I’d gotten some feedback about my recent preaching on evangelism that I felt merited sermons of its own.\u00a0 One of them was last week’s sermon.\u00a0 This week’s sermon is another. \u00a0Basically, some of the ladies were asking the age-old question, “But what do I say?”\u00a0 In particular, they wanted to know how to talk to somebody about baptism.<\/p>\n
To help all of you answer this question, I’m going to return to a style of sermon that I used to preach a long time ago.\u00a0 If you’ve ever seen a Thompson Chain-Reference Bible, this will be a chain-reference sermon.\u00a0 It’s going to take you from passage to passage, and next to each passage, you should write down the next text you’re going to.\u00a0 That way, if you’re in a study with somebody, you don’t have to remember the book, chapter, and verse.\u00a0 You just have to remember that you have the starting verse for the study written down in the back of your Bible.\u00a0 Let’s go through and see how this works when it comes to Bible truth about baptism.<\/p>\n
The first thing that we must do to discuss baptism is to define it.\u00a0 In this, there’s no point in looking at the English dictionary definitions for “baptism”.\u00a0 There are about a million of them, and some of them are based on the Bible, but most aren’t.\u00a0 It’s foolish to entrust our salvation to a dictionary.\u00a0 Instead, we should look at the word of God, and the way that it speaks of baptism.<\/p>\n
If you want to do the chain-reference thing, pick a blank page in the back of your Bible, and there write “Bible Truth About Baptism:\u00a0 Ephesians 4:4-6, because that’s where we’re going for this point.\u00a0 It tells us that baptism is\u00a0UNITARY.\u00a0<\/strong>Along with the other great ones of the Christian faith, Paul says that there is one baptism.\u00a0 If we want to have fellowship with God and other believers, we must agree with them on what that baptism is.\u00a0 If someone doesn’t accept that one baptism, they can’t be united with God or with His church.<\/p>\n This is tricky because there are several different things in Scripture to which the word “baptism” is applied.\u00a0 In addition to the literal sense of being baptized in water, the Bible also speaks of figurative baptisms:\u00a0 in the Holy Spirit, in fire, or in suffering.\u00a0 However, none of these other baptisms are ever said to have anything to do with salvation, and none of them are as Scripturally important as baptism in water is.\u00a0 Water baptism is the one baptism of Ephesians 4.<\/p>\n Second, baptism in the Bible is always\u00a0IMMERSION.\u00a0\u00a0<\/strong>For this one, write “John 3:23” down in the margin next to Ephesians 4:4-6, then turn to the first passage.\u00a0 There are actually a couple of ways to prove this point.\u00a0 The first is by referring to a Greek dictionary or lexicon.\u00a0 If you’re studying with somebody and you’ve got your smartphone, you can look up “baptism” at blueletterbible.org or any other reputable Bible-reference site, and the online Bible dictionary will tell you that baptism is being immersed or submerged in water.\u00a0 Never in the Bible is any variation of the word “baptize” ever used to refer to sprinkling or pouring water.<\/p>\n That’s the first argument.\u00a0 The second is to look at one of the several Bible passages that indicate by the context that baptism is immersion.\u00a0 This is one of them.\u00a0 Here, we see John going to Aenon by Salim to baptize because there is much water there.\u00a0 John’s behavior here only makes sense if he believes that baptism requires immersion.\u00a0 You don’t need “much water” to sprinkle a few drops on a baby’s head.\u00a0 You don’t even need “much water” to pour out a dipperful.\u00a0 You only need “much water” if you want to dunk somebody all the way under it.<\/p>\n Finally, baptism in the Bible is only\u00a0FOR BELIEVERS<\/strong>.\u00a0 Here, write Acts 16:31-34 down next to John 3:23, then turn there.\u00a0 It’s ironic that this text is one of the great proof-texts that people who baptize infants will use to try to prove their belief from the Bible, but it actually proves the opposite point.\u00a0 In context, this is the happy ending of the story of the Philippian jailer.\u00a0 The jailer has asked what he must do to be saved, Paul and Silas have preached Christ to him, and in consequence, the jailer and his whole household are baptized.\u00a0 Here, the infant-baptism folks like to jump up and down and point and say, “See???\u00a0 The whole household was baptized, and surely the whole household must have had children in it, so Paul and Silas baptized children!”