5/28/2025

For years I was hung up on baptism.

I was immersed (dunked) when I was 8 years old. It was my choice. I was absolutely sincere in my faith and in my intention to follow Jesus. But… 

The man who baptized me (let’s call him Brother Michaels) . . . was, well, not a good person. There was never any whiff of sexual impropriety about him, so it wasn’t anything like that. There are plenty of other forms of abuse. He was bullying, mercilessly judgmental, narcissistic and, maybe worst of all, BORING. His sermons would go on FOREVER and after an hour or so of listening to him drone on and on, I would sit in the pew and pretend to shoot him. Afterwards, we would stand for the altar call and sing something like “Lost forever! Lost forever! O, how sad,” I would feel guilty for wanting to shoot the preacher, so I’d go forward to get born again, again.

So for years I had the nagging feeling that my baptism wasn’t valid because of the person who performed it. 

There were some things I didn’t take into consideration. 

First, I didn’t take into consideration God’s grace. Baptism is a gift of God. We call it an “ordinance” because it was ordered by Jesus in his teaching (Matthew 28:19-20) and by his example (Mark 1:1-5). We also call it a “sacrament,” a means by which God’s grace is poured out on us. 

It wasn’t about Brother Michaels. It was about God. 

Second, I didn’t understand the “why” of baptism. I was always taught that baptism is an outward sign of an inward work. Which, while I believe is true, is a phrase not found in the Bible. 

What is found in the Bible is John the Baptist calling the people in Jerusalem and Judea to leave their homes and come out to the wilderness to be baptized in the Jordan River. Now, there were plenty of “miqvot,” pools of purification, all over Jerusalem and in the surrounding areas.  

John didn’t use those. No, he called the people to travel some 36 miles, a day’s journey, away from the convenient, clean pools to a fairly narrow, shallow and very muddy part of the Jordan.

Why? It gets us to the heart of the “why” of baptism. He was calling them back to the Jordan River where it all began. In fact, tradition says that the place John baptized was also the exact place where the children of Israel crossed the Jordan to come into the Promised Land. 

When those people, having repented of their sins, stepped out of the Jordan River on to the banks of the Promised Land, they were stepping out as part of the renewed Israel. 

Baptism is the rite of admission into the community of God’s people. In the Old Testament, the physical rite of circumcision brought an 8 day old male into the community (a woman’s “belonging” was based on her relation to her father, brother, or husband–yes, I know, but let’s save that discussion for another time). We read in Colossians 2:11-12 that baptism takes the place of circumcision:  “In him also you were circumcised with a spiritual circumcision, by the removal of the body of the flesh in the circumcision of Christ;  when you were buried with him in baptism, you were also raised with him through faith in the power of God, who raised him from the dead.”

In his Treatise on Baptism, John Wesley wrote, “It is the initiatory sacrament, which enters us into covenant with God. It was instituted by Christ, who alone has power to institute a proper sacrament; . . . And it was instituted in the room of circumcision. For, as that was a sign and seal of God's covenant, so is this.” 

Something happens to us when we are baptized. We are changed. