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;” “
Then they come back and say “ Don’t you know about Ephesians 2:8, “For by grace you have been saved through faith;”
Then we say, “Yes I know about that but do you know about 1 Peter 3:21, “baptism now saves you—”
So we get in this fight and we are doing the dumbest thing. We are fighting scripture with scripture. Like these scriptures can counter act each other. If it is in the Scriptures then it is a part of the whole will of God. And one will not negate the other.
But because of our reaction to those who are preaching Faith so strongly or Faith only, we come over here and say well you know faith isn’t that important, you forgot all about Baptism. Then next thing you know we have forgot all about Faith. It is almost like faith is the enemy instead of the victory.
I believe that if you ask Paul if he was saved by faith only he would answer yes. Now if you are talking about the teaching that says faith is just saying, “Yeah, I believe in God.” That’s not faith. Biblical faith is much fuller than that. According to Paul there is the obedience of Faith, it is all encompassing, it is my faith that moves me.
In our churches we have come up with what we call the 5 steps of Salvation. And I think that this might be a place where we got ourselves in trouble. We have separated Baptism from Faith.
I mean you have Hear, Believe (Faith), Repent, Confess and Be Baptized.
Biblically that’s not right. Biblically it’s all faith. Believing, repenting, confessing, and Baptism are all because of faith. It’s not faith down here and baptism at the top step. Biblically it’s all faith, and we got in trouble here.
Baptism is not in addition to faith but is an expression of faith.
Let’s look at what God says about it:
Galatians 3:26-27 for you are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus. For all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ.
Is Paul contradicting himself from one verse to the other? Or are the two parallel?
I believe that they are parallel.
Baptism is not in addition to my faith it is an expression of my faith.
This is totally different that I was taught. Baptism isn’t me putting my faith in me; it’s me putting my faith in Jesus.
The story in Acts 16 about the Philippian Jailer, used to make me break out in a cold sweat.
29 - 31 And he called for lights and rushed in and, trembling with fear, he fell down before Paul and Silas, and after he brought them out, he said, "Sirs, what must I do to be saved?" And they said, "Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you shall be saved, you and your household."
I always thought Paul, why didn’t you give the whole answer. But now I know that is the answer.
Now would you like to see the application of that answer? Let’s read verse 33 “And he took them that very hour of the night and washed their wounds, and immediately he was baptized, he and all his household.”
There is no contradiction, no fight between faith and baptism. It’s all together. And it’s all about putting my trust in God.
Baptism is not the Gospel it is my response to the Gospel.
In our reaction to what other people were talking about we just started preaching baptism. We emphasized the ritual or the outer form, and we didn’t bring them to faith. Our struggle came when we began to think that Baptism was the message.
I remember when I was younger reading tracts on baptism that would be 20 –30 pages long and never reading a word about the cross. Nothing about Jesus. And even though there was a lot of good information in there, there was nothing about Jesus.
We have to understand that Baptism is important and significant, but that’s not the Gospel it is my response to the Gospel. And anytime we talk about Baptism and forget to mention the cross we are in great danger. I would even go so far as saying anytime you teach baptism without the cross you are teaching heresy. Because what you are saying is “It’s up to me.”
That brings us to the second area where we have been wrong: Putting the focus on me.
Now I believe that this might be our biggest problem. The focus in baptism has nothing to do with you and what you are doing. The focus is on Christ and what he did.
I can remember when I was in college at Faulkner sitting on a pew late one night as a friend of mine was baptizing a young girl, who was really struggling and wanted to be rebaptized. As they stood in the water she is really trying to get it right, and as she came up she said my mind wasn’t focused we need to do it again. And down she went again, then she was worried about not being right while she was in the water so she was sinning as she was being baptized and down she went a third time.
We sat there for her to try to get her focus right and what we should have done is focused on Jesus because we will never be able to get it right. What we need is Jesus.
Romans 6:3-4 “Or do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus have been baptized into His death? Therefore we have been buried with Him through baptism into death, in order that as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life.”
Where is Paul putting the Focus? On You?
No the focus belongs on Jesus and what he accomplished for you on the cross. You are just associating with His blood that was shed on the cross.
