Can I baptize myself?

Question:

Hi,

Thanks for a good website I have learned a lot from reading questions and answers! Is it possible to support your website financially?

I want to ask if you would pray for me so I can get out of my sin. As a person, I used to be confident, but I'm not that anymore. Now I have anxiety. Would you pray for me that I can get rid of anxiety and leave sin?

I have a question about baptizing. I was baptized as a child but cannot remember that. Now I want to be baptized again but I'm not sure have it works. Do I have to be submerged underwater? If I have to be submerged underwater then how do I do that? I don't think it is normal to baptize that way, what do I do? Is it important who does it and how to find the right person? Is it important with witnesses?

Answer:

Regarding the work here: How can I support your work?

In regards to the sin you are facing, James tells us, "Confess your trespasses to one another, and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The effective, fervent prayer of a righteous man avails much" (James 5:16). It helps to have someone else know what you are going through and also to have someone help you analyze the problems for solutions. "Brethren, if a man is overtaken in any trespass, you who are spiritual restore such a one in a spirit of gentleness, considering yourself lest you also be tempted. Bear one another's burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ" (Galatians 6:1-2). But most of all it helps to know that someone cares and is praying to God on your behalf. If I can help, I'm willing to listen.

In regards to baptism, you cannot baptize yourself. It is always described as being baptized; that is, someone does it to you. You do need to have someone able to baptize as God commanded in Matthew 28:18-20. Christians exist in most places in the world.

Witnesses are needed, not for the baptism, but for another element of salvation. "But what does it say? "The word is near you, in your mouth and in your heart" (that is, the word of faith which we preach): that 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. For with the heart one believes unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation" (Romans 10:8-10). That confession has to be done before men. "Therefore whoever confesses Me before men, him I will also confess before My Father who is in heaven" (Matthew 10:32).

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