Have you noticed over the last 20 or so years, a new term used by credobaptists to define what baptism is
identification.
Some quotations I have gathered from the internet:
- Your baptism is a sacred symbol of faith that identifies you with the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus. Baptism also identifies you with other Christ followers.
- Baptism illustrates a “believer’s identification with Christ’s death, burial, and resurrection.
- Baptism by immersion, while it is the most biblical mode of identifying with Christ
- The Apostle Paul explains that going into the water enables us to identify with the burial of Christ, and coming out of the water enables us to identify with the resurrection of Christ.
CRITIQUE
- Identification, to identify, or identifying are not Biblical terms (not found in Scripture).
- Identification, to identify, or identifying as used by are undefined terms, just words which adds confusion and do not add clarity into an already contentious debate.
- It is impossible for any Christian to identify with Christ. Christians only have one nature, Jesus has two. How Jesus’ all atoning death be something a Christian can identify with is beyond logic. Jesus being the God-Man had to be man to be our substitute as man. Jesus being the God-Man, HAD TO BE GOD IN ORDER TAKE ALL THE SINS OF HUMANITY AND DESTROY THEM ON THE CROSS. This is something any Christian cannot identify with. Period.
- In the Incarnation, Jesus identifies with believers deeper and more profound than we might believe as revealed in the mystical union passages of Scripture such as
- II Peter 1:4 For by these He has granted to us His precious and magnificent promises, so that by them you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world by lust.
- John 15:4 Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself unless it abides in the vine, so neither can you unless you abide in Me.
- Gal. 2:20 I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me;
- II Cor 5:17 17 Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here!
- John 14:20 On that day you will realize that I am in my Father, and you are in me, and I am in you.
- Col. 1:27 To them God has chosen to make known among the Gentiles the glorious riches of this mystery, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory.
These passages of Scripture describe a formal union between God and the individual believer by justification by faith. Also can be seen as a union between Christ in the incarnation and the entire human race which makes objective justification possible. Additionally this union is the indwelling of the Triune God which effects sanctification.
Whatever the term “identification” means, it must be Christocentric and not man centered.
Very elegant.
Yesterday was the feast of St. Basil the Great and of the Circumcision of Christ in the Orthodox churches on the Julian calendar, including all Orthodox Christians in Jerusalem, and the canonical Ukrainian, Latvian, Lithuanian, Belarussian, Serbian, Coptic, Ethiopian, Japanese, Georgian and Aleutian / Native Alaskan Orthodox, as well as many of the Polish, the Orthodox Church in America, and some Bulgarian Orthodox, and some of the Carpatho-Rusyns, and also most Russian Orthodox aside from a few dual-calendar parishes in the OCA.
From Byzantine Rite (Eastern Orthodox) Matins were elegant stichera praising St. Basil, as well as the Katavasia of the upcoming Feast of the Baptism of our Lord, Theophany, also known as Epiphany in the West, until the fourth century also the feast of the Nativity, until this was moved to nine months following the Annunciation on March 25th, except in the Armenian church - Hagiopolitan Armenians in the Patriarchate of Jerusalem and the Holy Land, particularly at the Greco-Armenian-Latin Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem, will celebrate the Nativity on Monday the 19th together with the Baptism of our Lord.
Meanwhile from the liturgy today, I thought you might find these quotes interesting, which are presented for historical context only, and not as polemics:
Vespers begins with these hymns, known as Stichera, because of the way they are connected to each other and to Scripture, which reference the impending feast of the Baptism of our Lord and also St. Basil enduring persecution after confessing the true Christian faith to the Arian governor of Cappadocia, who like all Arians, denied the Incarnation and the Deity of Christ our God, note also the rich baptismal references:
Having caused Christ, the Well-spring of life, to dwell in thy soul by thy pure life, O divinely revealed Basil, thou didst pour forth rivers of the teachings of piety upon the whole world; and thereby watered the faithful people of the Church. The fruits of the confession of thy lips, offer grace unto Him Who hath glorified thy memory unto the ages of ages. (Twice)
O divinely revealed Basil, the myrrh of the grace which was poured forth upon thee anointed thee to be a priest of the Gospel of the kingdom of heaven, and with the sweet savor of Christ thou hast filled the world with the fragrance of the knowledge of Him. Wherefore, graciously accepting the pleas of thy servants, ask thou great mercy on behalf of us who honor thee.
