Dale Partridge - Real Christianity #64： A Biblical View of Baptism

00:00:00.000 Welcome to Real Christianity. Today we are talking about a biblical view of baptism.

00:00:05.740 Biblical view of baptism. Important episode that many people have requested from us.

00:00:11.820 Yeah, a question that we often get is, does somebody need to be baptized in order to be

00:00:15.880 Christian? Or what if they were baptized as an infant? Do they need to be baptized again?

00:00:21.080 And how is baptism properly carried out? Is it sprinkling or is it submersion?

00:00:26.080 Does it have to be done by a pastor or can be done by any Christian?

00:00:30.000 So we're going to answer a lot of these questions in this week's episode.

00:00:33.500 Yeah.

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00:02:01.780 Get it? 0.88

00:02:03.340 Okay.

00:02:04.180 So, yeah, over the years, I've heard and learned that baptism is kind of an odd reality in the church.

00:02:13.140 There's lots of baptized non-Christians, and there's lots of non-baptized Christians in the church.

00:02:20.740 And whether that's, again, from infant baptism, as Veronica said, or early baptism, or inauthentic baptism, that's another conversation.

00:02:29.180 But an unbaptized church, or a church that doesn't place baptism in the same position that the Bible does, causes a really big problem.

00:02:39.700 And I want to talk about that problem.

00:02:41.220 So listen up to this statement, because it's really important.

00:02:44.360 I think that a church that doesn't really put a super biblical focus on baptism or as much focus as the Bible does causes this problem.

00:02:54.640 We get churches to start accumulating and accumulating believers who never actually pay the price of a public profession of their faith.

00:03:04.320 And they never really have a chance to be held accountable to the identity that they've taken on in Christ.

00:03:10.020 And that's a big deal to not do that.

00:03:13.500 And what it really does, this kind of lack of baptism in the churches, or this kind of delay to baptism, which we'll talk about, has kind of blurred the visual lines in the church of who's in Christ and who is not.

00:03:27.040 Who can I hold accountable to the scriptures and who I can't hold accountable to the scriptures?

00:03:32.700 And the Bible's not indifferent about the idea of baptism, as we're going to learn here in this episode.

00:03:39.160 Yeah, so Dale's going to go ahead and take us through a few important questions.

00:03:42.180 um what is baptism and why do we do it and this might seem like a basic uh question to many

00:03:48.360 christians but a lot of christians don't have a firm understanding on baptism so we're going to

00:03:52.900 go ahead and just start there and then next dale is going to talk about um if salvation and baptism

00:03:57.560 are connected in any way which is also something many people ask us about um and then finally

00:04:02.780 you're going to hit uh sorry you did great that was perfect well i was i feel like i said it the

00:04:10.480 same. No, you didn't. You had way more like emphasis than that one. Yeah. So Dale's going

00:04:22.980 to take us through a few important questions. What is baptism and why do we do it? And this

00:04:28.080 may seem like a basic question to many Christians, but a lot of Christians don't have a firm

00:04:32.980 understanding on baptism. So we're going to go ahead and just start there. And then next,

00:04:36.980 Dale's going to talk about, um, if salvation and baptism are connected in any way, which

00:04:41.160 is also another question many people ask us about.

00:04:43.460 And then he's going to talk about, um, he's going to, we're going to look into how the

00:04:47.980 act of baptism identifies us and unifies us with the church.

00:04:51.720 Yeah.

00:04:52.160 So these are really important questions.

00:04:53.520 And again, as Veronica said here, like, what is baptism and why do we do it?

00:04:57.640 It's like, wow, are we really talking about that?

00:04:59.760 Um, it seems like a basic question, but I, again, I think that there's people in the

00:05:02.660 church that have been here for 10, 15 years, haven't been baptized, or they have been

00:05:05.560 baptized and they still don't have an answer for this. And so baptism, I think in its shortest

00:05:10.700 definition, is really just a symbolic event representing the death and resurrection of

00:05:15.780 Jesus Christ. That's what I would say a theological answer. I think you've heard many people say it's

00:05:20.280 an outward sign of an inward grace or an outward sign of an inward confession, right? That's what

00:05:25.380 kind of people, I guess, say in the church pretty often. But practically speaking, the scriptures

00:05:29.740 show it as an act in which a person is declared to be a member of the body of Christ. That's

00:05:34.160 That's really what's happening here is it's a proclamation, a declaration publicly that you become a member of the body or member of the church of Jesus Christ.

