156 Dimensions of Baptism
While 'the rest' (015e Xoi TTOI) renewed their taunting challenge for Elijah
to come and save him (v. 49a; cf. w. 39-44), 'another' (ocAAos) got a spear
(Acc(3cov XoyxTiv) and pierced Jesus' side so that 'water and blood came
out' (v. 49b). The scene fits together as well (or better) with the longer
reading as without it. Jesus' last two cries 'in a loud voice' (w. 46, 50)
frame two individual acts that could be read as expressions of either cruelty
or mercy, one aimed at prolonging Jesus' life, the other at ending it. In the
public setting of Matthew's crucifixion, 'blood' suggests guilt more than
purification. Only in the privacy of Jesus' last meal with his disciples do
we hear of blood as cleansing from sins: 'This is my blood of the cove-
nant, poured out (ei<xvvv6|j£vov) for many for the forgiveness of sins'
(Mt. 26.28). The evidence of Matthew's variant suggests that the account
of the spear thrust and water and blood from Jesus' side may be an inde-pendent tradition which John and Matthew have used in rather contrasting
ways.
- Purification in 1 John: 'Nothing but the Blood of Jesus'^14
The opening verses of 1 John (1.1-4) introduce 'the message we have
heard from him and announce to you' (1.5). The author brings it, he says,
'so that you may have communion (KOI vcoviav) with us, and our commun-
ion (KOIVCOVIOC) is with the Father and with his Son, Jesus Christ' (v. 3).The message (r\ ccyyeAicc) becomes explicit as 'God is light' (v. 5), and on
it the author builds a kind of chiasm (w. 6-7):
a God is light, and in him is no darkness at all.
b. If we say that we have communion (KOIVCOVICC) with him
c. and walk in darkness, we lie, and do not do the truth,
c'. But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light,
b'. we have communion (KOIVCOVICX) with one another,
a', and the blood of Jesus his Son cleanses us (Kcx0api£ei Tinas)
from all sin.
At the center of the chiasm stands the characteristically Johannine con-trast between 'walking in darkness' and 'walking in the light' (c and c ').^15
- 'What can wash away my stain? Nothing but the blood of Jesus; What can
make me whole again? Nothing but the blood of Jesus; Oh, precious is the flow that
makes me white as snow; No other fount I know, Nothing but the blood of Jesus'—
Robert Lowry (1826-99). This gospel hymn was first introduced at Ocean Grove, New
Jersey in 1876. - For this contrast, cf. 1 Jn 2.11, and Jn 8.12; 11.9-10; 12.35.