The identity industry is building bigger banks to hold their dollars these days. It has been for a while, even while it’s updated it’s branding over the last decade. Buy these shoes and you’ll be like Mike, buy this toothpaste and your breath will be sexy, gorge yourself at this restaurant and being fat never tasted so good. More up to date advertisements promote apps to connect you to an online doctor who will send you meds in the mail so that you can stop being a male, or try to be a male. The ultimate sale’s pitch came a long time ago when a woman heard that if she ate some fruit then she’d have the identity of a god. We’ve been rebelliously attempting to redefine certain identities since.

Knowing “who you really are” usually requires less backpacking across Europe and more reading of the Bible. It really doesn’t demand questioning everything, rather it more demands listening to wisdom. They’ve taken wisdom off the shelf and into the backroom these days, but God gives it to those who fear Him (Proverbs 2:1-8). As it turns out, when we fear the Lord, when we seek Him, we come to know ourselves as the kind of beings who can’t be explained without reference to Him.

All of the above belongs in a discussion about the realities of baptism into Christ, the process and progress of discipleship to Christ, and membership in the body of Christ. These issues relate to our morning liturgy of worship, our pastoral aim to see every man loving like Christ (1 Timothy 1:5), the command to fathers to raise their children in the nurture of the Lord (Ephesians 6:4), and even church discipline. What we have in front of us is all about identity, and how it points toward telos-level love and telos-level glory to God.

God is the one who decided that, after forming Adam from the dust of the ground and Eve from Adam’s side, every other human being would be born into the world, and born as a baby. Humans always start tiny, immature, albeit cute, which helps, because they are needy. Every newborn has some built-in characteristics and desires; they are one sex rather than another (regardless of what the American Medical Association lies about), and have other markers of identity that can’t be changed, even if they are developed and directed. Kids will eat, but they need to learn not to eat dirt, while also identifying some things to eat that grow out of the dirt. They need to learn not to eat deodorant but also to apply it. They have to learn how to speak and what is acceptable speech. They have to learn to walk and work and worship.

They are humans, not monkeys or donkeys. He is male, she is female, born of this mother not Mother Earth, born in a given town and nation, given certain opportunities but not endless ones.

We do not withhold food until they can prove that they are hungry, we do not wait to give them chores until they show us their resume of experience. Everyone has to start at a place they usually don’t end at.

Somehow, the church—and her pastors and the families within her—has gotten super confused, convoluted, carried-away, and counter-productive. We’ve taken Solomon’s observation that the end of a thing is better than the beginning (Ecclesiastes 7:8) and we’ve tried to put all our projects immediately into the grave so we can be done. We’ve also lowered the standard/definition of the “end” so that what used to be a beginning is now an end. The process is gone, or at least our appreciation of it (in others), or our persistent purpose in the middle of it (which, by the way, Solomon also praises in the second half of Ecclesiastes 7:8).

Take baptism. Baptism is a public profession of faith by the one who is being baptized. Unlike circumcision, which was given to Jewish parents for their sons, baptism is a command for professing believers. Baptism is a declaration of allegiance to Jesus Christ. It is the believer’s affirmation that he/she is in Christ, united to Christ, and committing to learn to obey and live for Christ.

For the one being baptized, it is an affirmation of identity. It acknowledges that you needed Christ because of your sin, sin which God says deserves death. You rebelled in sin against God, and in that disobedience your identity was one of a hostile (Colossians 1:21), an enemy. It acknowledges that you trust Christ’s death in your place, and that you’ve been given new life in Him through His resurrection. It is a step of obedience to Christ and a physical, embodied confession of faith. It is a credo-ordinance; it makes a statement.

There are three related implications of this: 1) Affirming this identity is something to be developed by the disciple. 2) Affirming this identity is something to be discipled by the church. 3) Denying this identity is something to be disciplined by the church.

Developed

Baptism is not the telos. Baptism is an initiation in the direction of the telos. We are commissioned by Christ to:

make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. (Matthew 28:19–20)

No one is born again into the season of their manliest girth of joy-pants. A baby Christian is not in his most mature stage of being a Christian. Professing faith leads to the obedience of faith; in Christ faith works through love (Galatians 5:6). Baptism is the starting line, not something offered after 20 laps around the track.

When you are tempted to sin, what should you do? Remember your identity. Is there something that helps with that? Remember your baptism.

What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin that grace may abound? By no means! How can we who died to sin still live in it? Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life. (Romans 6:1–4)

Conversion to Christ begins a life of consecration to Christ. A convert is not complete; a convert has a new identity as a disciple, and a disciple has more to go. We could call this a “philosophy of immaturity,” meaning that the church (through pastors, parents, disciplers) wants and affirms this kind of early immaturity.

