Day 13 Wednesday - Mar 8, 2023; Feb 28, 2024; Mar 19, 2025
Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned. -Mark 16:16
That baptism belongs to the gospel becomes clear when we see it is not a check-list item for salvation. Jesus doesn’t say it is a failure to get baptized that condemns us, but unbelief. Even in John 3, where we’ve already seen that Jesus says no one can enter the Kingdom of God without being born of water and Spirit, he also says “Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe is condemned already” (John 3:18). Baptism will not condemn us, unbelief does that. But it would be absurd to suggest one believes but has no desire to be baptized. How can one say they believe the gospel but yet will not heed its call to baptism or desire the promises therein? As R.C.H. Lenski puts it, “By believing he clings to the gospel, and part of that gospel is baptism…As he believes the Word, so he will demand all that the Word promises in baptism and thus the baptismal act itself. He who claims to believe but refuses and rejects baptism most surely deceives himself about believing…”
Our attitude about baptism should be our attitude about the entire gospel itself. It is to be believed, we should receive it with joy, and we should understand its working as the working of God by the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Too often baptism is just the start of the journey, an afterthought in a busy life, a ritual for babies, a family tradition, etc. Too often people of faith move baptism to the periphery as if it was not given to us by Jesus and did not hold his promise of salvation to all who believe.
A lot of mystery novels hinge on realizing that one obscure detail is actually quite central. If you can catch that, the whole mystery becomes clear. If not, you could miss the answer to the story completely. Sometimes you notice it when it first happens, but other times it takes new revelations to help you look back. You might not even remember your baptism, or you might have considered it a minor part of the story, but you can read a verse like the one today and see just how important it is and just how much it goes to the very heart of the gospel. Because when baptism proclaims salvation to those who believe, what else is it doing than proclaiming the gospel of Jesus Christ?
Keep baptism from being an afterthought in my life. Let me see it for what it is: a sharing of your gospel, and let me never make an afterthought of that! Rather let my whole life be one of faith in you, Jesus. To that end, let me keep the fact that I am baptized close to my heart. Amen.
This post is a part of my daily Lenten devotional on Baptism. You can read more about it here.
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