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Jump Right In - the Water is Fine
El Dorado UMC April 24, 2005
Answering Questions about Baptism
You have finally gotten your friends to join you for worship. You know its been awhile since they attended
church, and you are excited to finally have them visiting yours. The hoped-for Sunday arrives. You and your
friends are seated and ready for worship. Then you notice in the bulletin that there is to be a baptism that
day. Gulp! What will your friends say?
The minister performs the baptismal ceremony. A father and a mother have both come to faith in Christ, and
they have two little children. The entire household is baptized. You can't help but smile as you see the
pastor walking down the aisle with the baby girl for all to see. As you glance at your friends, you notice
that they look quizzical and somewhat uneasy. "Should be an interesting discussion at lunch," you think to
yourself. The rest of the service goes fine, but you can tell the cloud of the baptism hangs over your friends.
At lunch, you somewhat uneasily broach the subject. "So, what did you think of the service this morning?" you
ask. "Well, it was different," one of your friends responds. "We've always been taught that baptism is by
immersion. Why did your pastor sprinkle water on those people? That's not baptism, is it?"
Putting aside for a moment the question of infant baptism (I'll deal with that some other time), how do you
answer the common - and often dogmatic - insistence that baptism is only by immersion? After all, doesn't
Romans 6:4 say that we are buried with Christ in baptism? Doesn't Acts 8:39 say that the person baptized
comes up out of the water? Doesn't the word baptize mean "to dip or immerse" and nothing else? How do you
convince your friends that you really do believe what the Bible says about baptism?
I remember getting a fortune cookie once that said simply, "Many questions are unanswerable. Many answers
are questionable." With baptism, that is all too true. There is a mystery to the sacraments, and yet that
should never keep us from trying to understand them as best we can.
Perhaps you have heard that baptism in the Bible always refers to immersion. The simple answer is that the
word "baptize" does not mean "immerse" exclusively! While the Greek verbs bapto or baptizo may indeed
mean "to dip or immerse," they may also mean "to plunge, to pour, to sprinkle, or to dye." Certainly, the
words can have reference to immersion but the idea that immersion must be understood each and every time
the word is used is simply not true. The best cases to prove the various uses of the Greek words are to be
found in the Bible itself. Here are a few examples:
The giving of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost was called a baptism in Acts 1:5, 11:16, yet listen at how it was
described: "In the last days, God says, I will pour out my Spirit on all people. Your sons and daughters will
prophesy, your young men will see visions, your old men will dream dreams" (Acts 2:17, Joel 2:28-). What
happened at Pentecost was called a baptism, yet was described as a pouring!
In Hebrews 9: 10, the writer refers to Old Testament ritual as, "only a matter of food and drink and various
ceremonial washings - external regulations applying until the time of the new order." The Greek word
for "ceremonial washings" was baptismo. Baptisms. Certainly the prominent mode in the mind of the
author of Hebrews was that of sprinkling as the text continues: "The blood of goats and bulls and the
ashes of a heifer sprinkled on those who are ceremonially unclean sanctify them so that they are
outwardly clean. How much more then, will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered
himself unblemished to God, cleanse our consciences from acts that lead to death, so that we may serve
the living God!"(Heb9:13-14).
In Hebrews 9:19, we read that Moses "took the blood of calves, together with water, scarlet wool, and
hyssop,
and sprinkled the scroll and all the people." (See Ex. 24:6-8) Two verses later, in Hebrews 9:21, there
is a description of a ritual by which Moses "sprinkled with blood both the tabernacle and all the vessels
of the ministry. (See Lev. 8:19; 16:14, 16)
In sum, the sprinkling of blood in the Old Testament to remove the guilt of sin foretold the sprinkling of
Christ's blood which cleanses us from all sin. In Hebrews these sprinklings are called baptisms. In every
case the emphasis of these Old Testament baptisms was not on the mode of baptism, nor on the amount of
blood, but on the effect of cleansing and purification. These baptisms did not represent something that
people did, but something that God did to provide cleansing from sin and guilt. Just as the sprinkling
of animal’s blood could cleanse in the Old Testament, so the blood of Christ cleanses us today.
By now your friends may be somewhat upset. "But what does all of this have to do with baptism in the New
Testament?" they will ask. You might point out to them that the New Testament builds on the Old, and that
it is important that we always define our terms biblically. Hebrews 9 and the fuller Old Testament
passages to which it refers clearly describes baptisms. When New Testament baptisms are introduced, they
are linked with these Old Testament baptisms, both in the meaning and the mode except, of course, that
the only element used in New Testament baptisms was water.
