What is the meaning and importance of water baptism? - GotQuestions.org Podcast Episode 34

Welcome to the God Questions podcast. Your questions, biblical answers.

On today's episode, we're going to be discussing another of our top 20 most common, most popular questions of all time.

We'll be discussing baptism. Baptism is a very important issue. It's the issue where different churches, denominations have a different viewpoint on often, and it's just something that's worth discussing because there are some very important issues involved.

A little about my personal testimony with baptism. I was baptized first as an infant by sprinkling in some sort of ceremony.

It wasn't like a baptism in the sense of you are now saved, but it was more like a dedication thing.

I was baptized by sprinkling as a baby. I was about six or seven.

I remember attending this children's event where they asked if anyone wanted to be baptized. I was like, sure, why not?

I was baptized by some church leader in his swimming pool in his backyard. I did not know the

Lord at that point, and that became evident later in my life. After I came to faith in Christ as a teenager, my uncle, who led me to faith, baptized me in the bathtub in our house.

He believed that baptism, water baptism, was how a person received the Holy Spirit. I had been baptized three times at that point when

I was actually in Bible college, attending a local Baptist church. He preached a sermon on the importance of baptism.

I was like, you know what? I may not be 100 % convinced I need to be rebaptized, but I don't think any of my previous baptisms actually match what the

Bible teaches, so why don't I go ahead and get rebaptized? At the age of,

I think, probably about 20, 21, I was water baptized by immersion in a

Southern Baptist church. You can't get more baptized than that, in a sense. What was important to me was just the testimony aspect of it.

I wanted to declare to all the people that I had received Christ as my Savior and wanted everyone to know how baptism illustrates that.

Since then, I've had the privilege of serving as a baptismal assistant in the

Jordan River in Israel, one of the coolest experiences of my life. Then I had the privilege of baptizing someone as an elder in my church.

On today's show, Jeff and Kevin are two regulars. Kevin is the managing editor of God Questions Ministries, and Jeff is the administrator for BibleRef .com.

Welcome, gentlemen. Baptism, what is it? Well, Shay, I just have to say, after hearing your short testimony there, you definitely are covered when it comes to baptism.

What is that, four times? Did I count that right, that you've been baptized? It's interesting that in Scripture, almost every time that baptism is mentioned, it's always preceded by a command of some kind to believe.

A good case in point would be Acts 2 .38, change your hearts and lives and be baptized, each one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of sins.

Peter says, believe, he preaches the message, believe, repent, and then be baptized.

That's the pattern all the way through Scripture. We never see it reversed. We never see a command to be baptized and then believe or receive

Christ. It's always believe first and then be baptized. That's one of the reasons why in our church, we do not baptize infants or those that aren't old enough to make a decision for Christ.

We follow that biblical pattern of belief first, and then making that choice to follow the

Lord and believers' baptism. But baptism is presented in Scripture as a declaration of one's faith in Christ.

When we are baptized, we publicly declare that we are followers of Christ.

We are devoted to Christ for the rest of our lives. We've made that commitment, and we are now sharing that publicly.

It's a public declaration. Baptism is also a vow that we take.

In being baptized, we take a sacred vow before God to follow Christ.

1 Peter 3 and verse 21 says that baptism involves the pledge of a clear conscience to God.

We're making that vow that, yes, I am following Christ. I am one of His.

And then probably most importantly here, baptism is a symbol of what has happened in our lives through the

Holy Spirit internally. It's an external picture, an external symbol of what has happened internally.

We're saved by faith in the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Baptism then is a picture of what

Jesus did for us. He died in our place. He was buried, and He was risen again on that third day.

So in baptism, we identify with His death. We go under the water, and that's the burial.

And then we identify with His resurrection. We come back up.

We don't stay under the water. In Colossians 2, verse 12, we read this, for you were buried with Christ when you were baptized, and with Him you were raised to new life because you trusted the mighty power of God who raised

Christ from the dead. So the death, the burial, the resurrection of Christ, all pictured there in this symbol that we call baptism.

