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| Section: Basic Christian Living:
courses for new Christians |
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Beginning with God |
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2. Buried &
Raised With Christ: |
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Baptism |
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Dipped under the water
After repenting and putting your faith in Jesus, the next
step on the Christian pathway is being baptised. The New Testament takes it
for granted that, once you've accepted the Christian message, you will
submit to baptism more or less immediately. Take the following verses, for
example:
Acts 2:41 'Those who
accepted his message were baptised.'
Acts 18:8 'Many of the
Corinthians who heard him believed and were baptised.'
So closely is baptism linked with believing in Jesus that
many scriptures place them side by side as part of becoming a Christian:
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| Mark 16:16
'Whoever believes and is baptised will be saved, but whoever does not
believe will be condemned.'
Acts 2:38 'Repent and be baptised, every one of you, in the name of
Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins.'
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Acts 22:16 'What are you
waiting for? Get up, be baptised and wash your sins away, calling on his
name.'
Because of
this close link between baptism and believing in Jesus, it is
a condition of membership of the church that you have received
baptism as a believer, or that you are willing to be baptised
at the earliest opportunity.
What about the sprinkling
of infants?
Baptism isn't for babies. Not
once does the New Testament refer to such a practice. Instead,
it shows baptism to be for believers only, which implies
a certain level of mental development.
It's not unusual to see children
of seven or eight being baptised, but only when they have a clear
understanding of Jesus as their Saviour and because they want
to obey him by baptism. As for babies, the only babies to be
baptised are spiritual babies—those who have just
been born again!
What about
the sprinkling of believers?
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Baptism
by sprinkling is really a contradiction of terms. The word 'baptise'
is the English form of a Greek word meaning to dip, immerse,
submerge or plunge into a liquid. |
| It was used by dyers to
describe the act of dipping material in dye. New Testament baptism
was by immersion. Nowhere in
the New Testament is it suggested that a few drops of water are
sufficient. All the evidence is that there needed to be a large
and plentiful supply of water. Enough, in fact, to cover the
person being baptised:
Acts
8:38-39 'Both
Philip and the eunuch went down into the water and Philip
baptised him. When they came up out of the water . . .
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John
3:23
'John also was baptising at Aenon near Salim, because there was
plenty of water.' |
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Another factor
pointing to immersion is that baptism is described in Romans
6 as a picture of the death and resurrection of Jesus
and our association with him in it. We go down under the water
into death and rise up out of it again into new life.
It's a piece of theatre. We
are 'buried' under the water, marking the end of the old life.
Then we come up again, just as Jesus came out of the tomb, to
start a new life of victory:
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Romans
6:3-4 'Don't you know that all of us who were baptised into Christ
Jesus were baptised into his death? We were therefore buried
with him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ
was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we
too may live a new life.'
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What
does baptism do for the believer?
 | Being baptised is an act
of obedience to Christ-a clear-cut demonstration that we
know how to take orders from our new Governor, who said: |
Matthew 28:19-20
'Go and make disciples of all nations, baptising them
in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit,
and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you.'
There's great blessing and
satisfaction in obeying the Lord. Our baptism will set a pattern
of obedience to his lordship in our lives as a whole.
| It represents a cutting away of the old nature as the dominant
power in our lives. Just as Israelite boys in Old Testament days
received physical circumcision, so God's newborn children today receive at
their baptism a spiritual circumcision, or a circumcision of heart.
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| It's a cutting off of the power of the
old ways. Like all God's blessings, this must be received by
faith: |
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Deuteronomy 30:6
'The Lord your God will circumcise your hearts . . . so
that you may love him with all your heart and with all your soul,
and live.'Colossians
2:11-12
'In him you were also circumcised, in the putting off of the
sinful nature, not with a circumcision done by the hands of men
but with the circumcision done by Christ, having been buried
with him in baptism and raised with him through your faith in
the power of God, who raised him from the dead.'
| It reinforces our profession
of faith in Jesus Christ. Memories of the occasion when you
received the Lord may become a little hazy in time. In fact some
Christians can't put an exact day or time at all on their becoming
a believer. But there can be no forgetting being dipped under
the water! This sets up a spiritual milestone to which you can
later look back with assurance.
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| In addition, it tells
the other people present that you're serious about being a Christian.
By being publicly baptised you are declaring, 'From now on, Jesus
is my Lord and he's the one who will direct my life.' It's normal
for those being baptised to make a verbal declaration of their
recognition of Jesus as Lord of their lives: |
Romans
10:9
'If you confess with your mouth, "Jesus is Lord,"
and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead,
you will be saved.'
1 Timothy
6:12 'Take
hold of the eternal life to which you were called when you made
your good confession in the presence of many witnesses.'
When your friends see you submit
to baptism they know you're serious about following Jesus. For
people who come from, say, a Hindu or Muslim background, baptism
is seen as the definitive break with their previous culture and
religion—and often marks the beginning of persecution by
relatives and associates.
Have you been baptised by immersion
as a believer?
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