But the new birth is not
something that can be confined to the past. In this it exactly resembles the
sacrament of baptism which effects it. The need for new birth continues to
stand, not behind the individual Christian at the beginning of his pilgrimage,
but before him. He does not stand in need of the grace of penance or
that of confirmation—he stands in need of the prima gratia of baptism. This
is the only sort of grace there is.
Luther is able to express himself
about the effects of baptism so powerfully and reservedly precisely because he
places neither baptism, nor the new birth exclusively in the past tense. To put
it another way if the new birth cannot be confined completely to an event which
occurs at the time of administration, nor can the meaning of baptism itself be
restricted in this way. Luther is indeed capable of making expansive statements
about what happens “in the hands of the priest”. (WA 44,507,201-30 = LW 7,281f.
on Gen. 42:29-34; § 3.3.1) The new birth cannot be detached from the moment of
the pouring of the water. But it is not a closed past event, and Luther
cannot be credited with a new of ‘baptismal regeneration’ which implies that it
is so. (Jonathan D. Trigg, “Baptism
in the theology of Martin Luther simper ES in Motu Et initio” [PhD thesis; University
of Durham, 1991], 137-38)