<\/p>\n Now, there are several problems with the argument, but the biggest is that it pretends that the story of the Philippian jailer stops in v. 33.\u00a0 It doesn’t.\u00a0 It goes on to v. 34, and in v. 34, we learn not only that the whole household was baptized, but that the whole household believed.\u00a0 In this story, everyone who believes is baptized.\u00a0 No one who does not believe is baptized.\u00a0 The matchup between believers and the baptized is one-to-one.\u00a0 Far from proving that infants should be baptized, these events actually establish that they should not be, precisely because they are incapable of belief.\u00a0 Throughout all the New Testament, we only ever see water offered to those who believe in Jesus.<\/p>\n Now that we know what baptism is, we need to know what it’s for.\u00a0 We need to understand its purpose.\u00a0 For this discussion, the single best place in the Bible to go is to Paul’s great discussion of baptism in Romans 6:1-11.\u00a0 The first subsection within this context explains what\u00a0PAUL’S PURPOSE<\/strong>\u00a0is.\u00a0 Here, write Romans 6:1-2 next to Acts 16:31-34, then turn to Romans.\u00a0 In this passage, we see that Paul is trying to deal with a very different problem than we usually face.\u00a0 He’s not trying to explain to somebody that sprinkling isn’t the same thing as Bible baptism, or that the sinner’s prayer isn’t actually in the Bible.<\/p>\n Instead, he’s addressing an argument from the first century that hardly ever shows up today.\u00a0 He’s talking to people who understand that the grace of Christ glorifies God but think that gives them an out.\u00a0 The reasoning goes like this:\u00a0 if Christ extends grace to me every time I sin, and that grace glorifies God, then I should sin a whole bunch so that God is glorified a whole bunch.<\/p>\n In response, Paul argues that this kind of glib logic makes a mockery out of following Jesus.\u00a0 As Christians, we’re not supposed to be the same sinful people that we were, except now we’ve got a spiritual get-out-of-jail-free card.\u00a0 Instead, we are supposed to be dramatically different people, people who have so little to do with sin that we can only be said to be dead to it.<\/p>\n In proof of this, Paul introduces the point at which we die to sin, the point of baptism.\u00a0 He describes it as being\u00a0BURIED WITH CHRIST.\u00a0\u00a0<\/strong>This time, let’s consider Romans 6:3-4.\u00a0 I wouldn’t write it in the margin this time, though.\u00a0 I’d just underline key phrases throughout the context so that you can explain Paul’s argument.<\/p>\n First of all, let’s notice here that Paul’s words show that baptism is both common in and important to the early church.\u00a0 He doesn’t say, “If some of us have been baptized”.\u00a0 Instead, he speaks of “all of us who have been baptized”.\u00a0 He’s not trying to teach these brethren that they should be baptized.\u00a0 Instead, he assumes that they have been because they already know.<\/p>\n As a result, Paul is able to argue that baptism is this dramatic spiritual turning point at which the Christian dies to sin.\u00a0 The imagery here is vivid.\u00a0 When we’re baptized, we’re not just dunked in a water tank.\u00a0 Instead, we are spiritually united with the death of Christ.\u00a0 Somebody puts us under the water as He was put under the ground.\u00a0 Then, when we are brought back up out of the water, we rise just as Christ rose from the dead.\u00a0 He got a new life, and we do too.<\/p>\n This passage can leave no doubt about when our new life in Christ begins.\u00a0 It doesn’t start when we believe in Jesus.\u00a0 It doesn’t start when we repent of our sins or confess Him as Lord.\u00a0 Instead, it starts when and only when we are buried with Him in the watery grave of baptism.<\/p>\n Next, let’s consider what it means to be united with\u00a0THE LIKENESS OF HIS RESURRECTION.\u00a0\u00a0<\/strong>Now, look at Romans 6:5-7.\u00a0 Even though Paul never uses the word, I think here is where we see the importance of repentance to baptism.\u00a0 He talks about how our old selves were crucified with Christ.\u00a0 From texts like Galatians 2, we know what this means.\u00a0 It means that we surrender our lives to Jesus as He surrendered His life to God.\u00a0 Then, once we have made that resolution, the body of our sins can be done away with.\u00a0 When we die and are buried with Christ in baptism, that is the moment at which we are freed from those sins.\u00a0 When we emerge from the water in the knowledge that this is what has happened, we share in the glory of His resurrection.