And just as we use physical water to cleanse us from physical impurities, when we wash, when we take a bath, so the death and resurrection of Christ cleanses us from the spiritual impurity of sin.

So exercising faith in Christ, we are new and fresh and clean.

The physical water of baptism cannot wash away sin. Doesn't matter how many times you're baptized, it can never wash away your sin.

Jesus does that. The Holy Spirit does that when you're regenerated. He forgives the sin. He washes us clean.

But baptism then is a symbol of that. It's a picture of that. As we come up out of the water, new and fresh and clean, that's a picture of our soul being new and fresh and clean before God who has forgiven us in Christ.

We've been raised to newness of life. Romans 6 and verse 4 says we were buried with Him through baptism into death, that just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the

Father, even so we should walk in newness of life. And I always like to present this idea as being a picture of what baptism is for me, as to how

I understand it, is I think of my wedding ring. The wedding ring that I wear is not what makes me married, but it is a picture of me being married.

And so when I make a commitment, when I made that commitment to my wife, I put on the wedding ring.

When I make a commitment to Christ to follow Him, I'm baptized.

Baptism is like the ring. Baptism doesn't save me, doesn't place me into the family of God, but it does become a symbol that I am a child of God.

I share that with my congregation all the time when we do baptism services, and it just really helps me to understand what baptism is all about.

I think that's a good way to summarize that idea of it being this symbolic thing, not necessarily something that in and of itself accomplishes some salvation or something like that.

One of the things that I've run into, and I'm sitting here listening to us as we're having this conversation about baptism, and one of the things that's going through my mind is the fact that we keep using the word baptize.

And in a weird way, the fact that we're even using that word is a little bit of a confusion when we talk about this, because almost all the other words that we see in the

Bible are translated. We take a Greek or a Hebrew word and we turn it into English, and we use the

English word. Some words are what they call transliterated, where they just sort of make an

Englishified version of the word. And baptism is one of those words where it's a

Greek word, it's a verb like anything else, and we decided just not to actually translate that into English.

And the reason for that is just what it is. As controversial or as upsetting as it may be to some people, it's because the word baptizo in Greek means submersion.

It means to dunk something under the water. And as Shea was saying, there are some people who believe that baptism is something that can or should be done by sprinkling or pouring or something else.

Now, to the point that Kevin was making, we realize that baptism in and of itself isn't something that saves a person.

So on that account, the difference between being baptized by being sprinkled versus being immersed is not necessarily something with eternal consequences.

But the fact remains that the word means to immerse. We actually have Greek literature from the same time period as when the

Bible was being written, where they're using that word always in that same context. It wasn't until centuries and centuries after the early church that people started to use things like sprinkling and pouring.

Then when we started translating the Bible into English, that was a very accepted form of baptism in churches that were connected to royalty and to the government and so on and so forth.

And since the government was the one who was funding a lot of the Bible translations, people didn't necessarily want to offend.

So instead of translating these things, we transliterate them. So in a strange way, we really should be talking about John the

Immerser and be immersed for the forgiveness of sins and immersion that does this and that or the other.

So just the fact that we baptize in and of itself is sort of an ironic confusion because the word has a meaning that gets obscured in that sort of a way.

From the salvation standpoint, though, that is something that I know a lot of churches, a lot of people get confused with.

That's a subject that's worth debate. It's worth actually going over with people because that actually does mean something.

If you're trusting in something other than Christ's finished work, there's reason to be concerned. I have had those kinds of discussions in my own circle.

Shay, I think you've had some experience with debating people on the whole idea of whether or not baptism saves a person or not.

Yeah, exactly. People often ask me, so who disagrees with God's questions the most or what group or church do you find attacks the positions that God's questions takes the most?

Reality, it's those of the Church of Christ or Christian church persuasion who are convinced that baptism is necessary for salvation.