00:05:43.160 And in its simplest terms, I should say, it's viewed really as an initiation to the church.

00:05:50.980 That's how it's viewed in scripture.

00:05:53.740 And you're known at that point as a public, active, accountable, participating member of the church when you get baptized.

00:06:02.900 That's how you are to be known.

00:06:05.760 The word baptize is interesting.

00:06:07.520 It's not a English word.

00:06:10.560 It's actually a Greek word that we actually say the Greek word in English.

00:06:14.900 We've adjusted it a little bit.

00:06:15.960 It's like baptizo, I think, is the actual Greek.

00:06:18.980 But it's a Greek word that actually does mean submerge.

00:06:23.480 And the reason the original Greek, why we don't just say submerge,

00:06:28.740 why we didn't translate that word to go submerge people or or um you know go immerse people and we

00:06:35.300 just kept it baptism is because when they were translating the king james version of the bible

00:06:39.640 in 1611 they there was big debates and arguments going on of like what that actually meant was it

00:06:45.620 sprinkling was it submersion like how was it supposed to be done so they just left the word

00:06:49.220 in a i think it's called a transliteration where they don't actually change the word from from the

00:06:55.600 Greek to the English. And so that's why the word is there. And, you know, historically in like

00:07:01.920 Greek literature, if you look at like old farming literature from, you know, biblical eras, you

00:07:08.120 might see like a man baptized his goats in the river. And he's not talking to these like 0.80

00:07:14.480 spiritually baptizing, but he like just physically baptizes them. It means that he dunked them in the

00:07:18.880 river. I'll tell you what, he probably didn't take river water and sprinkle it on them. That's

00:07:24.140 probably not what he meant he probably kept a record that i'm cleaning my sheep or my goats

00:07:29.120 in the river and so um i think we we see this idea of immersion in jesus's baptism um i think

00:07:37.860 it's pretty evident and clear veronica is actually going to read the passage of scripture that talks

00:07:41.880 about that yeah matthew chapter 3 verses 13 through 17 it says then jesus came from galilee

00:07:47.940 to john at the jordan to be baptized by him and john tried to prevent him saying i need to be

00:07:53.340 baptized by you and are you coming to me but jesus answered and said to him permit it to be so now

00:07:59.720 for thus it is fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness then he allowed him when he had

00:08:05.160 been baptized jesus came up immediately from the water and behold the heavens were opened to him

00:08:10.440 and he saw the spirit of god descending like a dove and alighting upon him and suddenly a voice

00:08:15.880 came from heaven saying this is my beloved son in whom i am well pleased so if you know your bible

00:08:21.760 you know that this is the initiation moment of Jesus's ministry and it's a beautiful presentation

00:08:27.680 of the Trinity and the Father God is well pleased the Spirit is coming upon him like a dove and the

00:08:35.160 Son is being baptized in the water yeah and he says he's coming up out of the water right so it's

00:08:40.160 like again it's not immediately from the water yeah it's not a sprinkling here that's not at least

00:08:44.920 what the scriptures describe it to be and and again I love that just the Trinity look at that

00:08:50.820 It's just what a beautiful moment to just see all three in tandem right there in a physical presence.

00:08:56.640 But in the New Testament, baptism is not just an example scene.

00:08:59.640 It's also a command to observe.

00:09:01.540 So it's more than just Jesus did it and we should do it too.

00:09:05.200 It's actually a command also.

00:09:07.540 And so we need to look at that as well.

00:09:09.160 So Matthew 28, 18 through 30 reads, this is a really important passage of scripture.

00:09:14.900 We should all have it memorized.

00:09:15.940 It's called the Great Commission.

00:09:17.980 This is the mission of the church here.

00:09:19.720 And I'm going to just read it to you again.

00:09:22.380 It's 28, 18 through 30.

00:09:25.480 And Jesus came and spoke to them saying,

00:09:27.240 All authority has been given to me in heaven and on earth.