The case for sprinkling has not yet been made, though. It is one thing to say that the Bible does not
commend one particular mode. It is another thing to argue which is the best mode. My view is that
sprinkling is best precisely because it is the way the Bible describes the very reality behind the sign
of baptism: that is, the blood of Christ. The New Testament speaks clearly of the sprinkling of Christ's
blood. Christians are "chosen according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, through the sanctifying
work of the Spirit, for obedience to Jesus Christ and sprinkling by his blood." (I Peter 1:2)
Hebrews 12:24 tells us that we, as believers in the Messiah, have come to "Jesus, the mediator of a
new covenant, and to the sprinkled blood that speaks a better word than the blood of Abel"
In Hebrews 10:22 we are encouraged to "draw near to God with a sincere heart in full assurance of faith,
having our hearts sprinkled to cleanse us from a guilty conscience and having our bodies washed with pure
water."
Christ's blood has cleansed us from sin. This cleansing is what baptism pictures, and there is a biblical
pattern for baptizing by sprinkling or pouring water on the one to be baptized. Baptisms in the United
Methodist Church simply follow the pattern described in the Scriptures.
While there is a biblical pattern for sprinkling in the Old Testament, recognized in the New Testament,
there is however no clear example of a person being baptized by immersion in the New Testament,
regardless of what you may have been told. Point to one if you can.
Do you cite the baptism of Jesus? Turn to it. We read in Matthew 3:16, "As soon as Jesus was baptized,
he went up out of the water." Where does it say he was immersed? If Jesus had stepped into Jordan
knee-deep, or ankle-deep, and John, stooping, had taken up water in his hand to pour on his head, and
then Jesus went back to dry land, would not the language be just as it is in Matthew 3:16? In fact,
one of the earliest pictures of the baptism of Jesus, found in the catacombs of Rome, shows Christ
standing in the water, and John with his hand putting water on the head of Jesus.
Maybe you will cite Romans 6:4 as a clear case for immersion: "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." Our burial does have has a faint resemblance to immersion. However, there
is no mention of water at all, no mention of the mode of baptism. Rather, Paul is simply sharing that
through baptism we identify with the death and resurrection of Jesus. As Christ died, so we by baptism,
confessing him, die to the world, and as Christ rose again, so we walk in a new life. There is no
reference at all to the mode of baptism.
Perhaps you will fall back on the baptism of the Eunuch. Read the account in Acts 8:36 and 38: "As the
traveled along the road, they came to some water and the eunuch said, ‘Look, here is water. Why shouldn't
I be baptized?’ And he gave orders to stop the chariot. Then both Phillip and the eunuch went down into
the water and Philip baptized him. When they came up out of the water the Spirit of the Lord suddenly
took Philip away, and the eunuch did not see him again, but went away rejoicing.
Notice that it says both went into the water. If going in proves immersion, both were immersed. However,
where does it say anyone was immersed? According to vs.26, they were in the desert land between Jerusalem
and Gaza. If, coming to a small stream or pool of water crossing the road, they had left the chariot,
stepped into the shallow water, and Philip, taking up water in his hand, had put it on the Eunuch's head,
would not the occurrence be described just as it is in these verses? They both went into the water, the
eunuch was baptized, and they both came out of the water. Simple.
My point with these passages is that none of them say anything about the mode of baptism, and yet they are
among the strongest passages of those who tout "immersion only." How do you account for the fact that while
sprinkling is clearly mentioned, there is not one place in the Bible where baptism by immersion is so clearly
noted?
One of the most profound passages impacting baptism in found in Ezekiel 36:24-27. There God says, "For I
will take you out of the nations; I will gather you from all the countries and bring you back into your own
land. I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you will be clean; I will cleanse you from all your impurities
and from all your idols. I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your
heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my Spirit in you and move you to follow my decrees
and be careful to keep my laws.
After looking at these and other passages, I believe that the most accurate understanding of biblical baptism
is that it portrays the gift of God’s grace brought to us by the outpouring and cleansing of the Holy Spirit
made possible by Jesus' death and resurrection. Ritual baptism, in any form, testifies to this, and baptism
by sprinkling or pouring most clearly represents this great truth. This is what we believe, and why.
Brother Polk preached a series of sermons on baptism you may enjoy by following these links.
Baptism - A Meaningful Act | Jump Right In - the Water is Fine
A Paper on Infant Baptism | Infant Baptism?
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