Ecclesiology

Last week Kent concluded his post with a quote from Max Johnson noting the importance of the role of the Holy Spirit in questions “about faith, justification, ecclesiology, eschatology, and the meaning of the eucharist.” With that assertion in mind, we turn to the final chapter of Images of Baptism, Baptism as Incorporation into the Body of Christ. Johnson’s thesis (echoing both/and statements typical among Lutherans) claims that in baptism the person is incorporated into both the Head, Christ, and his body, the church:

It is not that we are first initiated into union and communion with Christ and then as a consequence into the community of the church. Rather, baptism itself signifies and effects both at the same time (Images of Baptism, 109-10, emphasis in original).

Reflecting his own ecumenical spirit, Johnson draws on Roman Catholic theologians Karl Rahner and Edward Schillebeeckx before turning to Lutherans Dietrich Bonhoeffer and Carl Braaten to support his thesis. A quotation from Braaten draws together the Christological, ecclesiological, and eschatological dimensions of this chapter: “The church is Christ as his bodily presence in the world, prefiguring the future of the world in the kingdom of God” (Braaten, Mother Church, 7 in Images of Baptism, 111, emphasis added by Johnson).

After warning against chasing after a romanticized ideal of “the church” as a cozy community, Johnson offers three biblical images as “proper” ways to understand what the church is, and, more importantly, ways to live as the body of Christ in the world.

Church as a Priestly Community

… the community of the church is a particular kind of community, one that knows itself as engaged in active priestly ministry and self-sacrificial service in the world. The body of Christ is not a community bent on its own survival or self-preservation. The body of Christ, who is Priest, Prophet and King, exists that it may die in Christ, so that it may extend itself for the life of others as it continues its baptismal pilgrimage through death to resurrection (Images of Baptism, 118).

Church as an Ecumenical-Inclusive-Catholic Community

… we are not really baptized “Catholic” or “Lutheran” or anything else. We should strive to remove such an incomplete theology of baptismal identity from our vocabulary (Images of Baptism, 121-22). [Referencing 1 Corinthians 1:13 and Ephesians 4:4-6 he says,] Christian unity is, above all, not a demand, not a call, but already a gift to be received and further realized gratefully…. Through baptism all are incorporated into the one Christ, the one church, the one body of Christ (Images of Baptism, 121, emphasis in original).

The Community of the Church as the “Communion of Saints”

To be incorporated into that body is to be incorporated into communion with the “great cloud of witnesses” who have gone on before us and who, according to the Letter to the Hebrews (11–12), fill the great stadium to cheer us on as we follow Christ, our great pioneer in the pilgrimage to the eschatological City of God (Images of Baptism, 128).

His trinity of images speaks to our current context, evoking ways to imagine the church that can inspire us

• To be a priestly community “not … bent on its own survival or self-preservation” but for the sake of others;
• To live with gratitude that, in spite of the fractured witness of the church, we, as the body of Christ, are already one;
• To rest in the assurance that the communion of saints transcends space and time; we are not alone in our priestly pilgrimage.

We have made it possible for readers to comment on our blog posts. What insights have you gained from this series on Images of Baptism? We would gladly receive your comments.

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Image: Padua Baptistry
Frescos by Giusta de’ Menabuoi, 14^th century
Photo, © José Luiz Bernardes Ribeiro, 2016
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Communion_of_saints_-_Baptistry_-_Padua_2016.jpg