Fresh Snow, New Song

Baptismal spirituality is about Christ making us new. Yesterday, the first Sunday in Advent and the first day of the new church year, brought that home to my heart in a couple ways.

Awaking while the world was still dark, I was surprised by a fresh layer of snow on the ground. As daylight arrived, a whole new scene unfolded before us. Some of us were surprised, others almost expecting it. The drab browns and grays of November were gone, replaced by a glistening white that impressed even the winter-haters. But just as the change to snow is not easy, neither is being new in Christ. For one, there is cold and shoveling and layers of clothing; for the other, surprise and shock and accepting this new person we are. Yet how good the new is in our lives. “Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be like snow” (Isaiah 1:18).

My early morning devotion was a Dietrich Bonhoeffer reading* perfect for the beginning of Advent. Bonhoeffer wrote, “Luther…often said that, next to the Word of God, music is the best thing that human beings have… Luther knew that it has dried an infinite number of tears, made the sad happy, stilled desires, raised up the defeated, strengthened the challenged, and that it has also moved many a stubborn heart to tears and driven many a great sinner to repentance before the goodness of God. ‘O sing to the Lord a new song ‘ (Ps. 98:1).” *from I Want to Live These Days with You, p. 349

What God did in baptism – making us new in Christ – God continues daily in ordinary ways.

Martin Luther’s Baptism

 

“How many Lutheran pastors does it take to baptize 525 people?”

 

The newsletter from Germany with this line – forwarded to me by the editor of my book – assures its readers this is not the beginning of a joke! Rather, it turns out to be an invitation, albeit a rather unique one.  

The great reformer Martin Luther was baptized November 11, 1483 in Eisleben, Germany, one day after he was born. This year, 2008, on the 525th anniversary of Luther’s baptism, the congregations of Lutherstadt Eisleben “would like to find 525 congregations around the globe to come together in baptismal remembrance.”  

 

Pastors Claudia Bermann and Scott Moore explain that their congregation worships in the church where they still use remnants of the baptismal font over which Luther himself received God’s promise. They’d love to have people receive baptism in Eisleben or in their own congregation on this occasion. Pastors might bring a group to Eisleben. A baptismal candidate, instructed by and with permission from his/her pastor, might go there for the sacrament. Not able to travel there? Check out the site www.Luther525.de for celebrate resources or celebrate in your own way and let them know.  

 

Luther loved the clarity of God’s grace given in the Sacrament of Holy Baptism. I hope this invitation from the Eisleben congregation will inspire many others to “remember [their] baptism,” give thanks to God, and be renewed in faith and discipleship.