\u00a0 That sinful person we used to be, with all of their guilt, has been left behind in the water.<\/p>\n Brethren, I don’t know how Paul could have said this any plainer than he did.\u00a0 If we want to die to our old sinful selves and begin a new life of service to Christ, baptism is the way we do that.\u00a0 Until and unless we are baptized like believers were 2000 years ago, our new lives haven’t started yet.\u00a0 We are continuing to live that old life with its burden of sins and may not even know it!<\/p>\n Finally, let’s consider\u00a0PAUL’S APPLICATION\u00a0<\/strong>in all of this.\u00a0 It appears in Romans 6:8-11. He wants us to understand that there are two senses in which rising from the waters of baptism is supposed to unite us with Christ.\u00a0 The first is that it unites us with the hope of his resurrection.\u00a0 Obviously, the unity of baptism is a figurative and spiritual one.\u00a0 We don’t physically die when we go beneath the waters and come back to life when we come up.\u00a0 However, the literal resurrection of Christ foreshadows our literal resurrections.\u00a0 Unless He returns first, the day will come when we literally die, but we will do so in the knowledge that the One who defeated death will come back to defeat death for us.\u00a0 Only the baptized can anticipate the resurrection of life.<\/p>\n However, there is also a sense in which we are supposed to be united with the life of Christ in the present.\u00a0 We are supposed to consider ourselves to be dead to sin but alive to God.\u00a0 One of the characteristics of death is its complete unresponsiveness.\u00a0 No matter what you do to a corpse, it’s not going to react.\u00a0 In the same way, once we have died with Christ in baptism, we are supposed to be completely unresponsive to the sins that used to allure us.<\/p>\n Momentarily, we’re going to partake of the Lord’s Supper, but before we do, let’s consider what we’ve studied in that context.\u00a0 Our rejection of our sinful desires is a metaphorical crucifixion, but Jesus was literally crucified.\u00a0 We figuratively die to our old selves in baptism, but Christ really died and was buried.\u00a0 He chose death so that through Him we could live.<\/p>\n Second, let’s ask whether we’ve been living the life of the resurrected.\u00a0 Are we dead to sin, or do we prove to be as sensible to temptation as our old self was?\u00a0 Let’s consider as we eat.<\/p>\n In the final part of our study, I want to examine several objections to Bible baptism that people who don’t want to obey the gospel customarily raise.\u00a0 The first of these is,\u00a0“I WAS ALREADY BAPTIZED.”\u00a0\u00a0<\/strong>When we’re talking Bible with somebody and they say this to us, we need to ask them whose definition they’re using.\u00a0 There are all kinds of definitions for baptism out there.\u00a0 The dictionary lists a whole bunch.\u00a0 Different churches may add their own.\u00a0 However, the only definition that matters is the Bible’s definition, because unless we were baptized with a Bible baptism, it will not save us, and we are no better off than if we’d never gotten wet in the first place.<\/p>\n In particular, there are two elements of Bible baptism that trip people up.\u00a0 The first is that it must be immersion.\u00a0 We’ve already seen one passage that shows this; now, let’s look at another.\u00a0 Next to Romans 6:1-2 in your Bibles, write Acts 8:36-39, and then turn there.\u00a0 Notice particularly that the eunuch went down into the water with Philip and then came back up.\u00a0 This isn’t sprinkling or pouring.\u00a0 It’s immersion.\u00a0 Unless we’ve been buried with Christ, we haven’t risen to walk in the newness of life.\u00a0 Sprinkling or pouring might make us feel better, but they have no spiritual effect.<\/p>\n Second, Bible baptism is for the forgiveness of sins.\u00a0 Next to Acts 8:35-39, write Acts 2:37-38, and then go to that passage.\u00a0 Here, the crowd on the day of Pentecost is terrified because they realize they’ve killed the Son of God and they want to escape His wrath.\u00a0 Peter tells them that even the sin of killing Jesus can be forgiven if they are baptized in His name.\u00a0 Baptism for any other reason than forgiveness of sins, with any other goal than leaving the old life of sin in the water and beginning a new life, isn’t the baptism of the Bible and does not save.\u00a0 It’s just a bath.<\/p>\n Of course, we in the churches of Christ are not alone in recognizing the necessity of immersion in water for the forgiveness of sins.