'There is no inherent reason that a piece of paper printed by the U.S. Treasury with the picture of Abraham Lincoln on it should be worth five dollars - but once created and defined as such by competent authority it really is five dollars, at least in a certain context: within the boundaries of the United States.
...When God, the ultimate competent authority, says in his Word, the Bible, that in the context of the church and of Christian faith, my baptism counts as my being united with Christ in his death and resurrection (Rom 6:4), then it is really so: I really have died and risen with Christ. Because of my God-declared union with Christ, I indeed truly have a new identity...'
John Jefferson Davis, Meditation and Communion with God, p.84.