00:09:30.900 Go, therefore, make disciples of all nations,

00:09:33.600 baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit,

00:09:36.660 teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded to you.

00:09:39.140 And lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.

00:09:42.760 Amen.

00:09:43.000 so if this was the only place in scripture that commanded baptism it would be enough so just know

00:09:52.100 that like the fact that jesus is giving a commission to the church to baptize folks that

00:09:58.660 are being discipled go disciple and then baptize them and i would say that's you know sharing the

00:10:03.460 gospel baptizing them is what you would see in the book of acts which we'll talk about

00:10:06.960 it would be sufficient. All four Gospels talk about baptism. Acts, the book of Acts,

00:10:14.680 3,000 people at Pentecost receive the gospel, 3,000 people are baptized. And so you see that

00:10:22.400 pattern in the book of Acts. First Corinthians mentions it, Galatians, Ephesians mentions

00:10:27.180 baptism, Colossians, Hebrews, and first Peter all mention or directly command the idea of

00:10:34.880 baptism and so it's really i would say theologically impossible to ignore the command

00:10:40.660 to baptize and uh and uh and also we have lots to learn from just how it was done

00:10:47.820 in the biblical account all right so moving on to the next question yeah lots of people

00:10:55.460 send us messages online asking if baptism is connected to your salvation um so in other words

00:11:01.300 do you need to be baptized in order to be saved um what does the bible tell us about this yeah

00:11:06.980 that's a good question i think a lot of people um i know it's so crazy that people ask this

00:11:12.000 question because we're just not taught common question it is a common question i'm going to

00:11:16.960 read you i would say this one of the central passages of the new testament that talk about

00:11:22.960 salvation there's many this is just one of them it's romans 10 9 through 10 uh paul writes that

00:11:28.480 But if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised him from the dead, you will be saved.

00:11:37.020 Verse 10,

00:11:37.980 For with the heart one believes unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation.

00:11:43.240 So there's really this two-part element.

00:11:45.160 It's confessing with your mouth and believing in your heart that God has raised him from the dead.

00:11:51.120 And it's not just confession.

00:11:52.380 It's also confessing that he's Lord of your life.

00:11:54.040 So there's a lot of depth there.

00:11:55.080 However, there's no mention of baptism in there.

00:11:58.300 That's for sure.

00:11:59.260 So if you read 1 Corinthians, I'm going to give you another example

00:12:03.160 why baptism is not necessarily connected to salvation.

00:12:07.500 1 Corinthians 14, or chapter 1, 14 through 17, Paul tells us, and I quote,

00:12:13.860 I thank God that I baptized none of you except Crispus and Gaius,

00:12:18.040 lest anyone should say that I had baptized in my own name.

00:12:21.500 Yes, I also baptized the household of Stephanas.

00:12:23.420 Besides, I do not know whether I baptized any other,

00:12:25.860 for Christ did not send me to baptize, but to preach the gospel.

00:12:29.760 So if baptism saved, Paul would have been baptizing every single person

00:12:34.700 that he shared the gospel with.

00:12:37.100 And Paul doesn't do that.

00:12:38.900 Paul actually says the opposite.

00:12:40.200 Like, Jesus didn't send me to go baptize.

00:12:43.600 This is part of the work of the church.

00:12:46.340 It's not necessarily the part of the apostle to do,

00:12:49.660 and it is not directly connected to salvation.

00:12:53.760 Baptism does not save you.

00:12:54.900 It does not make you more holy or make you more secure in your faith.

00:12:57.880 It does not do those things.

00:13:00.420 The thief on the cross is, I'd say, it's one example.

00:13:05.600 It's probably the most common example that, hey, Jesus promises this thief on the cross next to him paradise,

00:13:13.000 and he didn't get baptized.

00:13:15.240 And so, again, that's just one example.

00:13:17.960 But this does not reduce the critical responsibility of baptism, though.

00:13:22.300 So just because it's not connected to your salvation doesn't mean that we don't have to observe this command.

00:13:27.480 Yeah. Okay. So then why is baptism so important?

00:13:30.940 I think a lot of people need help here because if we don't need it for salvation, then what's the point?

00:13:38.100 This is probably why so many people in the church today haven't been baptized.

00:13:41.900 So can you share about the spiritual proclamation of baptism?

