Baptism for Repentance: Unauthorized Worship, Part 2

You won't find anything about baptism commanded in the Old Covenant.

Yes, there is Numbers 19, much of which is devoted to the description of sprinkling with waters of cleansing in connection with sacrifice and the priest bathing after the sacrifice of the red heifer. There's a description of the Sea or Laver in 2 Chronicles 4 in which the priests were to wash, and basins for the washing of the sacrifices. And I gladly concede that these could foreshadow baptism as we read of it in the New Testament - just as Peter saw the water which floated Noah's ark as symbolic of it (1 Peter 3:20-22) and as Paul saw the parted Red Sea as its precursor (1 Corinthians 10:2).

You'll even find Naaman performing a seven-fold dipping in order to be cleansed of leprosy (2 Kings 5), but it's just not the same. Its origins are doubtless within Jewish tradition; connection with the Essene communities such as Qumran during the intertestamental period are possible.

In the New Testament, it appears first as a practice of John, Jesus' cousin - to which He accedes, though He must persuade him (Matthew 3, Mark 1:9-12, Luke 3:1-22). As Jesus and His followers adopted the practice, John quelled any rivalry by supporting it (John 3:22-36). In fact, he had earlier testified that the reason he cam to baptize was to reveal Jesus as the Son of God to Israel (John 1:29-32). And whether the relationship between belief and baptism was cause-and-effect is debatable, but there undeniably was a relationship (Luke 7:29-30).

After Jesus had been crucified, restored to life, and was about to depart again to be with the Father, He instructed His followers to go, teach and baptize (Matthew 28:19) and attached a promise to belief and baptism (Mark 16:16); and Peter was faithful to preach it come Pentecost and a powerful inSpiration (Acts 2:38). As John the Baptizer had prophesied (John 1:33) and Jesus reminded them before returning to the Father (Acts 1:5), so Peter preached that baptism and the Holy Spirit would be linked as gift with gift: the complete giving of a person's self to God; the complete giving of God's Self to that person.

Baptism into Christ is present in every story of people giving themselves to God through Christ in the book of Acts of the Apostles (2:41; 8:12-13; 8:36-40; 9:18; 10:47-48; 16:15; 16:33; 18:8). It is contrasted with John's baptism, with which the gift of the Spirit did not seem to accrue (Acts 19:1-7). In seven letters to churches in the New Testament, it is taught and preached and exemplified and enriched as the way in which God has chosen to connect us with a new life (Romans 6:4), a washed-clean life (1 Peter 3:21; Acts 22:16), a life of modeling His Son (Galatians 3:27), a life that does not end (Colossians 2:12).

None of this is commanded, exemplified, necessarily inferred, nor even directly prophesied from the text of the Old Covenant. Baptism may have been adapted from obscure Jewish tradition, but it does not immediately descend from practices God requires in His Law. And baptism into Christ - into His death, burial and resurrection - comes with gifts that do not come with the baptism of anticipatory repentance practiced by John. Jesus' disciples instituted the practice, but at His command and description (Matthew 28:16-20).

Jesus asked His followers to observe an entirely new way for people to give glory to God in gratitude for the sacrifice of His Son, by demonstrating their faith in His death, burial and resurrection in a very tangible way, and by putting into practice a life of worship beginning with this washing of body and soul; this filling of joy and purpose and Spirit.

In short, Jesus innovated.

Redefining the Sabbath Day: Unauthorized Worship, Part 1

The law said:

"Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the LORD your God. On it you shall not do any work, neither you, nor your son or daughter, nor your manservant or maidservant, nor your animals, nor the alien within your gates." ~ Exodus 20:8-10

" 'Observe the Sabbath, because it is holy to you. Anyone who desecrates it must be put to death; whoever does any work on that day must be cut off from his people.' " ~ Exodus 31:14

There's no equivocation there. No loopholes. This is one of the Ten Commandments, not just one of the other 603. Observe the Sabbath, or be cut off from your people. Desecrate it, and die.

