DEVOTION//Baptism's ironclad promise

Few Christians rest in Baptism’s continuing assurance of God's grace. Baptism is so much more than a Christian's commitment to God. It is God's unchanging commitment to the Christian. In the Sacrament, God makes the Christian eternal, unbreakable promises. Baptism's few words mixed with water write God's name on us, demonstrate that from that moment forward we belong to him, guarantee that all sins -- even those in the distant future of our lives, even those of unspeakable shame -- have been washed away. 

God describes Baptism in this way:

• Baptism… now saves you also—not the removal of dirt from the body but the pledge of a clear conscience toward God. It saves you by the resurrection of Jesus Christ, who has gone into heaven and is at God’s right hand—with angels, authorities, and powers in submission to him (1 Peter 3:21,22).

• Don’t you know that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life. For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we will certainly also be united with him in a resurrection like his (Romans 6:3-5).

Therefore, Luther says of Baptism:

“The fact that we then often fall and stumble does not render Baptism void. Rather, just as grace lasts and governs forever, as Psalm 117 [:2] says—so that, even though we fall, we can always come back to it (provided we do not deny or oppose it)—so also Baptism lasts forever. You cannot fall so far away and so far down from it that you cannot and should not take hold of it again. For that reason, there is no need for him to make a new Baptism for you, even if you did not believe. It is (as stated) an eternal washing in which we are placed once and must abide eternally or be forever condemned” (Luther’s Works: American Edition 57:184-185).