval Roman Catholic abuse, taught baptism to be what Luther called a “means of grace.” A “means” is nothing else than a medium, an instrument, a vehicle. “Grace” in the New Testament is a word that means unearned, undeserved love. A means of grace is therefore a vehicle for God’s unearned love, and that is what baptism rightly is, as we shall see. Though Baptists, Evangelicals, and Pentecostals in some way all lay claim to a recovery of the true, biblical teaching of the church of the Apostles, they came on the scene long after the Reformation accomplished the very thing they claim to have done. The Reformers did this on the basis of careful translation and interpretation of the Bible without an accompanying assumption that practically all the Roman Catholic Church taught must be dismissed. Modern biblical scholarship has probed the context of the Apostolic era, compared biblical literature with Jewish literature and religious practice, and carefully interpreted the New Testament texts. The results are devastating to the individual-centered position. Those who hold it do so usually without adequate knowledge of biblical context. In the First Century the universal emphasis was on God’s choosing, not individual decision.
The Means of Grace View of Baptism
This view says baptism is an act of God which brings forgiveness of sins and the gift of the Holy Spirit to the baptized. Baptism marks the beginning of the relationship of faith. The baptized individual does not become saved through his own decision. The only choice open to the baptized is to then turn away from God. The danger lies in doing this, not in trusting baptism. Unless one rejects God and the life of faith, God will forgive and save. Since baptism is God’s work, the age of the baptized is irrelevant. People who reject baptism reject Christ, and all he died and rose to bring them.
God, the Agent
In the Bible, God and God alone is the agent of salvation. When Israel was in slavery in Egypt it was God who broke Pharaoh’s hold on them and destroyed his army at the Red Sea. Later, when the Assyrian hordes came up against Jerusalem and their officer the Rabshakeh insulted God, it was God alone who delivered the city. God saved David from Saul. God saved Noah from the flood, Daniel from the lions, the residents of Nineveh from the consequences of their behavior, Saul of Tarsus from the citizens of Damascus… But God didn’t save in honor of some prior, human decision; God saved by grace through his own chosen means. Those God rescued were not rescued because they first chose to be.
Of great importance as we contemplate God’s salvation in earlier times is the Passover event in Exodus 12. God gave instructions through Moses that all the people of Israel must gather in their houses and mark their doorposts and lintels with lamb’s blood. As they ate the prescribed meal of roast lamb, unleavened bread, and bitter herbs, an angel known as the Destroyer went through the land of Egypt and struck down the firstborn in every house except those marked with the blood of the lamb. These houses were “passed over”. Thus God saved the firstborn of the people of Israel. In this forerunner of New Testament salvation we find nothing about making a choice for God or his servant Moses. There were no existential decisions that night in Egypt, just doing what Moses said. Whether the ordinary heads of households even knew the purpose of the blood yet is unclear. Firstborn members of the households were saved by being inside the marked houses—saved by the blood. The compliance of the head of the household resulted in the preservation (salvation) of the firstborn. It made no difference at that moment whether the occupants of the houses were ethical or not, compassionate or not, reverent or not, aware of the plan or not. One person alone may have made the decision to mark his house with blood; but that saved any firstborn who were inside. If they were inside a house marked by the lamb’s blood, they were spared for now. Even if a firstborn stranger were to enter, that stranger would be safe. But presuming to have God’s protection on the basis of something other than the lamb’s blood would have proved a deadly mistake. Later these members of the households would have their own opportunities to be faithful or unfaithful to the God who saved them, but God had saved them and set them free. The lamb’s blood was a means of grace preserving lives which should then have been lived for the God who saved them.
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