The Theology Behind the Lord's Supper and Baptism

In the protestant or reformation tradition, only two of the many sacraments from the Roman Catholic church survived. For whatever reason the original reformers had, it must have been the Divine hand that guided them to retain only two because of the deep meanings underlying this rituals.

It must be noted that the Roman Catholic ritual traditions ALWAYS had something to do with the devotee's salvation. Unfortunately, many of them implied salvation by works or salvation by ritual. We owe a lot to Martin Luther, scholar and theologian, and those who followed after him, to courageously point out the fallacy of such beliefs in no uncertain words.

So let's dissect the two survivors: The Lord's Supper and Baptism

In the succeeding discussion below, it is my hope for those who agree with my assessment would take these two rituals more seriously and even make sure the principles are preached either explicitly or implicitly whenever these ceremonies are conducted because of their impact as a reminder of who we are and should be in Christ.

The Lord's Supper ACCURATELY symbolizes the salvation experience while the believer's baptism ACCURATELY represents the Christian life. So these two symbolic rituals alone show in picturesque form, the believers entrance into the Kingdom of God and how he is to stay there once he gets in.


The Lord's Supper

Jesus Christ himself, declared in this ritual that the cup is the new covenant in his blood (Luke 22:19-21; 1 Corinthians 11:24-26). When he broke the bread, he also commanded his disciples to "do this in remembrance of me". In fact, Paul emphasized to "do this as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me". Those are two very profound declarations by our Lord when he administered the sacrament. Paul added the principle in 1 Corinthians 11:26 "For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until he comes."

Let us examine these declarations and why they are of utmost importance such that we have to perform the ritual as often as possible:

1. What is in the new covenant that his blood represents?
2. Why should we do this in remembrance of him?
3. Why should we do this as often as possible?
4. Why does the ritual proclaim the Lord's death? What is so important about proclaiming the Lord's death? Why death only?

Let's discuss the significance of the symbols in the Lord's Supper before we answer the above questions which are, of course, mostly theological. What is not obvious is the practical value of the reminders behind these symbols.

The bread, according to Christ, is his body broken for us. The key words are "bread" and "broken". The gospel according to John declares that Christ is the "Bread of Life" which simply means that anyone who "eats" this Bread will never go hungry (or will live not only temporally as what food does but eternally because of its spiritual significance). Now that Christ identifies himself as the bread of life, he switches gears a bit to declare that the bread represents his body. 

We all know that Christ meant that he would suffer and die on the cross of Calvary to pay for the penalty of our sins. What is not obvious and what most Christians do not realize is that this bread theologically represents Justification (which is by faith) since it is the broken body that pays the penalty for sin. Therefore, the bread represents our freedom from the penalty of sin (discussed by St. Paul in the book of Romans chapters 3-5) which is the justification part of our salvation.  

The cup of wine represents Christ’s blood shed for us. Wine is a cleansing/detoxing and healing agent, and so is blood which is the agent that maintains life, signifies that we are cleansed and healed from the dominion of inbred sin (sin nature) and therefore freed from the power of sin. The wine actually represents the second part of full salvation which is SANCTIFICATION by faith. Note that I used the term "part" of salvation and NOT "phase" or "stage" of salvation. Sanctification DOES NOT come AFTER justification as is commonly and mistakenly articulated by many theologians. Instead, sanctification as preached by Paul comes WITH justification. TRUE SALVATION is justification AND sanctification by faith! It is like marriage, you can't have one without the other.

We disagree with the Reformers if they say that Justification by faith is FULL salvation. The Bible never presents it that way. Every time full salvation is mentioned it is in the context of sanctification. Jesus did not experience death and resurrection just so the righteousness of God can be imputed to the believer. That is "partial" salvation if ever there is such a term since it is ALL OR NOTHING with God. So technically, that is the HALF TRUTH about salvation.

Christ did not come just to free us from the penalty of sin but to free us also from the power of sin.

Salvation is not full salvation if it is declared as only to IMPUTE the righteousness of God to the believer. Full salvation is realized when salvation is declared also to IMPART the righteousness of God to the believer. That is what SANCTIFICATION is all about. Sanctification is essentially a cleaning process, a catharsis for sin. The Greek word for catharsis is found in the pruning of the branch in John 15:2. Sanctification is freedom from the power and dominion of sin.

Now we can answer the questions we posed earlier.First, it is important that the new covenant was based on the blood of Jesus alone and not based on the bread nor based on both bread and wine. This openly declares that the new covenant has more emphasis on sanctification and cleansing compared to justification or forgiveness. The new covenant therefore emphasizes sanctification or the sanctified life. In fact, we pointed out in an earlier blog that the goal of salvation is entire or full salvation. This point is quite important and is a slight against the emphasis of the reformers which is confined (unfortunately) to justification by faith. Luther made this a slogan but his intention was not to stop there. His biography indicates that Luther actually struggled against the power of the sin nature and finally got freed from its power. We had to wait for John Wesley, who also struggled against it, to articulate properly that such experience of relief is the experience of full salvation or entire sanctification.

