Gospel
Validity of Baptism
Lets start with the essential foundations first.
“For all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.” - Romans 3:23
Every person on this earth has sinned. We do things wrong every day. We lie, we cheat, we steal. Un happy husbands or wife’s commit adultery, teenagers engage in sexual intercourse before marriage. All of us do things wrong at some point, all of us are sinners in the eyes of God. But a good thing to know is that in God’s eyes, all sins are equal. So to the murderers, your sin is the same as the lies told, or the rumors spread. All sins are equal, and all people are sinners. No one is perfect, no one can be sinless, but everyone can strive to sin less.
Now that we have established that all have sinned, how can we have our sins removed? This is a question fought out in many different denominations today. The truth? Lets look to the bible.
Acts 2:38; “Peter replied, "Repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins. And you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.”
Peter in this passage in the book of Acts is preaching the very first sermon on the day of Pentecost around 33AD. This was after Christ had already died on the cross, resurrected, reveled himself to over 500 witnesses, then ascended back into heaven. Peters words here are in response to his sermon telling the people that they had crucified the Christ, the Savior. Christ dying on the cross was for one purpose, to take the place of our lives. We deserved to be killed for the sins we committed, but Jesus loved us so much that He took our place. They asked them “what must we do to be saved?” and that was peters reply. To repent and be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of sins and the gift of the Holy Spirit. Now lets look at only one section of that verse for a moment. “For the forgiveness of sins.” in the first sermon we already have mention of how we must get rid of our sin. How is that? To repent and be Baptized. Lets define baptism. The word Baptism comes from the Greek word baptizo which means “immersed”. this excludes the use of sprinkling, and pouring as substitutes for a Baptism.
So now that we know what to do to get rid of our sins, what must we do to receive salvation?
There are many views of the validity of Baptism when it comes to salvation. There are some churches that say you receive salvation by saying a prayer and asking Jesus into your heart. If you are one of those people, I want you to hear this story:
A man was at a Christian seminar and at the end, the minister upfront said, “if there are any people in this audience tonight who want to make the decision to follow Christ and receive this gift of salvation, pray with me these words…….” as I watched in amazement, thousands of people repeated the “prayer” that he prayed. After the minister was finished, I found him backstage. I approached him and took out my checkbook. “Excuse me sir” I said, “do you believe that the bible is the truth?” “well of course!” he replied. “well,” I said, “I was at your seminar and I listened to the prayer that you prayed at the end. Now I have an offer. I will write you a check for $5,000 if you can show me where that prayer is in the bible.” The man franticly opened his bible and began to search. He searched and searched and searched. Finally, after around ten minutes of looking I stopped him. “sir, is it in there?” the man looked me straight in the eye and said “it isn’t.”
You see? This prayer that you may have prayed to receive salvation, its not in Gods word! don’t you think that if it was such an important part of salvation that God would have mentioned it in at least one of the 66 books?
Another church I know of will argue that baptism is not necessary. Their belief is that at the moment you believe in Christ and accept him, you receive salvation. For those of you who think that your belief will lead you to your salvation, let me ask you a question. We have established that Baptism removes our sins (Acts 2:38). Christ died on the cross for our sins. Why did Christ die? To give us the chance to have our sins forgiven! But you may wonder, who do we have to be forgiven? Well, God cannot be with sin. When we are baptized we are clothed in Christ;
“For all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ.” - Galatians 3:27
So that one day, when we arrive in heaven to be judged, if we have been baptized God wont see our sins, he will see Christ. So my question is, if God cant be with sin, and the only way in the Bible that we are instructed to remove sin is baptism, then without baptism, how can we receive the gift of heaven? Since God cant be with sin, think about that.
The true, biblical way to receive salvation does in fact include baptism but there are a few other things we need to do also. First, we need to hear the word, and not just hear it, to search it our for ourselves. What’s the word? The Bible is the word, God’s word. We need to search it out for ourselves, but also to confide in a more experienced person to aid us. Second, our searching should turn to a belief that Jesus is the Christ the Son of the living God. This believe develops into Faith. Faith is the belief in things not seen. Our faith is what will grow and eventually bring us to the understanding that we are sinners, and that we must repent. Repentance, the third aspect of salvation. Repentance isn’t just saying your sorry, it is saying, “Lord, I am sorry I sinned, and I will change!” Change is what repentance is. Looking at your life and seeing what your doing is wrong, then turning, a whole 180 away from sin, and towards God. Now this doesn’t mean that we wont turn to sin again, we will. But Christ loves us enough to take us back, if we repent. After repentance comes confession. This isn’t just something that takes place in your heart, God wants us to say, in front of witnesses, that we believe in him, and want to make him Lord of our lives. “I believe that Jesus is the Christ the Son of the living God! And I will make him Lord of my life!” those are some strong words, a confession that needs to be lived up to and taken seriously. Next comes baptism. It is at baptism, as previously discussed, that we receive the gift of the Holy Spirit and the forgiveness of sins. We have talked about what the forgiveness of sins is, God erasing the sins you have committed from memory, but what’s the gift of the holy spirit you ask? Well, the Holy Spirit is what lives in us who are Christians. We receive the gift of the Holy Spirit at baptism. But the Holy Spirit is mentioned being given in another way also, what about that one? Well Acts 2:2-4 says;
“And suddenly there came from heaven a noise like a violent rushing wind, and it filled the whole house where they were sitting.
And there appeared to them tongues as of fire distributing themselves, and they rested on each one of them.
And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak with other tongues, as the Spirit was giving them utterance.”
In these verses, the apostles received the Holy Spirit and spoke in tongues. Speaking in Tongues is not gibberish, as some churches say it is. Speaking in tongues is speaking and every man can hear what you are saying in their own language. Greek, Hebrew, Spanish, or English, what ever language you spoke, you heard their message in that language. Now this might bring up a few questions such as “if I get baptized will I be able to speak in tongues?” “how in the world could that ever happen?” Well I have answers for you. First off, the only way it can happen is by God. And second, when you are baptized, you will not get the ability to speak in tongues. I know what your thinking, the bible just contradicted itself! No, it did not. You see, we receive the GIFT of the Holy Spirit, the apostles were FILLED with the Holy Spirit. What’s the difference? Being filled with the Holy Spirit is always accompanied by a loud noise such as a loud thunder, or a rushing of wind, as in this case. And being filled with the Holy Spirit will always be shown physically, as in outsiders will know something is going on. The part of the Holy Spirit we receive at Baptism is what aids us in prayer as well as helps us in remembering our sins so that we may repent.
Now that we know we receive the gift of the Holy spirit and the forgiveness of sins, what do we do next? Well, we are instructed to live our lives for God. Living steadfastly isn’t always easy, we will fall, we will stumble, but the good thing? Through baptism, we not only receive the forgiveness of sins we have committed in the past, but we receive the ability to go to God in prayer and repent for the sins we commit in the future. What a wonderful, loving God we have!
Now its time to commit your whole life to God. Attend every meeting at the church that you can! Tell others about how you found Jesus! Confide in a strong Christian to help you along you way. And always ALWAYS continue to read Gods word! It is your B.I.B.L.E. (Basic Instructions Before Leaving Earth)
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