Jesus said:

"Haven't you read what David did when he and his companions were hungry? He entered the house of God, and he and his companions ate the consecrated bread—which was not lawful for them to do, but only for the priests. Or haven't you read in the Law that on the Sabbath the priests in the temple desecrate the day and yet are innocent? I tell you that one greater than the temple is here. If you had known what these words mean, 'I desire mercy, not sacrifice,' you would not have condemned the innocent. For the Son of Man is Lord of the Sabbath." ~ Matthew 12:3-8

"I ask you, which is lawful on the Sabbath: to do good or to do evil, to save life or to destroy it?" ~ Luke 6:9

There's no equivocation here. Jesus and his followers broke the Sabbath law. They picked grain and ate it on the Sabbath. Jesus healed a man's withered hand on the Sabbath - right in the synagogue where He was teaching! He deserved to die; to be "cut off from [his] people." So he was. Just like Isaiah and Daniel predicted.

Yet He said He was innocent.

Don't loophole on me. I already know that it was Jesus' disciples who picked the grain and ate it to satisfy their hunger - Matthew, Mark and Luke are quite clear about it. They don't say that He did it. His sin would have been, to the ever-watchful eyes of the Pharisees and teachers of the law, in failing to correct them. Rabbinical tradition was quite clear about that. And the sin was not in picking the grain at the edges of the field; that was perfectly permissible (Leviticus 19:9; 23:22). The sin was in doing it on the holy Sabbath.

I also know that Jesus was probably the only person on the planet at that time who could have "sinned" by healing someone on the Sabbath. (In fact, that's His point in response to His critics: He IS Lord of the Sabbath.) But just a couple or three chapters of Luke earlier, He had sent out his disciples by twos to heal people and cast out demons and preach repentance. He is serving as their example for future missions, remember. And nothing in His meticulous instructions to the twelve or the seventy(-two) forbids them from healing, casting or preaching on the Sabbath.

Think about it, now. Here are just two examples where Jesus permits doing something that the Law forbids doing. One permitted His followers to do something good for themselves - eat - and the other permitted good to be done for others - the sick, the lame, the demon-tortured. He was not restricted from doing good on a holy day and in a holy place just because others felt it was bad because it was on a holy day and in a holy place.

The law is dead silent on giving such permission.

Just as it was dead silent on relieving priests from the brutal, exhausting work of preparing sacrifices on the Sabbath; just as it was dead silent on giving David and those with him access to the showbread of the tabernacle. Still, David was not struck dead nor specifically punished for this act. He was the King. He was famished.

Mark even quotes Jesus as adding, "The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath." ~ 2:27. And Luke twice quotes Him as pointing out that those around Him would have mercy on a thirsty ox (13:15) or on one which fell into a well on the Sabbath (14:5).

Jesus did not stick to the letter of the law, even before all was accomplished. He introduced unauthorized worship on the Sabbath: seeing to the needs of others. Showing mercy to them actively, rather than keeping a passive law whose intent was to inspire mercy and prevent overworking. He turned the "don't" into a "do."

In short, Jesus innovated.

An Awesome Adaptation (But Not Authorized)

As we cautiously adapt popular Christian music for our hymnody in churches, may I offer this as an option to some of our most cautious brethren ...?

Our god is a "gotcha" god
he feigns his heavenly love
then smites you from up above
our god is a "gotcha" god

When he rolls up his sleeves
he's preparin' you a blitz
(our god is a "gotcha" god)
roll you under with his footsteps
zap with lightning from His fist
(our god is a "gotcha" god)
Well, he really isn't joking
'bout his mind you should be readin'
if you do something unauthorized
you'll be dead; you're best believin'
that our god is a "gotcha" god

Our god is a "gotcha" god
he feigns his heavenly love
then smites you from up above
our god is a "gotcha" god

And if you worship some way that you think is right
(our god is a "gotcha" god)
he'll blast you into darkness in his holy spite
(our god is a "gotcha" god)
judgment and wrath he'll pour out on ya
mercy and grace aren't options for such loss
don't you know that all your innovation's misbegotten and
our god is a "gotcha" god

Our god is a "gotcha" god
he feigns his heavenly love
then smites you from up above
our god is a "gotcha" god

our god is a "gotcha" god

our god is a "gotcha" god

(with sincerest apologies to Michael W. Smith the late Rich Mullins)

I just can't bring myself to capitalize the "g," though ... I'm not sure the deity pictured in these verses is well-rounded enough in justice and mercy, righteousness and love to be the genuine article.

Home Again

Twenty-four hours ago Angi and I finished our second and last day at the Pepperdine Lectureship, sitting in the courtyard of the little 1960s motel on the beach that she loves and has wanted to share with me, and we listened to the waves crash a few yards from our feet and reflected on the blessings of the previous forty-eight hours:

Safe arrival. Beautiful weather. Our kids' safety at home while thunderstorms and tornados passed to the north and the south of them. Two wonderful surrogate houseparents for them, freeing us to travel alone together for the first time in a decade.

