Water Baptism

Know the Truth Series

Rex Deckard

Calvary Apostolic Church

The doctrine of water baptism is possibly the simplest of all doctrines to understand in the Bible, and yet it is also the one which is most commonly distorted and misapplied.

We will look at six common misperceptions regarding

water baptism, and what the Bible has to say about each

one of them.

Six common but inaccurate doctrines on baptism

• Infant baptism

• Baptismal regeneration

• Sprinkling

• Baptism in any formula other that the Name of Jesus Christ

• Baptism for the dead

• Baptism as a symbolic act not related to the plan of salvation

Infant baptism

Not one infant was ever recorded to have been baptized in the New Testament Church, nor in early church history.

The few prerequisites to baptism make it impossible for an infant or very small child to be baptized under any circumstance.

The ability to be taught and understand the Gospel

• Matthew 28:19 Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them

Belief and Repentance

• Repent, and be baptized every one of you… Acts 2:38

• He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved….Mark 16:16

• And as they went on their way, they came unto a certain water: and the eunuch said, See, here is water; what doth hinder me to be baptized? And Philip said, If thou believest with all thine heart, thou mayest. Acts 8:37

And in Acts….

• And they said, Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved, and thy house.And they spake unto him the word of the Lord, and to all that were in his house.And he took them the same hour of the night, and washed their stripes; and was baptized, he and all his, straightway.

Acts 16:33

An infant or small child does not have the ability to understand the Gospel, repent, or believe.

And these are the requirements of

baptism!

Baptismal regeneration• This is the idea that a person

receives the Holy Spirit through the Act of water baptism.

• While it is possible for someone to receive the Spirit at the time they are baptized, the two remain separate, distinct experiences.

Notice in the book of Acts…

Can any man forbid water, that these should not be baptized, which have received the Holy Ghost as well as we?

Acts 10:47

The house of Cornelius received the Holy Ghost, then afterward were baptized in water.

And the Samaritans

Who, when they were come down, prayed for them, that they might receive the Holy Ghost:

For as yet he was fallen upon none of them: only they were baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus. Then laid they their hands on them, and they received the Holy Ghost.

Acts 8:17

And the Ephesians….

When they heard this, they were baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus.

And when Paul had laid his hands upon them, the Holy Ghost came on them; and they spake with tongues, and prophesied.

Acts 19:6

Even Jesus in His discourse to Nicodemus…

Jesus answered, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God.

John 3:5

Water and Spirit Baptism are two separate distinct experiences in the conversion plan

During baptism we receive remission of sins, but not spiritual regeneration.

Repentance is our death to the old man, baptism is our burial of that old man, but it takes the Spirit to have regeneration or life.

Water baptism is not a magical act

Baptism is without spiritual value unless accompanied by conscious faith and repentance. Baptism is important only because God has ordained it to be so. God could have chosen to remit sin without baptism, but in the New Testament church He has chosen to do so at the moment of baptism. Our actions at baptism do not provide salvation or earn it from God; God alone remits sins based on Christ’s atoning death. When we submit to water baptism according to God’s plan, God honors our obedient faith and remits our sin.

Sprinkling

There are no incidents in the Scripture where

anyone was ever sprinkled in water

baptism!

baptizo, bap-tid'-zo; to make whelmed (i.e. fully wet)

bapto, bap'-to; a primary verb; to whelm, i.e. cover wholly with a fluid;

David Bernard says that first endorsement of baptism by sprinkling was by Cyprian, 250 AD

Infant baptism helped popularize another innovation:

sprinkling (aspersion) or pouring (effusion) instead of full

immersion. In the New Testament water baptism was by immersion (Matthew 3:16; Acts 8:38-39). Indeed, only immersion preserves the

signficance of baptism as a burial with Jesus Christ (Romans

6:4; Colossians 2:12).

The very word baptize is a transliteration of the Greek word baptizo, which means to dip,

plunge, or immerse. In early post-apostolic

times, baptism was by immersion, and to this

day the Eastern Orthodox Church practices baptism by immersion, even for

infants.

David Bernard, “History of the Church”

Many Protestant churches that emerged from Catholicism

continue the practice of sprinkling. The Lutherans,

Reformed, and Methodists do, even though their

founders—Luther, Calvin, and Wesley—acknowledged

that the original method was immersion and expressed a

preference for it. In most cases, tradition has prevailed

over biblical precedent.

Bernard, “History of the Church”

John baptized in the Jordan River (Mark 1:5, 9) “in Aenon near to Salim, because there was much water there” (John 3:23). He needed springs and rivers large enough for immersion, not just the few drops of water sprinkling would have required. John immersed Jesus:

“And Jesus, when he was baptized, went up straightway out of the water” (Matthew 3:16).

“And straightway coming up out of the water, he saw the heavens opened” (Mark 1:10).

Philip immersed the Ethiopian eunuch:

“They went down both into the water, both

Philip and the eunuch; and he baptized him. And when they were come up out of the

water, the Spirit of the Lord caught away

Philip” Acts 8:38-39

Paul described baptism as a burial with Christ (Romans 6:4; Colossians 2:12).

No one is buried by sprinkling or pouring a little dirt over the body, but only by complete submergence. Relative to Romans 6:4, The Pulpit Commentary states: “The reference . . . is to the form of baptism, viz. by immersion, which was understood to signify burial, and therefore death.”

Baptism in any formula other that the Name of

Jesus ChristThe formula for baptism gradually shifted from the name of Jesus to the titles of Father, Son, and Holy

Spirit. The first documented compromise came with Justin in

the mid second century, when he taught baptism in the name of the Father, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit.