00:13:45.920 Yeah. It's like we live in a culture that's like, if I don't have to do it, I'm not going to do it.

00:13:48.960 I don't have time to do it. Like that's more minimalist.

00:13:51.360 like just just give me whatever the necessities are very basics and as i said earlier you know

00:13:56.580 baptism is a form of public confession regarding a spiritual conviction that's really what it is

00:14:02.500 and scripturally speaking baptism is an immediate public response and testimony to the saving work

00:14:09.920 of jesus christ in your life it's an immediate public response if we're looking at scripture

00:14:13.780 it's not one of these things that some people did like months later or even weeks later

00:14:19.580 It's like you accepted the gospel and like, bam, let's go dunk this person.

00:14:24.640 You know, like that's what happened, scripturally speaking.

00:14:28.380 It doesn't mean that it has to happen like that.

00:14:29.840 Always, that is the description of what happened.

00:14:32.980 It's not the prescription of what to do.

00:14:35.700 But it is what happened.

00:14:38.660 And it's something that people did just as a reaction to the reception of conversion.

00:14:48.900 And if they weren't willing to do that, I'd actually imagine that people would be less confident that there was true repentance and actually acceptance of Jesus Christ as their Lord, if they were hesitant for baptism.

00:15:02.100 And if you were authentically converted, then I don't think you had any problem getting baptized.

00:15:08.000 Even in a hostile and persecuted culture where your baptism might even cost you your life, people were willing to confess Jesus Christ openly and publicly, which is a big deal when we're talking about baptism.

00:15:23.080 Yeah, Jesus makes a public confession a major responsibility in scripture.

00:15:27.720 So let's go ahead and take a look at Matthew chapter 10, verse 32 through 33, where he says,

00:15:32.820 therefore whoever confesses me before men him i will also confess before my father who is in

00:15:38.460 heaven but whoever denies me before men him i will also deny before my father who is in heaven

00:15:43.840 yeah so public confession that's a scary scripture by the way um and you know guys like we're talking

00:15:52.700 about baptism in a developed world i mean most of us are like oh i gotta go get baptized in that hot

00:15:57.200 you know it's we we you know it's not a uh it's not a hard thing to do especially you know in

00:16:05.140 most parts of the world it's something that we should do so this this idea of public proclamation

00:16:09.180 and and really identifying yourself with christ publicly um you know we might be more confident

00:16:15.240 or uh comfortable i should say uh with baptism um kind of uh you know baptism free christianity

00:16:22.660 where you just don't need to do it or baptism as like a private matter where you kind of just

00:16:27.140 you don't really want anybody to see you're just kind of afraid to get in front of people to like

00:16:30.920 let everybody know that you're baptized um but it's not intended to be private it's actually a

00:16:37.180 public act um it's your act of identifying with the lord before others so they can hold you

00:16:44.120 accountable it's kind of like a wedding you know you don't oh the purpose of a wedding is that

00:16:48.680 everybody knows you're married so that they can hold you accountable to what it means to be married

00:16:53.540 and if you're embarrassed to be baptized you got to ask yourself why like what's really causing you

00:16:59.100 to be embarrassed about being baptized i have a friend um i'm not gonna say his name but he

00:17:04.900 he is a church planter in some of the craziest places in the world afghanistan and iraq and

00:17:12.140 south america and and he shared some stories with me about people in these persecuted countries

00:17:19.180 that just want to be baptized.

00:17:21.720 So they accept the Lord

00:17:22.580 and they will do just about anything to be baptized.

00:17:26.480 There's one village that's in Afghanistan 1.00

00:17:28.900 and they would dig down on this creek

00:17:32.100 that had just a little bit of water,

00:17:33.940 like a tiny little stream.

00:17:36.040 And it would take maybe an hour and a half

00:17:38.800 to fill up enough

00:17:39.700 that it would maybe be about six inches deep.

00:17:42.420 And you'd have to dig around

00:17:43.560 and build a small little dam

00:17:44.640 and get it all built up.

00:17:46.360 And they would just barely get themselves underwater

00:17:49.080 and baptize people. 0.99

00:17:50.820 Another group that would take the twin beds 0.98

00:17:54.260 out of their mattress frames

00:17:55.480 and staple gun rubber around the inside

00:17:59.260 of the mattress frames

00:18:00.480 and fill it up with water

00:18:01.700 and make a baptismal inside of a house

00:18:03.600 that no one could see.

