The 9th chapter of J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Hobbit is titled “Barrels Out of Bonds,” where Bilbo helps the dwarves escape captivity by stuffing them into empty wine barrels and floating them down the river to Lake-town. This is one of my favorite action scenes in the film adaptation, watching soggy wet dwarves cascading through the mountain forest, big beards bobbing up and down in the raging river rapids and they evade enemy arrows.
The image of being plunged into wild waters that lead to liberation from captivity reminds me of baptism.
Like the Bilbo and the dwarves held captive by the Wood-elves, we need to be dunked into the barrel of baptism to rescue us from the bonds our trinity of tyrants, the World, the Flesh and the Devil. While Christian baptism should plunge us into the waters of grace and a new life in the Spirit, some find they’ve been baptized into the rough waters of religious moralism and riding constant waves of fear of God’s disapproval.
In this past week’s text from the Common Lectionary observing the “Baptism of Our Lord Sunday”, the apostle Paul arrives in Ephesus to find a group of Christians who have been baptized. But exactly which waters have their baptism barrels landed them in is the question?
“While Apollos was in Corinth, Paul passed through the interior regions and came to Ephesus, where he found some disciples. He said to them, “Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you became believers?” They replied, “No, we have not even heard that there is a Holy Spirit.” Then he said, “Into what then were you baptized?” They answered, “Into John’s baptism.” Paul said, “John baptized with the baptism of repentance, telling the people to believe in the one who was to come after him, that is, in Jesus.” On hearing this, they were baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus. When Paul had laid his hands on them, the Holy Spirit came upon them, and they spoke in tongues and prophesied–altogether there were about twelve of them.”
Acts 19:1-7
“Into what were you baptized?” That’s the hot, sizzling question I want us to reflect upon today. Not all believers are plunged into the same kind of religious culture. The disciples in this case were unknowingly trying to follow Jesus totally devoid of the power and indwelling presence of the Holy Spirit! The brand of Christianity they’d embraced centered around John the Baptizers fiery riverside religion of “repent or else!” Not the worst place to begin, but not the waters God wants our barrels to end up.
The older I get and the longer I pastor, the more I’m convinced that people are either bobbing up and down in a Faith of Fear, or floating peacefully in the Grip of Grace. The first is no liberation at all, but another kind of captivity. It’s a religion of moralistic striving void of the Spirit’s help, and trying to please a demanding Deity who’s always disappointed in us. We remain captive to fear: fear of judgment, fear of the culture, fear of heretics, fear of liberals, fear we’re not really saved, fear of Hell, fear of doubting and questioning, etc.
The latter is a faith rooted in what God has already done for us, believing that God really looks like Jesus and we’re not pawns but beloved sons and daughters who delight our Heavenly Father even when we neglect our morning devotions and our prayer life is in the dumps. We’re held in the infinitely patient grip of God’s amazing grace, and he will never let go of us so long as we keep reaching out for Him.
Compare the two below:
| Faith of Fear | Grip of Grace |
| Focused on outward piety | Focused on inward identity in Christ |
| Trying to please a Score-Keeping God | Basking in a relationship with a loving Father |
| “Repent or else!” | “Receive the Holy Spirit!” & Adoption |
| Self-help Moralism | Spirit-generated fruit/virtue |
| Faith motivated by fear | Faith motivated by Love |
Watch the video clip below of those disheveled dwarves hanging on for dear life in their barrels out of bonds. Is that your experience of God? Do those angry, churning waters reflect the state of your soul? Were you promised amazing grace at your baptism, but recently you’ve been getting guilt trips and fear-mongering from the Christians around you?
Like those believers in Ephesus, perhaps you need someone like Paul to lay gentle hands on you today and pray to receive once again the Holy Spirit of Jesus in your life. Paul sums it up in Romans 8 where we’re faced again with the choice of being swept along by a spirit of fear and slavery, or blown gently down God’s lazy river by the Spirit, or Wind, of divine adoption. Paul gets the final word today:
For those who are led by the Spirit of God are the children of God. The Spirit you received does not make you slaves, so that you live in fear again; rather, the Spirit you received brought about your adoption to sonship. And by him we cry, “Abba, Father.” The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children.” (Romans 8:14-16)
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Jeremy L. Berg 