Birth and Our Rebirth in Baptism
Since giving birth to my son, a little over two years ago, my understanding of baptism has deepened. I myself was baptized as a teenager after professing my own faith, but we baptized our son before he uttered his first words. It was in witnessing the baptismal waters poured over his head, and in hearing his godparents and our parish make vows to him, that a new awareness stirred within me of how our own entrances into the world reflect the rebirth Christ has given us. Ever since then, I get profoundly emotional at baptisms of any kind. There is a weight they carry that I have borne inside, one I hope to share with you.
A New Creation
There is an anticipation, an expectation that comes with baptism. As baptismal waters flow off the body of the baptized, there is an understanding that “[they are] a new creation. The old has passed away, the new has come” (2 Corinthians 5:17). A similar anticipation is present with birth. There is a new life, a new creation coming into the world.
Sponsored
At birth, we experience a profound transformation. In the womb, our lungs are filled with amniotic fluid, unable to take our first breath of air until birth. As with baptism, we go from a world that fills our lungs with false hopes, fears, and destruction, and instead receive the breath of life. We exchange the flooding of our lungs with one substance for another, one which makes us truly alive. While the harsh realities of this life rush upon us as we enter the world, those who have become new themselves by bathing in the waters of baptism often immediately embrace us. In the same way, the family of God greets and embraces us.
DNA
Upon conception, you immediately belong to a group of people. Your DNA weaves you into a tapestry that people have crafted for hundreds of years. People can identify you by your last name, even by how you look. They can place where you belong, and who you belong to. When you are submerged into the birthing waters of baptism, you are born again into the family of God.
Our baptismal rites in the Book of Common Prayer tell us,
We are received as his own children by adoption, made members of his holy Church, and raised to the new life of grace.
Book of Common Prayer (2019), pg. 169
It is a place of immediate belonging. They share common ‘DNA’ among them. While the body is diverse, made up of people from all different backgrounds and experiences, through Christ we are woven into the tapestry of his family, bound together not by blood but by water. We bear his likeness and receive a new commandment to
“love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another. By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”
John 13:34-35
Just as people identify us biologically by our last names and similarities in our appearance, they know us as members of the family of God by whom we represent and how we do so. When the water cascades from our skin, we become adopted brothers and sisters in a spiritual family. The Congregation professes together that they
receive you into the fellowship of the Church. Confess the faith of Christ crucified, proclaim his resurrection, and share with us in the royal priesthood of all his people.
2019 Book of Common Prayer, pg. 170
A found family in Christ, and it is in this family we find ourselves spiritually fed.
Being Fed
The placenta is an organ that functions as a filter, removing toxins and delivering nutrients to the baby; it ensures the baby is fed, receiving the oxygen and sustenance necessary for growth. It attaches to the uterine wall to provide stability and life. Not only does the placenta filter, but it also protects. It provides a barrier from harmful bacteria.
In the same way, the body of Christ vows to cover those baptized into their body. They vow to renounce the devil, empty promises, the destruction of this world, and sinful desires. They vow to walk obediently in God’s holy will and commandments the rest of their days. Saying together that they will do all in their power to support them in their walk and life with Christ (BCP, 164-165). The church attaches itself to God, much like the placenta attaches to the uterine wall. Acting as a spiritual fortification
against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places.
Ephesians 6:12
Our faith no longer becomes a question of how one ensures their own salvation, but rather a question of how we, as the church, uplift, protect, and steward the new life brought into our midst. When baptism brings us into the body, we enter a place where sustaining ourselves is not the responsibility of any one person alone. Those in our community share the responsibility to bring us up in the ways we should go, to guide and shepherd us into faithful Christians, and to remind us of our belonging found in baptism. The call of the church community is to help filter out what is impure and unrighteous.
Living Waters
Amniotic fluid protects and surrounds a baby in utero. Thick vernix coats them as they enter the world. In the same way, the living waters of baptism surround and protect us. The vows of the church echo this protection, in their willingness to protect and nourish. While the waters do not physically encompass us constantly, the sacramental act of baptism encapsulates us into a new life. It spiritually coats us as we go out into the world to live as Christ has asked us to live.
Anointing oil coats our skin like vernix on a newborn, sealing us by the Holy Spirit and marking us as Christ’s own forever. On Sundays we eat the body broken and blood shed, a concrete reminder of Christ’s sacrifice. As we dip our fingers into the baptismal font to cross ourselves, the birthing waters that brought us into new life, in Christ, remind us. I am reminded of Christ every time a friend gives birth. Birthing waters broken, trickling as if to announce the entrance of a new life. The body broken through pushing or the cut of a scalpel, blood shed sacrificially. A new life brought forth, shielded from the harsh realities of this world, guarded by those dedicated to the faith. Once we leave the womb, naivety and self-sufficiency no longer protect us. We are keenly aware of the cold world around us as the water dries, but those who have gone the distance before us immediately embrace us.
Conclusion
As I dip my hand into the baptismal font and lift up my son to do the same, this Sunday I will let the water drip down my face and cross my body. I will let my spiritual rebirth settle into my soul. I will think of my own waters breaking to welcome a new life. When I remember my son’s own anointing with thick vernix and oil, his baptism with waters of living truth, and his birth in water set to protect, I will linger on the memory of the dedication I have made to his life and on the vows those around us made. My body will remember the sacrifice made, body broken and blood shed. Not just my own, but the ultimate one made so that we may live eternally.
Photo by Antonio Gravate, courtesy of Canva. Digitally edited by Jacob Davis.
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