Baptism in The Covenant 1: Introduction

These are not fighting words. Let me make that much clear. I realize that peoples’ and pastors’ theologies are dearly held convictions, and to challenge their beliefs and practices is stepping where angels fear to tread. But I am not throwing rocks. Rather, I am looking at what is communicated by Covenant people, churches and pastors regarding who we are and how we live out our faith: Covenant identity and practice. And the issue that raises this series of posts is how we live out our identity in the area of baptism.

We need to start from common ground. Firstly, I am writing from a perspective of love for The Evangelical Covenant Church, and deep respect for my colleagues in ministry.

Secondly, If you are unfamiliar with the Covenant’s baptismal perspective, you’ll need to read these two documents, or else what follows will not make much sense:

Here is The Covenant’s Policy on Baptism, which every Covenant Pastor is required to sign in order to be ordained.

And here is a Statement on Baptism in The Covenant (pdf format), which explains a lot of the theology and sociology behind our policy.

MY PERSPECTIVE
I am writing from a perspective that is fairly unique in The Covenant. I am currently serve on the ministry staff of Christ the King, a Lutheran church of about 1000 people in Kingwood, Texas (suburban Houston). I am Director of Communications at CTK, a thriving and healthy contemporary church – very contemporary in the context of the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod – and in fact my guess is that most Covenant people could attend CTK and feel right at home. In fact one Covenant friend visited us in Kingwood, and after worship, commented that she felt as though she had been in a Covenant Church.

I am deeply thankful for the blessing of serving this wonderful church alongside so many gifted and godly believers, both lay and ordained, on and off of the staff. But my perspective is also colored by my history. While God’s sovereign hand has led me to this place, the journey occurred through the experience of serving two Covenant Churches that were characterized by a lot of dysfunction. As a result I found myself twice pressured out of Covenant ministry. Neither church continues in ministry: The dysfunction that was present before my arrival continued after my departure and eventually closed the churches. And you need to trust me: When an ordained pastor in The Evangelical Covenant Church longs to be in pastoral ministry in The Covenant and has been led by God out of that ministry context for a season, one watches with great interest The Covenant’s doings, hopeful that some day in God’s sovereignty an opportunity might be provided to return to that context for ministry. One carries a concern about how readily re-entry to Covenant ministry can be accomplished (Indeed, there is not a little anxiety in me as I write these words and reflect on how their appearance on a public forum like my blog might impact my ability to return to Covenant ministry when God’s season for me at CTK is concluded.)

There are those Covenant pastors, of course, who do not wish to return to ministry at all, or to ministry in The Covenant. I do not write from the perspective of these friends in Christ.

While the policy states that “Covenant pastors may, and must hold their own convictions concerning baptism”, I am, as I put it in my Pastoral Profile, “sincerely, genuinely non-partisan on the issue of baptism. I am pro-baptism”. I don’t really “have a dog” in this discussion. I write in the interest of accurate and compelling communication.

As Director of Communications at CTK (Here’s what that means), among many other tasks I am responsible for website development (and am in the midst of a major re-working this week, in fact). I surf a lot of church websites. And because of my heart for The Covenant, I surf a lot of Covenant websites. And I see what appears to me to be (at least) confusing communication about who we are and how we live out our faith and commitments - specifically in the theology and practice of baptism.

In my next installment I will address the specifics of my observations.