Just engaging with these and trying to understand both their viewpoint. I've come to a point where, okay,

I get it. I understand why you believe the way you do, but it's wrong.

It's unbiblical. Now, the problem is that there are several scriptures in the New Testament that at face value do seem like they teach that baptism is necessary for sin, whether it's

John 3, where it says, I'm being born of water and the Spirit, or 1 Peter 3, it says, and baptism, which now saves you, or in Acts 2, it says, repent and be baptized for the forgiveness of sins.

There's a few others, but linking baptism so closely with salvation is not the same thing as saying you have to be baptized to be saved.

If you look in Acts 16, for example, the Philippian jailer asks Paul, it's like, sir, what must

I do to be saved? And Paul's response is, believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, you'll be saved.

So that verse right there, if baptism is necessary for salvation, Paul just taught the person wrong.

Now, later in the passage, the Philippian jailer and their whole family are baptized, but Paul doesn't link baptism directly to salvation.

Baptism is, as we discussed, the outward sign of something that's happened to us, but baptism itself is not required for salvation.

Now, I'll include links to the different articles that cover some of these verses so you can have a chance to study them yourself, but baptism is an important first step.

In the early church, it was so important that the idea of an unbaptized believer was completely foreign to their minds.

The idea that someone could believe in Jesus Christ and then not go through with the obedience of baptism, that's not even possible.

So it's another reason why the writers of the New Testament, the apostles, so closely linked baptism with salvation in some of the writings.

And we'll jump into exactly how the Church of Christ and other groups similar parse this, but it's important to understand, while baptism is a very important step of obedience, a public decoration of your faith in Christ and identification with him, baptism is not required for salvation.

If so, perhaps the most best -known verse in the Bible, John 3, 16, is wrong in that it says salvation is received by believing, by faith, and faith alone.

Yeah, and going along with that, Shea, 1 Corinthians 15, where Paul identifies the gospel.

I mean, he just lays it out. This is what the gospel is. You believe in the death of Christ, that he died on the cross for our sins.

That was proved by his burial. That you also believe in his resurrection from the dead.

That was proved by the various witnesses that he lists there in 1 Corinthians 15. So the gospel is those two elements.

Nowhere in that passage is baptism mentioned. That would have been a perfect opportunity for Paul to talk about baptism as being part of how we're saved, but he doesn't do it.

Salvation comes through faith and faith alone. I think another thing that people get hung up on when we get into that is exactly what you just said,

Kevin, is that, yes, there are verses that if you take them carelessly, casually, a little out of context, and with respect, yes, some of those, as they're stated, if you aren't looking at the rest of what the

Bible says, seem like they're a relatively clear thing, but that's not how we're supposed to read scripture.

We're supposed to read the full context of what it says, but the full context of scripture goes to great lengths to explain that rituals and good works and good deeds have nothing to do with our ability to earn a place in eternity with God.

That is a major stumbling block. If you're going to believe that a person has to be physically baptized in order to be saved, because scripture routinely says we're saved by grace through faith, not works.

There is no good that you can do, no ritual, no anything like that, that's going to get you saved.

Now, because that's in scripture and that's fairly obvious, one of the things that I have seen persons do is make the attempt to actually argue that baptism isn't a work.

In other words, the argument is, well, you're right, we're saved by grace through faith, works do not save us, therefore baptism is not a work.

And it's obviously a bit of a logical leap. I say a bit of a logical leap, it's quite a logical leap.

We're talking about a physical process that has to be physically done by a person in the real world.

And even more so, it involves another person. In other words, this isn't just like something that you can choose to do at home alone by yourself or to just say you're going to do.

You have to have other people involved in baptism. So the theological and logical gymnastics it takes to argue that baptism is not a work is mind -boggling, beyond the fact that Jesus, when he was actually being baptized, talk about, we're going to do this so that we accomplish all things according to righteousness.

He's identifying it as a good thing to do. It's a work when it's being done.

So that whole context, yes, there's verses in the Bible that you can read and you can come away with the wrong conclusion about baptism.

