Subject: How can you explain the SDA faiths? |
Bible Note: The word baptizo means 'to drench', and derivatively 'to overwhelm' (looking at both Biblical and secular usage). What a word means is not determined by its root, but by how it is used. (The use of bapto is therefore irrelevant to its meaning). The Pharisees did not wash their hands they drenched them, pouring water over hands and wrists. Paul's use in 1 Cor 10 was metaphorical. The Israelites were not really baptised, thus whether they got wet or not is irrelevant. Paul is using the word as a technical term. Certainly in the UK you will not find any baptists that I know of who suggest that baptism saves. Indeed they could not, otherwise they would not allow a delay in baptism after salvation. I know of no UK baptist church thast insists on baptising people the moment they believe. Most would insist on a course of instruction to ensure that the person knows what they are doing. Salvation occurs through faith in Jesus Christ and His blood shed for us, not through baptism. Baptism is simply a final visible seal indicating outwardly that the person is claiming to have been sealed by the Spirit, baptism in water being important but not vital. The reason Baptists practise immersion is: 1) because they believe that that is how it is portrayed in Scripture. 2) because they believe it better portrays the idea of dying with Christ and rising with Him, which is the main meaning of baptism in Scripture. It is only a sacramentalist who would suggest that it mattered whether every part of the head and body were covered. Few UK baptists are sacramentalists. But of course as immersion means going right under the water it is difficult to see how any part could not be covered by water. Thus if there is absurdity, the absurdity that talks about a part not being covered lies with those who suggest otherwise. (It is a pity that Christians try to point to other Christians as having absurd ideas. Whatever they may be they are rarely if ever absurd. Baptists could say that sacramentalist ideas are absurd, some probably do, but I do not think it right to do so. Such ideas may be wrong, but they are not absurd. We should respect each others views). I write this not in order to promote baptists but in order to correct any fales impressions that may have been gained from what has previously been said. Best wishes. |