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Jan 21, 2024

The Spirit and the Sacraments – I: Baptism

The Spirit and the Sacraments – I: Baptism

Passage: 1 Peter 3:18-22

Speaker: Patrick Lafferty

Series: That’s the Spirit: Learning to keep in step with Him who indwells

Keywords: power, salvation, spirit, water, baptism, patience

The sacraments of baptism and Lord’s Supper are neither magic nor are they mere moments that invoke a memory meant to move us. If not like those, what are they? What are they for? And if they involve something inward–something spiritual–then how, if at all, is the Holy Spirit at work in our participation in them? If we can summarize the Spirit’s work as applying in time to us what Jesus accomplished in history for us, then we’ll ask what the Spirit is meant to impress deeply upon us when we either are baptized or are witnesses to a baptism.

Readings & Scripture

PREPARATION: Psalm 145:1-3, 8-9
LEADER: I will extol you, my God and King,
and bless your name forever and ever.
Every day I will bless you
and praise your name forever and ever.

ALL: Great is the LORD, and greatly to be praised,
and his greatness is unsearchable.

LEADER: The LORD is gracious and merciful,
slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love.

ALL: The LORD is good to all,
and his mercy is over all that he has made.

AFFIRMATION OF FAITH Matthew 3:11-18
Soft instrumental underneath reading: Holy, Holy, Holy

LEADER: “I baptize you with water for repentance, but he who is coming after me is mightier than I, whose sandals I am not worthy to carry. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire. 12 His winnowing fork is in his hand, and he will clear his threshing floor and gather his wheat into the barn, but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire.” Matt. 3:13 Then Jesus came from Galilee to the Jordan to John, to be baptized by him. 14 John would have prevented him, saying, “I need to be baptized by you, and do you come to me?” 15 But Jesus answered him, “Let it be so now, for thus it is fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness.” Then he consented. 16 And when Jesus was baptized, immediately he went up from the water, and behold, the heavens were opened to him, and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and coming to rest on him; 17 and behold, a voice from heaven said, “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased.”

CENTRAL TEXT: 1 Peter 3:18-22
18 For Christ also suffered once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, that he might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh but made alive in the spirit, 19 in which he went and proclaimed to the spirits in prison, 20 because they formerly did not obey, when God’s patience waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was being prepared, in which a few, that is, eight persons, were brought safely through water. 21 Baptism, which corresponds to this, now saves you, not as a removal of dirt from the body but as an appeal to God for a good conscience, through the resurrection of Jesus Christ, 22 who has gone into heaven and is at the right hand of God, with angels, authorities, and powers having been subjected to him.

CONFESSION OF SIN:
ALL: No one has suffered for our sake as he has. No one has triumphed over wickedness as He has. No one bound us to himself, quite in spite of ourselves, as He has. But we forget any and all of that too easily. In forgetting Him and His love, we forget ourselves. For forgiveness of sin, and for renewal of our love to Him and for Him, we ask.

ABSOLUTION OF PARDON: 1 Peter 3:18
LEADER: For Christ also suffered once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, that he might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh but made alive in the spirit.

BENEDICTION: Colossians 3:3, 4
LEADER: For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ who is your life appears, then you also will appear with him in glory.

RELATED SCRIPTURES:

  • Genesis 6:6
  • Isaiah 53:11,12
  • Acts 2:38-39
  • Acts 10:44-50
  • 1 Corinthians 10:1, 2

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS:

  1. Have you ever been part of a group that had some kind of rite of initiation–a pattern, tradition, or ritual that inaugurated your connection to the group? What group? What was the rite like? How did you feel about it, or when it occurred? What if any lasting impact did it have?
  2. When were you baptized (if you have been)? What meaning did it hold for you then, or if baptized as a child took on meaning later?
  3. Ours is a baptism into his death (and his resurrection! Cf. Romans 6). What all do you remember from the sermon about the nature of His death that Peter outlines?
  4. What’s your first reaction–be honest!--to the notion that God both pronounces and brings judgment upon sin? Now, what if he never did such against anyone or anything? How would that reshape your view of Him?
  5. What all does your baptism “mean?” From the sermon, what do you remember about baptism being, in addition to being forgiven,  also an appeal or pledge to a good conscience? 
  6. Now that the sermon has urged you henceforth to “remember your baptism” whenever you are witness to another’s, what plain, concrete actions will that entail for you? What thoughts might you have, or words might you say to yourself, to drive home what is true of you on account of your baptism into Jesus? Why could that be of help to you?

ILLUSTRATIONS:  

1.21.24 Album

QUOTES: 

 

  • My thesis that the practice of nonviolence requires a belief in divine vengeance will be unpopular with many Christians. . . . To the person who is inclined to dismiss it, I suggest imagining that you are delivering a lecture in a war zone . . .. Among your listeners are people whose cities and villages have been first plundered, then burned and leveled to the ground. . . . The topic of the lecture: a Christian attitude toward violence. The thesis: we should not retaliate since God is perfect noncoercive love. Soon you would discover that it takes the quiet of a suburban home for the birth of the thesis that human nonviolence corresponds to God’s refusal to judge. In a scorched land, soaked in the blood of the innocent, it will invariably die. And as one watches it die, one will do well to reflect about many other pleasant captivities of the liberal mind. . . .if God were NOT angry at injustice and deception and did NOT make a final end of violence, that God would not be worthy of our worship. Miroslav Volf
  • We must realize that at whatever time we are baptized, we are once and for all washed and purged for our whole life. Therefore, as often as we fall away, we ought to recall the memory of our baptism and fortify our mind with it, that we may always be sure and confident of the forgiveness of sins. John Calvin, Institutes
  • For this reason we must hold boldly and fearlessly to our baptism, and hold it up against all sins and terrors of conscience, and humbly say: ‘I know full well that I have not a single work which is pure, but I am baptized, and through my baptism, God, who cannot lie, has bound himself in a covenant with me, not to count my sin against me, but to slay it, and blot it out’ Martin Luther

 

BOOKS / DOCS

SERMONS

   “Baptismal Sermon,” and “A half-learned Christ,” and “the promise of baptism,” Sinclair Ferguson