But the context of scripture telling us that it's by grace through faith, not works, means that those things cannot actually be involved in our salvation.

Now, sometimes we have conversations with people about the requirements of baptism for salvation. And does that mean if I'm standing on a street corner and a preacher convinces me to accept

Christ and I say, yes, I believe I repent, let's go across the street and get baptized. And then

I get hit by a bus. That's an awkward, uncomfortable question.

Sometimes people say, no, you're out of luck. You didn't get baptized. So you don't go to heaven.

Well, that's at least consistent with that person's belief. The flip side is when someone says, no,

I think God would understand at that point. Well, if God understands at that point, then you're recognizing what scripture says.

And to what Shea was saying in the original context of the New Testament, people took their faith much more seriously in general than people in the modern world do.

And I don't say that to be dismissive. I just say that to remind people that when the apostles were preaching, making a commitment to Christ was a commitment.

And the idea that somebody would pretend or to fake or to just go along with it for the sake of popularity was completely foreign.

So a person who was truly committed was going to make that step. They were going to take that process under the process of becoming identified with the

Christian community. So there's reasons beyond just the text that we see in there that says, this is why when we look at the

Bible, we see a direct correlation between salvation and baptism, not because one is required for the other.

In this case, it's not that baptism is required for salvation. It's just that it was unthinkable that a person would choose to identify as a

Christian and not go through with baptism. So Jeff, to a point that you were making earlier about people defining baptism as not a work, and I've heard people go as far as saying, okay, yes, it's a work and it's something you do, but it's not a work that earns you salvation.

Rather, it's a work that God requires before He grants you salvation.

And so the fine parsing of this term work, this foreign description of work, when

Ephesians 2 .9 says, I'm not of work so that anyone should boast, the word there is just the word for doing something.

And so people will even say, well, how is baptism a work when believing isn't?

Well, of course, believing is something that we do, and yet scripture is clear. It is something that God empowers.

It is something, it's us receiving. It is in a sense a passive and active work at the same time.

It's not something that we are doing actively in order to earn something from God. It is something we are receiving by His grace and mercy.

So to try to parse the word work to that extent and saying, oh, well, yes,

I'm being baptized and it's required for salvation, but it doesn't make me worthy of salvation. Well, that's, okay,

I see where you're going with that, but that's still, that's not what scripture teaches. And works is pretty well defined, at least in context in scripture as something that involves a physical action.

There's really no sense in which you could claim that your belief or disbelief is something physical. It's not, it's not, it's not the kind of thing that you can observe or that you can transfer in that sense.

That's the whole reason the Bible talks about God seeing the heart. I can't see a person's belief. I can see their works.

That's why Jesus says, do your works in some circumstances so that people can see them and glorify

God. Belief cannot be a work because it just isn't.

I mean, at the risk of being reductive to it, that's just not what it means. That's not what it means in scripture.

That's not what it means anywhere. True. You go to James 2 where it talks about, you show me your faith.

I will show you my faith by what I do. So works is belief in action.

And that's what baptism is. Baptism is a work that we do after we are saved as a public declaration of our faith in Christ and identification with him and desire to follow him.

Now, before we run out of time, there's one, maybe one more aspect of baptism that we receive questions on fairly often.

And that is, what does it mean to be baptized in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit versus being baptized in Jesus' name alone?

So just as a background, there are a few church denominations who are very, very strict about this in that, no, you don't be baptized in the name of the

Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. You're baptized in Jesus' name because there are several passages in the book of Acts where it describes they baptize them in Jesus' name.

And the problem, main problem with this is that baptism is not a magic formula.

It's not as if you have to say certain words in order to make baptism real. If you are being baptized in your commitment to Christ, it honestly does not matter if the preacher or whoever is baptizing you says,

I baptize you in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, or I baptize you in Jesus' name.