Listening to Randy Harris before about 5,000 assembled Christians in the fieldhouse, admitting that he could not preach his assigned topic from the Sermon on the Mount about loving one's enemies; he was still learning it from his students at ACU.

Hearing Rick Atchley, the embattled minister of North Richland Hills Church, describing his need to change his message to an audience of 400 in Africa because, odds were, more than a quarter of them would be dead from AIDS within a few years, and all of them were hungry to the point of starvation. The passion in his voice when he quietly said, "I'm done with arguing about the things that rich Americans can or can't do for one hour a week on Sunday. If you folks want to go home and do that, that's fine; you go ahead. But I'm through with it."

Sitting on the stage a few feet behind Mike Cope, our minister during our three-year sojourn in Abilene, as he declared the soteriology of Paul to Galatia: that Jesus was enough; that Jesus plus anything else - circumcision, law, acts of righteousness, anything - was powerless to save.

Accepting the solo singing of "Redeemer" by Sheryl Thomas for the first time in person as a priceless blessing with our shameless, grateful tears - while we were still on the platform behind the ZOE Group and Mike; right in front of everyone else in that auditorium of 700-800 souls. Longing to share that blessing with our church family in a gathered worship setting even as a recording - yet knowing that some, like the spiritual hatchlings of Jerusalem that Jesus would have gathered under His wings - some simply would not.

So we do not.

After a silence there by the sea, I confessed to Angi: "It's taken me a long time to realize that I grew up in a church that really was liberal; it wasn't just called that by the other churches who wrote us up in their bulletins. It was truly liberal; liberal in love. I grew up hearing sermons about Jesus and about grace and how our own righteous acts are powerless to save us but are powerful to lead others to salvation; and when I hear messages and share in songs that are all about Jesus and all about His grace ... I'm home." And I found myself in quiet tears again.

And the waves went on crashing on the sand.

Genuine, Authentic: A Fine Distinction

As a second-grader, I thrilled to be able to actually see, close-up, a genuine U.S. Navy fighter jet parked on the tarmac of a base visitor's center while we were on vacation to the east coast. So, a few weeks later, I was overwhelmed when my dad brought home my first Renwal plastic model kit - "AUTHENTIC IN EVERY DETAIL" - of that fighter jet, and I couldn't wait to rip off the cellophane and open the cardboard box and peer inside.

It was almost as advertised on the box, down to the last rivet, except for one major detail: the nose cone. While the prototype jet had a sharp, pointed, air-piercing nose; the model kit had a blunt bulb of misshapen plastic and an instruction sheet which advised the modeler to soften the bulb chemically or with heat and shape by hand to conform to the original.

Clearly, this required powers and abilities far beyond those of a seven-year-old child and a father who had never before assembled a plastic model kit.

So we put it together as it was and mounted it on its clear styrene stand. But with its Jimmy Durante schnozz, it was pretty hard for me to imagine it soaring in the stratosphere at supersonic speed.

The U.S. Navy fighter jet I saw was genuine - the real thing.

The model kit was not quite authentic - like the real thing; only smaller. (And with a pug nose.)

Genuine, Authentic. These words, as here compared, have reference to historical documents. We call a document genuine when it can be traced back ultimately to the author or authors from whom it professes to emanate. Hence, the word has the meaning, "not changed from the original, uncorrupted, unadulterated:" as, a genuine text. We call a document authentic when, on the ground of its being thus traced back, it may be relied on as true and authoritative (from the primary sense of "having an author, vouched for"); hence its extended signification, in general literature, of trustworthy, as resting on unquestionable authority or evidence; as, an authentic history; an authentic report of facts.

A genuine book is that which was written by the person whose name it bears, as the author of it. An authentic book is that which relates matters of fact as they really happened. A book may be genuine without being, authentic, and a book may be authentic without being genuine. --Bp. Watson.

- Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary

I'll leave this thought with you while I'm winging to California on a decidedly subsonic passenger jet with a nose cone somewhere between the two described above:

I wonder if too many Christians aspire to - and are satisfied with - an authentic faith, an authentic worship experience, an authentic church,- all just like the real thing IN EVERY DETAIL ....