00:18:05.780 There was one story that

00:18:07.860 at the very top of a mountain in Iraq

00:18:11.220 that they had no water.

00:18:14.260 All they had was a well up there.

00:18:16.080 And they didn't have much water to drink

00:18:18.200 and they couldn't use the water for baptism in that capacity.

00:18:22.580 So they got a bunch of towels and they soaked up water

00:18:25.660 and they laid people down and covered them with wet towels.

00:18:30.020 And I'm not necessarily saying that's the right thing to do.

00:18:32.180 I'm just saying that that is the heart behind that to go,

00:18:35.120 man, I just want to get baptized.

00:18:36.680 I just want to identify with Christ.

00:18:39.160 So different from our hot tub baptisms that we're like,

00:18:44.600 maybe I'll do it when I have time here in America.

00:18:48.200 And so lastly, guys, baptism is a form of unity.

00:18:53.960 It's a really important form of unity.

00:18:55.800 Ephesians 4, 4 through 6 says,

00:18:58.220 There is one body and one spirit, just as you were called in one hope of your calling,

00:19:02.040 one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God, one Father of all,

00:19:06.260 who is above all and through all and in you all.

00:19:10.080 And so I guess just to wrap up what we're saying here is

00:19:15.260 I'll give you just kind of a four-point structure of what we talked about today.

00:19:21.360 We are to follow our Lord and his example of baptism.

00:19:25.160 So he got baptized.

00:19:26.420 We should do what he did.

00:19:28.240 Number two, we are to follow our Lord and his command in baptism,

00:19:32.980 which he gives to us in the Great Commission.

00:19:36.760 Number three, we are to show our confession of our faith in baptism.

00:19:41.220 We are to be willing to identify with him publicly and confess him before men.

00:19:45.260 And then fourth, we are to show our unity with his church in baptism because there's one baptism and one Lord above all who is through all and in us all.

00:19:56.720 And so it's an important, basic understanding of baptism.

00:20:00.740 Short episode today.

00:20:02.260 I know Veronica is going to close us out with a cool baptism confession.

00:20:10.520 Yeah, so it was written in the 1700s.

00:20:14.520 so i'd like to go ahead and share that with you yeah this is just like a cool confession of

00:20:19.880 so i don't know if you you know back throughout church history they had what's called like

00:20:24.380 baptism confessions and you'd like sign a document that said something or you'd write

00:20:29.760 your own document and this is from one of those and i thought what a passionate thing to write

00:20:34.940 that we would just probably not do in a modern era all right here it says i hereby confess in

00:20:42.380 my willing submission to this divinely appointed ordinance my glad obedience to the command of my

00:20:48.780 lord and savior in this manner i show forth my identification with the one who bore my sins

00:20:54.340 took my place died in my stead was buried and rose again for my justification as christ went

00:21:01.360 through the dreadful reality of suffering and death to secure my salvation so my immersion

00:21:06.340 in water and emergence therefrom i publicly declare my identification with my lord in his

00:21:12.780 death burial and resurrection on my behalf with the intention from here on to walk with him in

00:21:18.920 newness of new life signed on this date by your name blankety blank blank right so this is it's

00:21:26.780 a cool thing that you just go wow we've lost so much richness declaration yeah in in our church

00:21:33.760 today. I love the beauty of just, you know, just really understanding what you're doing

00:21:40.160 in baptism today. So on that note, last thing I want to remind you guys, if you guys appreciated

00:21:47.660 this show, a review would really be helpful. The reviews actually really do help the exposure of

00:21:52.700 the show. The podcast is continuing to grow. More and more people, I think, are looking for biblical

00:21:57.520 truth. And that's our goal here, is to help you guys understand the Bible so that you can apply

00:22:03.480 its principles to your life and have a biblical uh real christian uh relationship with with god

00:22:09.560 um on that note we will see you guys next wednesday for the next episode of real christianity

00:22:16.040 see ya take care

Dale Partridge - September 25, 2019

Real Christianity #64： A Biblical View of Baptism

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