The composition of Byzantius: Arrayed in the vesture of a hierarch, O Basil, thou champion of the Trinity, thou didst stand before the governor’s tribunal, accepting tribulation for the Faith; and like unto one with the prowess of an athlete, thou didst put to shame the wrath of the governor, who mightily raged with ungodliness, threatening thee with merciless dismemberment; but by zealously reasoning, and becoming a martyr by intent, thou didst receive a crown of victory from Christ, Who hath great mercy.
The baptismal references become the focus of the Canon of Matins:
Ode IV from the Canon of the Circumcision:
Canon of the Feast
Irmos: I have heard report of Thy dispensation, O Lord, and have glorified Thee Who alone lovest mankind.
Circumcision hath ceased since Christ was circumcised of His own will, saving a multitude of the nations by grace. // The eighth day, whereon the Master was circumcised in the flesh, is an image of the everlasting life of the age to come.
Ode IV from the Canon of the Hierarch St. Basil
Irmos: I have heard report of Thy dispensation, O Lord, and have glorified Thee Who alone lovest mankind.
As the Church of Christ is adorned like a bride by His nativity, so is it also adorned by thy memorial, O most blessed one. * Doing battle for God, thou wast shown to be invincible, O Basil, making all subject to His precepts. * Thou hast been given to the Church by God as a firm rampart and bulwark, O most blessed Basil. * O father Basil, thou hast been shown to be a scythe cutting down the adversary, and a fire consuming falsehood.
Theotokion: We beseech thee, O pure one who didst conceive God without seed: Pray thou ever for thy servants.
Katavasia from Ode V:
Katavasia I: Jesus, the Prince of Life, hath come to set loose from condemnation Adam the first-formed man; * and though as God He needeth no cleansing, * yet for the sake of fallen man He is cleansed in the Jordan. * In its streams He slew the enmity * and bestoweth the peace that passeth all understanding.
Katavasia II: Washed clean of the poison of the dark and defiled enemy * by the cleansing of the Spirit, * we have set out upon a new path * which leadeth to unapproachable joy, * to which only they whom God hath reconciled with himself * can draw near.
Sticheron in praise of St. Basil the Great:
“Having become a child of God through grace, by the regeneration of divine baptism, O venerable one, in essence and truth thou didst confess the preëternal Son and Word of God, as consubstantial and equally without beginning with the Father; and with the brilliance of thy words thou didst shut the gaping mouths of the heretics. Wherefore, thou hast made thine abode in the kingdom on high, reigning together with Christ, Who ruleth alone and naturally, and doth richly grant great mercy unto the world.”
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Obviously these ancient Orthodox hymns strongly emphasize the doctrine of baptismal regeneration. Of course not all who advocate infant baptism believe in baptismal regeneration; notably John Wesley believed in infant baptism but not baptismal regeneration, an odd exception to his usually fairly crisp Patristic orthodoxy (or, perhaps he viewed the matter as adiaphora; he might well have believed in regeneration, but he sought to remove references to it from the version of the Book of Common Prayer he edited for use by the Methodists of North America, the Sunday Service Book; that would actually be more typically Wesleyan.
One thing I like about Martin Luther is that, like the Early Church Fathers, Luther was less willing to agree to disagree, to put it mildly. On the other hand, Wesley fortunately managed to get dogmatics right most of the time, due to having chanced upon heavily Eastern theological material, even going so far as to attempt to revive among Anglicans and Methodists the practice of fasting on Wednesdays, which had died off in the Western church (now, fasting on Fridays has all but died off except in Lent, and even in Lent its basically seen as an excuse to consume seafood more than an actual abstinence; to be fair, some Orthodox regard Lent as an opportunity to indulge in lobsters and caviar, which in some churches are permitted because the ancient fasting regulations were written before these became delicacies. Meanwhile, still others like myself suffer from health problems and have to fast in manners other than our diet, for we involuntarily fast much of the time.