\u00a0 Baptism does not have to be carried out in a church building that says “Church of Christ” out front.\u00a0 It only has to follow the pattern that we’ve been studying.\u00a0 Anybody who has been baptized by anybody for the forgiveness of sins has been saved.\u00a0 They may not have gone on to live lives of obedience, but in that, at least, they did obey the gospel.<\/p>\n Second, lots of people like to say,\u00a0“ALL BAPTISMS ARE EQUALLY VALID.”\u00a0\u00a0<\/strong>Sure, you might have been immersed, and I might have been sprinkled, but so long as we all love God, it doesn’t really matter, right?\u00a0 Friends, nothing could be further from the truth!\u00a0 The mode of baptism matters a great deal because one way is obedient to the gospel, and all the others aren’t.<\/p>\n For our next Scripture, write Acts 10:34-35 in your Bibles next to Acts 2:37-38, then turn there.\u00a0 Let’s pay very careful attention here.\u00a0 Peter identifies two characteristics of the people God will welcome.\u00a0 God doesn’t care whether they’re Jew or Gentile.\u00a0 Today, He doesn’t care whether they’re white, black, brown, or purple.\u00a0 Instead, He cares whether they fear Him and do what is right.\u00a0 Indeed, we show our fear of God, which is clean and endures forever, by our determination to do what is right.\u00a0 God-fearing people will obey the pattern of Bible baptism.<\/p>\n By contrast, when people dismiss that pattern, in effect they’re saying, “I don’t really care what God says in His word.\u00a0 I’m going to do what seems best to me.”\u00a0 Brethren, anyone who dismisses the command of the King does not fear the King and can’t expect His welcome.<\/p>\n Finally, the last objection I want to consider is,\u00a0“YOU DON’T HAVE TO BE BAPTIZED TO BE SAVED.”\u00a0\u00a0<\/strong>Lots of people will say this, pointing to their experience with the sinner’s prayer or some other manmade spiritual construct.\u00a0 However, this position isn’t consistent with the Bible.\u00a0 For our final Scripture, write 1 Peter 3:21 next to Acts 10:34-35, and turn there.<\/p>\n As arguments go, this one is pretty simple.\u00a0 Lots of people say, “Baptism doesn’t save.”\u00a0 The Bible says, “Baptism saves.”\u00a0 Who you gonna believe, them or it?<\/p>\n Some people at this point are going to want to pit baptism against belief.\u00a0 They’ll say, “Well, you don’t believe that faith saves!”\u00a0 That’s hardly true.\u00a0 I’ve preached and will continue to preach that faith is absolutely essential for salvation.\u00a0 Unless you believe that Jesus is God, you will die in your sins.\u00a0 That’s not the question.\u00a0 The question is whether faith alone is sufficient for salvation, and it isn’t, any more than baptism alone is.\u00a0 If we want to be saved, we must understand and obey the whole Scriptural witness about salvation.<\/p>\n There are many more passages in the New Testament that address the subject of baptism and what we must do to be saved, but this lesson provides a useful summary of the topic and an outline to follow in a study with a friend, should the subject arise.<\/p>\n However, we need to be wise in our expectations for such studies.\u00a0 Truth alone is not enough to guarantee that an outsider will obey the gospel.\u00a0 Some people simply don’t believe in Jesus.\u00a0 Others don’t accept the Bible as the sole authority for following Jesus.\u00a0 Still others will claim to accept both Jesus and the Bible, but when presented with the evidence, they won’t be honest about it.\u00a0 If we study with others enough, we will run into people in all three of these groups.<\/p>\n To be blunt, though, that’s not our problem.\u00a0 We’re responsible for sowing the seed, not guaranteeing the harvest, and as long as we freely share the truth, we’re doing what God expects.<\/p>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" by Matthew W. Bassford via\u00a0His Excellent Word, November 14, 2016 I’d gotten some feedback about my recent preaching on evangelism that I felt merited sermons of its own.\u00a0 One of them was last week’s sermon.\u00a0 This week’s sermon is another. \u00a0Basically, some of the ladies were asking the age-old question, “But what do I say?”\u00a0…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[52],"class_list":["post-38998","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-article","tag-baptism"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":16350,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/what-is-the-best-study-bible\/","url_meta":{"origin":38998,"position":0},"title":"What is the best study Bible?