... rather than the genuine article, the real thing, the faith that comes from the heart, the worship that is in Spirit and in truth, the church that the Lord established through the water and His blood.

It's a fine distinction.

But an important one.

Off to Pepperdine This Week

Angi and I will be presenting a class on the Pilgrim Heart Group Guide we wrote on Friday at the Pepperdine Lectureship (http://www.pepperdine.edu/biblelectures/schedule/complete-by-participant.htm?id=10337), and we're looking forward to seeing good friends, meeting new friends and enjoying our first getaway together - without our kids attached - in about a decade. Too long!

Our home church is really well represented among presenters this year ... our Singles Minister, our Family Life Center Manager, even a part-time member who lives in Tennessee but has family here and visits frequently.

We're eagerly anticipating Pie Night, fish tacos, ocean air and ZOE worship.

And you, hopefully!

Where Should We Worship God Together?

I just received my copy of Pagan Christianity? by Frank Viola and George Barna from Amazon, and have begun to read the first chapter.

I'm going to withhold full judgment until I've read it fully, but my first impression is mixed.

I can't disagree with the premise that a lot of what Christians do today in gathered worship has little in common with what Christians did in their worship together in century one.

What I'm not certain about is whether that's a completely bad thing.

The first chapter of the book speaks to the point that both Jews and pagans differed from early Christians in their worship by their emphases on sacred places, people and things - and that, over time, Christianity began to absorb the same fascinations. Did Christians in century one never purchase or build a place for worship together? There's no record of it in scripture. Can we assume that it never happened?

More importantly - does it matter?

Can God be worshiped acceptably in other places?

In the early days of Christianity, Jewish Christians met in the temple courtyards. Daily.

For good reason: Jesus taught in the temple courts, too. And on mountainsides, from a boat, on a plain. He accepted worship in the home of a Pharisee, on the streets as he traveled, on horseback ... all right, donkeyback. He went to synagogue, read Isaiah there. (Synagogue was not something God included in His commandments revealed through Moses.) He prayed in lonely places. He sang with his followers after Passover in a second-story room. He prayed in a garden.

Stephen taught on the road in a chariot. Paul taught (and presumably worshiped) in synagogues, and when they booted him out, went next door to the synagogue ruler's house or rented a lecture hall. (He could have spent the money on meeting the needs of the poor.) Or looked for a place of worship and prayer by a river where there might not be any synagogues. Christians met in homes, broke bread together - however you wish to interpret that phrase.

You can probably think of a lot more.

I get the picture that what's important about worshiping together is not so much the where, but the how: in spirit and in truth. With His Spirit poured into our hearts to commune with Him; with our hearts, minds, souls and strength truly engaged.

If God accepts worship from within a stinky animal stable from foreign astrologers, from inside a religious leader's home tainted by a sinner's perfume, from a magnificent incense-fragranced temple made with hands, from a fresh-aired lake or a mountainside or a plain made by His hand - where can we go to escape His Spirit? Where can we flee from His presence?

Are we not to be the aroma of Christ to others wherever we are?

Are the prayers of the saints not regarded as incense to Him in heaven?

Are These Commandments?

"When you fast, do not look somber as the hypocrites do ... But when you fast, put oil on your head and wash your face, so that it will not be obvious to men that you are fasting."

"Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you." ... "Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you." ... "But love your enemies, do good to them, and lend to them without expecting to get anything back."

"Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth ... store up for yourselves treasures in heaven." ... "Sell your possessions and give to the poor. Provide purses for yourselves that will not wear out, a treasure in heaven that will not be exhausted, where no thief comes near and no moth destroys."

"... do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. ... Seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself." ... "Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat; or about your body, what you will wear. Life is more than food, and the body more than clothes."

"... go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you."

"Love each other as I have loved you." ... "This is my command: Love each other."

Jesus said these things. Unless He was exaggerating, He wants us to do them. He knows that doing them will be good for us, good for the kingdom, good for others, good for the whole world.

Whether they are commandments or not.

So what would happen if we stopped fretting so much about things that we might or might not be authorized to do, and started diving headfirst into doing the things He has asked us to do - with all our heart, soul, mind and strength?

Is An Imperative Always a Commandment?

When I was a kid, my dad tried to improve my attitude about the things he told me to do by telling me that they were "get-to's" and not "have-to's." He knew it would be easier on me to regard them as things I get to do, rather than things I have to do; that I would be more likely to do my best at them and have my heart in them if I did them because I knew it made him glad. (I'm not sure I appreciated his effort until I had children of my own.)

