Baptism: Where We Have Been Wrong Series

Today we are going to look at the second lesson in our series on Baptism; where we have been wrong. Honestly this one to me has been a little hard. I don’t think I am any different from anyone else here today. I have a feeling or a belief because I have thought about it and it just makes sense to me. So when I have to admit that I am wrong, in my theology, my morals, in my marriage, or whatever it’s hard. In essence I am saying that I didn’t think that one through enough.

I liked a phrase I read the other day looking for Pre-martial counseling material. It said, “If it weren’t for marriages men would live their entire lives never realizing that they had faults.

We are all wrong at different times. And that’s a hard thing for us to accept.

It’s like a man is riding home from work one day when he get’s a call from his wife on his cell phone. She tells him to be careful because the news just showed some nut driving the wrong way down the very interstate that he would use to come home. The husband replied Honey, it’s not just one man it’s hundreds of people.

He just couldn’t see that he was wrong. And one place we have a difficulty in admitting that we are wrong is religion. Because we have built up some big walls and bigger arguments, and we defend those things to the death.

But I want to say to you today that most false religious doctrine is a knee jerk reaction to other false religious doctrine.

In other words someone says I am going to teach it this way and we say that’s not Biblical so we jerk it all the way over here. And when it comes to the issue of Baptism we have done the same thing. If you look at the history of religion in America this has been the most highly contested issue.

You see the Protestant reformation jerked against what they felt was an abuse of baptism as a sacrament that put the power in the water and left out the blood of Jesus. So the Protestants come over here and say you know baptism is worthless. It’s all about faith.

Then we become a part of what is known as the Restoration Movement and we say you know we are reading a lot of verses about baptism and maybe there has been something left out and so we come over here and we respond. Now if we are not careful we jerk it back past what the Bible says. We begin to build up arguments that are not Biblical.

Today I want to ask you to do the same thing I asked you to do last month. I don’t want you to react to what I say today. I don’t want you to leave here all disgusted. I just want you to think! Take notes and think about what you here from me and from God’s word today. Then in a week if you are disgusted come to me and let’s talk.

Now as you are thinking through this process and you were not here last month I hope that you will get in touch with Tim Glover and get a copy of what I said. Last month we talked about what we in the churches of Christ have gotten right. And I do believe that we have gotten a lot right. And I do believe that the Bible says enough on the subject that we cannot just look the other way and pretend that there is nothing there.

But I am afraid that in our teaching we got so busy reacting to what we thought everyone else was teaching on the subject that maybe we jerked a little to far and began to teach baptism to poorly.

Or maybe this is just a little time of personal confession.

I am not going to speak for anyone but me today. The things that we are going to discuss today are areas that I have done a poor job teaching on Baptism. And I don’t think that I am totally alone.

I believe that the first way that we have been wrong:

Because we have picked a fight with faith

More that once the discussion has gone something like this.

“Hey we don’t need baptism to be saved. Don’t you know about John 3:16? "For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish, but have eternal life.”

And we reply, “forget John 3:16 what about Acts 2:38. "Repent, and let each of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins;” “