Baptized in Your Love

Ephesians 4:4-6 (NRSV)

There is one body and one Spirit, just as you were called to the one hope of your calling, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is above all and through all and in all.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I would be a fool to let you go
With you I'm reborn
I'm no longer torn
Yeah
I refuse to loose my heart and soul
I have to be Strong

I don't want to know emptiness
Take me down to the water
Wanna be baptized in your love
Far away from the loneliness
Take my heart and wash away the fear
Let me be baptized in your love

Baptized, by Lenny Kravitz, from Baptism, 2004

There are several different images the church uses when describing the sacrament of bapitsm.

There is the bath. The waters of baptism are seen as the cleansing, the washing away of sin and rising clean in the presence of the Lord our God. Many cultures and in many faiths, the symbol of ritual washing-oblation-is still very, very important.

There is the womb. The waters that we come from are the waters of the second birth in the presence of Christ. As we come from the womb of our mothers, so too do we come from the womb of the church in the waters of our baptism.

There is also the tomb. In the ancient world, water was often seen as a place of danger and death. So when we rise from the waters, we rise from the death of an old way of living in the world and living in the presence of God.

But another image which is quite glorious is that of our baptism into the Church, the community of the Christ. The hope of our calling is the one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is above all and through all and in all.

Life is often filled with emptiness. Seems ironic doesn't it? "Filled with emptiness." It is a feeling we have become all too comfortable with. In a way, we have become comfortable with this discomfort. Again, ironic, isn't it? But in Christ we are reborn. In this rebirth, in these waters, it would be foolish to return to the emptiness, to the discomfort.

We want to be baptized in the love of God. This love takes us far away from the loneliness we know in this world, so we ask god to take our hearts and wash away the fears. This is cleaned in the waters of our baptism. This is what dies in the tomb of baptism. This is our rebirth into a life worth living.