In the gospels, Jesus is recorded as uttering a lot of imperatives - things expressed in a tone of instruction or command to do or not do.

His followers, in the books of the New Testament that follow, are recorded as often doing the same, speaking in imperatives.

Are all of them commandments?

There's a way of looking at such scriptures as "God commanded it, we obey it, that's all there is to it, and that settles it."

Is that the way God wants us to regard his word to us?

Let's look at Acts 2:38-39 as an example:

Peter replied, "Repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins. And you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. The promise is for you and your children and for all who are far off—for all whom the Lord our God will call."

(That's the short version my tribe most often quotes. Sometimes we quit after "the forgiveness of your sins.") Is the instruction to repent and be baptized a commandment? By far most of the people in the tribe of Christianity I call home would agree that it is. (In fact, I would be one of them.) But is it, strictly speaking, a commandment and nothing more?

There I might diverge with the most. The two verses begin: "Peter replied". Replied to what?

Well, verse 37, of course:

When the people heard this, they were cut to the heart and said to Peter and the other apostles, "Brothers, what shall we do?"

So, to me, the context of this verse indicates that what Peter said was the reply to a heartbroken, guilt-drenched plea for help and mercy. Why? Because they heard something, and for that something we have to back up one more verse, to 36:

"Therefore let all Israel be assured of this: God has made this Jesus, whom you crucified, both Lord and Christ."

God made us, and knows us, and knows that when we are convicted in our hearts by His Spirit when we have done something wrong that the conscience He gave us fills us with a need to do something to try to make it right; to set right our relationship with God once again.

The problem is, there is really nothing we can do to un-do what we've done.

Until there was Jesus.

Knowing this about us, God extravagantly provided not only His Son, but other gifts by which we could accept His Son and begin a new life in Him: penitence and baptism. Penitence has been around since there were two trees in the middle of Eden, but there really wasn't a way for it to give it the power to turn lives around until Jesus came, was crucified, buried and raised to life again.

So He also gave us baptism, the pledge of a good conscience; the washing of rebirth; the means by which God chooses to perform His initial saving work in us - and a tangible way for us to express an intangible new Truth in our lives, as well as our gratitude for Him and our faith in Him and our willingness to host Him and partner with Him in good works and truth-sharing.

Even Jesus Himself was baptized - not because He was somehow being baptized into His own yet-to-come death, burial and resurrection for forgiveness of any sins He had committed - but "to fulfill all righteousness." He did it because it was the right thing to do; an example to others of an experience that God wants for all of His children to remember and cherish and treasure - and build their lives and ministries upon!

So, among all the imperatives in scripture that we call or think of as commandments, has there ever been even one of them which (even if seemingly arbitrary to us) was not given to us as a gift by the God who made us and loves us and knows us - and that has been given for any other reason than it is the right thing to do before God, and therefore good for us?

Look back at verses 38-39 again, above. There's a promise attached to this imperative: yet another gift, the gift of the Holy Spirit. He is the means by which God empowers us to partner with Him to tell others about His Son - just as Peter and the other disciples did on that Pentecostal day recorded in Acts 2. How much of that gift do we need to share the Way, the Truth and the Life? Isn't a life turned 180-degrees away from self and toward God pretty miraculous all in itself?

Is there anything God asks us to do that He has not been willing to do Himself? That He won't partner with us to do through His Spirit?

Put that way, it all sounds too simple, doesn't it?

I don't know how you feel toward Mike Huckabee - and I'm not sure I would want him serving as President - but he did a remarkable job of working with legislators to reduce the amount of red tape and unnecessary paperwork and pointless hours of waiting to renew your Arkansas automobile license plate. The first time I went in to my local branch and zipped through the process in about five minutes, I was astonished. As I wrote my check, I asked the clerk "Are you sure that's all? No sacrifice of my first-born son, or anything?" As deadpan as Ben Stein, she replied, "No, the Legislature won't let us do that anymore."

Does it really suit God's purpose to load us up with as many commands as possible, making it as difficult as it can humanly be to divinely do what He wants to do with us and through us?

Is there anything that God wants FROM us that He does not also want FOR us?

Should we regard the things He asks of us merely as "have-to's"?

Or are they really "get-to's"?