On the second and third questions as to why Christ wanted to perform this ritual and as often as we can, is simply to keep reminding us that Christ himself desires that all believers be reminded firstly of their freedom from the torturous penalty of sin and secondly (and as we pointed out earlier) that believers are ACTUALLY freed from the dominion of inbred sin or the sin nature. This profoundly means that ALL BELIEVERS SHOULD LIVE AS CHRIST LIVE and be CHRIST TO OTHERS. Unfortunately, what we witness in our generation are people who claim to be Christians but whose values are worldly and live like they do not know Christ! That is why the Lord's Supper either reminds us who we are or convicts as as to who we are NOT.

The last question is most interesting. Why did Paul interject that every time we perform the ritual we proclaim the Lord's death? Well, both Christ and Paul have analogies to answer this.

In John 12:24-25, Christ delivers a universal principle of life and death, "unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit. Whoever loves his life loses it, and whoever hates his life in this world will keep it for eternal life." Christ is actually teaching the BASIC principle behind true sanctification. Something has to die in order for a more important thing to rise to life.  And Christ holds no punches, if we love this old life we lose everything. Instead we should love the new born-again life in order to keep it for eternity.

Paul also points this same principle even much clearly in Romans 6 where he has an exhaustive discussion on the doctrine of sanctification. He likens it to baptism where the old self dies and is buried with Christ so that the new self can rise with the power of the resurrection and newness of life.

So next time we partake of the Lord's Supper and as often as possible, meditate on the profound truths behind the symbols. Let us be reminded that we, as new creatures in Christ, as born-again people of God, are freed and continuously free from the power and dominion of sin. We simply have to make that choice.

Baptism

Let us first make clear that Biblical baptism has very little to do with immersion as it has to do with washing and cleansing as one will notice in the following discussion. Yes, Paul discussed baptism in the context of immersion in Romans 6, but he was simply using a common practice to illustrate an important point. Paul, wanted to emphasize the "burial part" of sanctification. But burial in not the full thrust of baptism. The full trust of baptism is washing and the cleansing from the sin nature so that the believer has freedom to live for God and God alone. Immersion, on its own does not cover the more important concept of resurrection life and power.

Baptism was commanded by the Lord as part of the Great Commission in Matthew 28:18-20. The book of the Acts demonstrates the consistent application of this principle to all new born-again believers. I believe that the passages that give most sense to the concept of baptism are found in Acts 2:38 when the concept was first declared in evangelism by Peter. The second passage is Paul's dissertation on salvation and sanctification in Romans 6.

While the Lord's Supper depicts the doctrines of justification AND sanctification, of forgiveness AND cleansing, of dying to gain life; baptism gives almost the same analogy but focuses more on the new born-again life given resurrection power to live. True, baptism still talks about dying but Paul simply emphasized being BURIED with Christ to point out that we should have done away with the old self. True as well, baptism talks about sanctification but there is more focus on cleansing this time and even more emphasis on ACTUAL LIVING WITH RESURRECTION POWER.

A very significant concept in Baptism is the necessary PREREQUISITE of DEATH; death to sin, death to the world and worldly values, death to self! All this PRIOR TO being able to achieve or gain RESURRECTION LIFE and POWER for living. Western Christianity has always emphasized living in the power of the Holy Spirit WITHOUT pointing out the prerequisite of death. The Holy Spirit completely respects free will. So for as long as the old self is alive (not even if it is half-dead) the Holy Spirit cannot and will not take over. The Holy Spirit desires to work in a believer's life COMPLETELY UNHINDERED, given total control and privilege to work out change in the believer's heart and life. When this occurs, such is the experience of entire sanctification as Wesley would put it.

This principle of DEATH has to be clear in any sermon on baptism especially in a baptismal preparation class or the baptismal service itself. Otherwise, it will just be mere ceremony and completely superficial.

None of the two sacraments is superior to the other. They do symbolize the same facets of true salvation but they focus on different aspects or angles and they are all equally important for any believer to appreciate the experience of true salvation, in fact, up to entire sanctification. The two sacraments are at the core of any Christian creed. Reciting or believing in any of these creeds amounts to nothing unless the evidences of full salvation as depicted by these rituals are realized in the believer's life.

While the Lord's Supper depicts true and full salvation, Baptism depicts true and full life with resurrection power in the Spirit.
These two sacraments encompass the full message of the gospel. We can only thank the all-wise God for choosing (by declaring and giving importance to) these two sacraments in the pages of Scripture.