Sunday, April 02, 2006

Baptism and Return



The Lutheran Church that I was baptized in is only four miles from my door. It was the church that my mother was confirmed, married and baptized her two children in. It was also the one that I went to Sunday school for the first couple of years but when I didn't want to go anymore, was allowed to quite. Now I was too young of an age to be allowed to make this choice, but because of a strange laize'fare attitude that my mother and her parents had regarding religion for children, I was allowed to quite going. By the time I was in middle school I was attending an Open Bible church in town mainly because I was invited by a friend. This would be the sum of my religious exposure as a child. Years later when I was enlisting in the Navy and filling out the required forms, I was asked for my religious affiliation, I originally put "Non" but then remembering my baptism, something I had hardly done before, I changed it to Lutheran. Now I understand how a Christian has such assurance as stated by Dr. Luther. When we question our justification or faith we can always look back to our baptism and know that we are saved through Jesus Christ and the sacrament. I'm sure the Navy did not intend on leading me back to the faith, but I can point to this question that is asked of all recruits, and know that this was the spark that smoldered, eventually reminding me that I am a Christian, a Lutheran. Is there a more obvious fact that the Holy Spirit alone, brings us to faith, keeps us in it and returns us to it if needed? There is no doubt in my mind, the recruiter was not even a Christian for all I know, he was just asking the required questions. Having never been chatechized my knowledge of such things was shamefully small, but I did know that my baptism occurred as a Lutheran. This would later shape the church that I would find to raise my children in. After attending adult classes, I continued to try to find more study material to grow in my faith, and knowing that Concordia Publishing House is the synods publisher, I selected works from it. Various writings of Luther, along with Spirituality of the Cross by Veith, and The Defense Never Rests by Parton. They both are quick reads, accessible for lay types like myself and help to solidify Lutheran identity in their descriptions of shared experiences that many of us coming out secular or evangelicalism can recognize. It's important that contemporaries of Lutheran study be encouraged to write and read similar books.
For now, when I'm not blog cruising, I'm picking through Luther's collected sermons, and re-reading Bondage of the Will.

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