For years I have heard that only members of the Church of Christ are going to heaven. That’s faulty theology.
Christians are going to Heaven. Not the Church of Christ. Any one who falls upon the Grace of God and is baptized associates with Christ’s blood and is saved.
I would dare to say that not every member of the Church of Christ is going to Heaven. You see we are looking at our membership, an outward sign and putting our faith in that. Just because you name is in a directory does not mean that it is in the book of life.
Well Jeremy we are the only ones who worship correctly!
How do you know that? I believe there is a pattern for worship but is it my worship that saves me? Not according to Scriptures.
I am saved not by my perfect obedience but by His perfect grace.
I believe that some of our problem, or at least those of us who grew up in the church is that we learned those Old Testament stories where someone got it wrong and got zapped.
Do you remember Uzzah? What did Uzzah do? He touched the Ark that God after God said it was holy don’t touch it. What did God do? Zapped him on the spot.
How about Nadab and Abihu? They offered strange fire and God zapped them.
I believe that there are legitimate points to those stories. God expects obedience. But I think that we were so Uzzah’d to death that we came out with a view that God was some nitpicker waiting for you to blow something so that he could zap us.
We have used that mentality to teach that if we don’t get the outside right we were going to get zapped and we forgot all about 1 Samuel 16:7 “God sees not as man sees, for man looks at the outward appearance, but the LORD looks at the heart."
God doesn’t look at the outer form God looks at the heart. And because of our reaction to faulty theology we begin to look at the outer form and forget the heart issues that even more important. And if we are not careful we begin to teach baptism actually in a way that denies the Gospel. Because it was almost saying I can save myself. “If I can understand it perfectly, then I got it right.” So what happens is every time we learn more we get rebaptized.
Listen to the Bible’s short list of motivations and benefits of baptism.
Obedience,
Salvation,
Remission of Sins,
Receive the Holy Spirit,
A New Life,
Be Clothed With Christ.
Now is there anyone here that understood all of those things when you were baptized? I didn’t. So do I need to be rebaptized?
You see if my heart was set on God, God does what he says weather I understand it or not.
We took one act of Baptism – Remission of Sins – and we made it the purpose. And all of the other purposes didn’t count.
You see people do not need to be rebaptized they need to be truly baptized.
What do I mean?
Well if a bunch of your friends at summer camp were getting baptized and it seemed like the thing to do then I don’t think that you have ever been baptized.
If you got baptized because you knew the only way you were going to marry that woman is by getting in the water, then I believe that you have only gotten wet and you need to be truly baptized.
Or maybe your parents, with great motives, had you baptized as an infant. I praise God that they were concerned about your spiritual well being. But now maybe you have read the scriptures and you see that Baptism was always a choice that someone made, it was an immersion, and you think I appreciate all that but now I need to complete my obedience. I need to be truly baptized.
The third and final way that we have been wrong is when we teach that Baptism is the end.
Matthew 28:19 says that it is just the beginning: "Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age."
Baptism is not the end of the journey it is the beginning.
Sometimes we get someone in the water and we leave them there when in truth the Bible says they are just babies in Christ. I wouldn’t leave Trafton alone; He needs guidance, nurturing, love, and teaching.
When you understand that baptism is the beginning not the end it leads us to the truth that:
You need to be baptized because you don’t have it together.
I have heard so many times, you know I really believe in Jesus and I really need to be baptized but not yet. I have got so much going wrong and when I get it fixed then I’ll come. Friends did you know that the Bible is full of people who were baptized the very first time they hear the Gospel. I don’t think they had all knowledge, and I don’t think they had all of their bad habits licked. They decided that they were going to trust God and rely on His grace.
So today let me encourage you. If today you need to be baptized what you need to do:
1) Put your faith in Jesus. Not in this act but in Jesus.
2) You need to keep the focus on what Jesus did for you. You need to clam the promise in scripture that says you are buried with Him and you will be resurrected with Him.
3) You need to say I want a new beginning. It’s not working and I really need to get it together because it’s not working.
4) You need to throw your self on the grace of God.
All of these promises can be yours today, is today the day that you start over. The message is your while we stand and sing.
* This sermon passed several hands before it got to mine. I believe Rick Atchley preached the original series.