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"September 12, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: What Bible is the best to study? Several publishers now teach that baptism is not required, such as the Life Application Bible, and several teach the 1000 year war. How can I know which publishing house and what Bible are the best for me? Answer: First, pick a Bible\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":88900,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/sermon-openers-the-preface-and-introduction\/","url_meta":{"origin":38998,"position":1},"title":"Sermon Openers: The Preface and Introduction","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"July 24, 2025","format":false,"excerpt":"by Clay Gentry Preachers, you invest countless hours in developing your sermons - exploring passages, mastering the text, writing memorable points, crafting powerful statements that make an impact, and setting the right tone. However, all this effort can be wasted if the congregation isn't engaged from the beginning with a\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Article"","block_context":{"text":"Article","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/article\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":3076,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/can-you-recommend-a-good-commentary-and-study-bible\/","url_meta":{"origin":38998,"position":2},"title":"Can you recommend a good commentary and study Bible?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"March 12, 2019","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: Dear sir, Could you please recommend a good Bible commentary and study Bible? Thank you very much. Answer: Commentaries are basically a man or a group of men's opinions about what the Bible is saying. The opinions might be good, or they might be completely wrong depending on the\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":62427,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/what-is-the-gift-of-the-holy-spirit\/","url_meta":{"origin":38998,"position":3},"title":"What is the Gift of the Holy Spirit?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"August 31, 2023","format":false,"excerpt":"by Bill Boyd My preacher friends do not agree on the meaning of \"the gift of the Holy Spirit.\" This is frustrating because this expression is at the end of the oft-quoted Acts 2:38. The passage is clear that baptism is \"for the remission of sins,\" but what does the\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Article"","block_context":{"text":"Article","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/article\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":23263,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/demanding-a-sign\/","url_meta":{"origin":38998,"position":4},"title":"Demanding a Sign","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"June 8, 2020","format":false,"excerpt":"by Matthew W. Bassford Matthew 16:1-4 is one of the more off-putting passages in the gospels. Some Pharisees and Sadducees come to Jesus asking for a sign. A reasonable request, right? Don\u2019t you have the right to ask a self-proclaimed prophet to show that he\u2019s really from God before you\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Article"","block_context":{"text":"Article","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/article\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/06\/demanding.png?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":29039,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/is-it-appropriate-to-have-powerpoint-presentations-during-sermons\/","url_meta":{"origin":38998,"position":5},"title":"Is it appropriate to have PowerPoint presentations during sermons?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"September 20, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: Is it appropriate to have PowerPoint presentations during services? Personally, I find it very helpful in keeping up with Bible verses during the sermons, but I wonder if God approves it. I don't know how the brethren feel. This is something I have been wondering about since I began\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38998","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=38998"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38998\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=38998"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=38998"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=38998"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}The Purpose of Baptism<\/h2>\n
Objections to Bible Baptism<\/h2>\n