Discipled

Because the preceding is true, discipleship should not be a knee-jerk default reaction of questioning the disciple’s salvation every time he sins.

Many of us have been brought up with a brutal paradigm, and in the name of defending the faith we’ve been taught to default to doubt. We defend the faith by keeping people out. We have been taught to be suspicious of our own sincerity, and we disciple others to hesitation. It’s as if, since we’re drowning, we’re eager to criticize someone else’s swim strokes. Our spiritual growth of faith has been stunted Sunday by sermon, it has been confused and overwhelmed on Monday, and made us hypocrites toward our kids.

There is such a thing as a false assurance of faith. But more of us, in this context, are familiar with false accusations of unbelief. This is where the typical church liturgy drives sermons which create an obstacle course for faith. And just as the pastor makes you skeptical of your salvation every week, so you challenge your kid’s salvation every time she disobeys.

Yes, Paul said “examine yourselves, to see whether you are in the faith” (2 Corinthians 13). But two observations about that exhortation: 1) while exhorting them, he assumes that Christ is in them.

Examine yourselves, to see whether you are in the faith. Test yourselves. Or do you not realize this about yourselves, that Jesus Christ is in you?—unless indeed you fail to meet the test! (2 Corinthians 13:5)

And 2) remember the previous 28 chapters (just of what we have, since there was at least another letter we don’t) of Paul’s inspired letters to the Corinthians where he expects them to act like Christians. Even toward that congregation Paul keeps calling them “brothers.”

We worship as Christians every week, which includes confessing of our sins. We are coming to Jesus, again and again, because we are His disciples. We are still learning to obey all that He commanded. We don’t need a bath every time, but our feet do get dirty (John 13:10). Discipling (which is included in parenting) is faithfully pointing the disciple to keep coming to Christ for forgiveness and cleansing by faith, not learning that our faith is futile and failed again.

None of us love Christ, or our neighbor, or our wives, or our enemies, just as Jesus loved us (see John 13:34). Not yet. You might not know better, so, you know, learn better. You might know better, but sinned anyway. So, first, stop acting like it’s the unpardonable sin when someone else does it, and second, act according to your identity.

This is where the church should start. Has there been a profession of faith? Has the believer been baptized? Then call that person back to his baptism. I ask this question especially to our younger baptismal candidates: if everyone sees you profess faith in Jesus are you ready for others to ask you why you’re not acting like Jesus? Likewise, parents, raise your children with the same sort of charity in their immaturity that you know you need from your heavenly Father. You need reminders of your identity, along with reminders of His standards. This belongs in a context of discipleship.

Disciplined

Baptism is an affirmation of identity by the believer, as well as an affirmation of identity of the believer by the church, as represented through her pastors. The pastors and the flock receive into, and as part of, the body those who profess their faith and commitment to follow Jesus.

What happens when something goes wrong?

This where the process in Matthew 18 starts: you go to your brother and tell him his fault, which is not the same thing as telling him he’s not a brother. (see Matthew 18:15-17)

What happens when something goes really wrong?

We keep following the process, increasing the accountability and prayers, until we can’t affirm his identity anymore. But that’s the end, not the place we start.

We do not say to a married man that his vow is meaningless because he did not know everything about marriage, or about his wife, on the day he made his vows. We knew that he did not know everything that was going to happen in their life together, we even told him so, confidently if gently. He made a public promise to take on, and to hold on to, a new identity. He committed to continue. We don’t say, “Oh, he said that 25 years ago when he was a lot younger, so it shouldn’t count.”

Of course if there has been no pursuit of growth in love on his part, no renewal of his identity through daily sacrifices of love, if he’s been given no encouragement toward his responsibilities to love or accountability for it, we may not be surprised if he breaks his vow. But we shouldn’t make it easy. It’s not right, and it’s not good, whatever he claims he feels.

In a church it is not good for anyone to deny their baptism. If they deny that identity, through words, or through a time of disobedience and defiance, the church must discipline them. It is not better for anyone, so it can’t be neglected, or made easy. “I am writing to you not to associate with anyone who bears the name of brother” (1 Corinthians 5:11).

Conclusion

We disciple those we love, we disciple them to love. We also discipline those we love, and discipline in such a way that restores their love.

The gospel is not one option among many, no matter how pluralistic unbelievers want it to be. The gospel is a command for everyone: believe in the Lord Jesus Christ. Telling others that is not “pushing” our faith on them, and denying their new identity is not discipleship. Do they need to grow? Point them to Christ (2 Peter 3:18). Are they confused? Point them to Christ (Colossians 2:2-3, 6-7). Are they being attacked? Point them to Christ (1 Peter 2:21). Have they sinned? Point them to Christ (1 John 2:1).