Apparently he modified the baptismal formula to reflect his

view that Jesus is not the supreme God but a second person

subordinate to the Father. Later Irenaeus echoed the same

formula.

Bernard, ibid.

The Encyclopedia of Religion and Ethics says with respect to baptism in the New Testament, “The formula used was ‘in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ’or some synonymous phrase: there is no evidence for the use of the trine name.”

The Interpreter’s Dictionary ofthe Bible states, “The evidence of Acts suggests that baptism in early Christianity was administered, not in the three-fold name, but ‘in the name of Jesus Christ’ or ‘in the name of the Lord Jesus.’”

“And whatsoever ye do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God and the Father by him”

(Colossians 3:17)

Baptism consists ofboth word and deed, so this verse applies.

Every incident in the Book of Acts where the baptismal formula is given, it is “in the Name of Jesus Christ” or a synonomous phrase.

• Acts 2 the Jews

• Acts 8 Samaritans

• Acts 10 Romans

• Acts 19 Ephesians

All were baptized in His Name!

Baptism for the dead

Of all the false notions concerning baptism, this one seems the most far-fetched.

And yet there have been literally millions of people baptized (by proxy) for the

dead!

This practice is almost exclusive to the Mormon Church

(Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day

Saints)

On any given day, in more than fifty Mormon temples around the world, thousands of faithful Mormons are baptized vicariously for the dead. Most non-Mormons are dimly aware that the Mormons are interested in genealogy, but they are not sure why.

Mormons believe that their church has missionaries in the "spirit world" who are busy spreading the Mormon gospel to dead people who have not yet received it. Should any of these dead people want to convert to Mormonism, they are required to abide by all its rules, one of which is water baptism. Hence the need for proxies to receive the corporeal waters of baptism.

Mormons believe that baptism is a required ordinance; therefore, anyone who dies without baptism needs to have it done another way.

Work on behalf of the dead is one of Mormonism's most serious pursuits--so serious that Joseph Smith indicated that those who neglect this duty do so "at the peril of their own salvation."

The Latter-day Saints possess "the most astonishing and extensive genealogical library in the world, religious or secular. . .The Family History Library based in Salt Lake City has more than 2 billion names on various kinds of records, over 700,000 microfiche files, and nearly 2 million rolls of microfilmed records ranging from Korean clan genealogies to Scottish church records to the American Social Security death index.")

[Ost.MA, 190]

The Bible nowhere teaches the doctrine of a chance to accept the gospel after this earthly life is over - if anything, it indicates

there is no such chance:

“It is appointed unto men once to die, but

after this the judgment”

Hebrews 9:27

“Marvel not at this: for the hour is coming, in the which all that are in the graves shall hear his [the Son’s] voice, And shall come forth; they that have done good, unto the resurrection of life; and they that have done evil, unto the resurrection of damnation” John 5:28-29

“And the sea gave up the dead which were in it; and death and hell delivered up the dead which were in them: and they were judged every man according to their works” Revelation 20:13

The practice of baptizing on behalf of

dead peopleis based on an

erroneous interpretation of I

Corinthians15:29. Paul taught the resurrection of Jesus

and the future resurrection of the dead. As part of his

argument, he asked, in essence,

“If there is no resurrection why are some baptized for the

dead?”

Looking at the context at the Chapter provides a simple explanation for Paul’s words. He asks, if Jesus did not raise from the dead, then why are we baptized into Him (since He is dead)?

I Corinthians 15:16 - 17

For if the dead rise not, then is not Christ raised:

And if Christ be not raised, your faith is vain; ye are yet in your sins.

There are some that teach that baptism as a symbolic act not related to the plan of salvationHe that believeth and is baptized shall be saved; but he that believeth not shall be damned. Mark 16:16

The like figure whereunto even baptism doth also now save us…

I Peter 3:21

Is baptism necessary?

God could have chosen to remit sins apart from baptism, but His Word teaches that He has chosen to remit sins at baptism. The question is not what God could do but what He does. We do not question God’s sovereignty, and we have no authority to teach remission of sins in this age apart from Christian baptism. The Bible does not discuss the possibility. We must avoid human speculation.

Let’s remember what baptism does:

• It remits all of our sins

• It is our burial (with Christ)

• It is part of the New Birth experience

• The Name of Jesus Christ is applied to us

• It places us into the body of Christ (Romans 6:3-4; Galatians 3:27).

• It is our Spiritual circumcision (Colossians 2:11)

Water symbolizes death. Water causes great destruction and death through storms and floods, and a human being will drown after a few minutes of immersion in water. In Noah’s day God used water to bring death to the entire unbelieving world.

Second, water is universally associated with washing and cleansing. For many reasons it is the most commonly used cleansing agent. It dissolves dirt, it is readily available, it can be used on almost anything without causing damage…

Finally, water symbolizes life itself. No plant, animal,or human life can exist without water. A man can survive for several weeks without food but for only several days without water.

Water dissolves many substances, making it possible for the necessary chemical reactions to take place in the body.

Approximately sixty percent of the human

body is water, and about eighty percent of

the blood is water. Blood, which distributes oxygen and nutrients to every part of the body, could not flow without

water in it; it would cease to be “the life of

all flesh” (Leviticus 17:14).

Even in the physical realm, watertransports and applies life-giving blood to the body. These three important truths about water make ituniquely suited to symbolize what happens at baptism.

When we are submerged in the waters of baptism, God destroys, drowns, and buries the old man.

During baptism, God applies Christ’s life-giving blood to

cleanse us from sin. When we emerge from the waters of

baptism, we are ready for the new life in the Spirit.