The words that he's saying is not what accomplishes the baptism. Now, we can debate whether Matthew 28 and 19 to 20 should be used or the patches and acts, but the point is being baptized in someone's name is identification with that person.

So it's not a magic formula. Again, I believe either method of baptism is correct based on 2 ,000 years of church history and also with the very early church fathers, baptism in the

Trinity became very, very common. So that's where the baptism in the name of the Father, Holy Spirit became the dominant way people were baptized.

And an interesting side note, one of the earliest forms of baptism by immersion, they would actually baptize the person forward and three times.

So I baptize you in the name of the Father, Son, Holy Spirit. I'm actually kind of glad that's no longer practiced that common, but that seems kind of a really good opportunity to get a lot of water up your nose.

But still, I believe that is a perfectly valid way to baptize people because it illustrates what's happening.

You're identifying with the entirety of who God is, the Trinitarian God that we follow and worship, who has revealed himself as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

So baptism, so many side issues, so many different things the church debates about.

And what's most sad about that is that there are passages in the epistles that talk about there's one faith, one baptism.

Baptism is supposed to be something that unites us. What seems to be happening far too often is that to be something that we divide over.

Now, granted, there are things related to baptism we should divide over. We should not be in fellowship with someone who teaches the baptism necessary for salvation.

But modes of baptism, the words you say, those sorts of things, whether you're baptized in a lake, a river, a baptismal or swimming pool, none of those things matter.

They're not things we should be fighting about or even necessarily arguing over.

Kevin, one thing I think would be interesting to get your take on is, again, we're looking at a different culture today than we were looking at back then.

And I know some people are hesitant when it comes to baptism. Some of that has to do with fear of being in public and so on and so forth.

As a pastor, what's your advice or your statement to somebody who's become a new believer or recognize that they're in that condition?

And they say, I'm just a little hesitant on the baptism thing. What's your suggestion to somebody in that circumstance?

Yeah. Well, I would just counsel them that this is what Scripture says.

This is the guideline that Jesus has laid out for us, that this is how we follow in his steps.

Jesus was baptized. We're going to be baptized as well. And then just trying to take the pressure off saying, you're going to have an opportunity to say as much as you want to the congregation that's gathered to watch your baptism.

But basically, all you have to do is answer three questions. I ask them three yes or no questions concerning their commitment to Christ, their faith in eternal life, their forgiveness of sins.

They're all yes or no questions. And so it's as easy as that. And then I also go through the procedure with them privately to say, this is how you might hold your hand and plug your nose and this is how it's going to go.

And so they get all their questions answered up front. And so going into the water in front of people, they're much more confident that they know what's going to happen and they know they're not going to have to make a big speech.

And they simply let their action speak for them. I am a follower of Christ and I'm glad for it.

The one time that I've had the privilege of baptizing someone at the swimming pool at our local

YMCA, I talked to him beforehand to make sure that he both understood salvation and that he had as best as I could determine and evaluate, had accepted

Christ as his Savior by grace through faith. But also that he understood what baptism was because you don't want people thinking, oh, baptism is what saved me or baptism is something

I need to do in order to accomplish something else in the Christian life. And so a proper understanding of baptism is key.

So for those of you out there who are believers in Christ, who've never been baptized, we would encourage you to speak with your pastor, express your interest in being baptized.

And then most churches will require some sort of baptism class, for lack of better words, is to make sure you understand what baptism is and what it isn't.

And as Kevin described, to make sure you're ready for what's going to happen. So make you as comfortable as possible in preparing for the actual baptismal event.

So again, this is the Got Questions podcast. Hope our discussion on baptism has been helpful for you.

Again, we will have links to our various articles on baptism, including the ones that discuss the verses in the

Bible that seem to indicate that baptism might be necessary for salvation, how those can be explained in harmony with the verses that teach that salvation is by grace alone, through faith alone, and Christ alone.

So please check out those links if you have any questions. Hope this conversation has been encouraging to you.

This is the Got Questions podcast. Got questions? Bible -less answers. We'll help you find them.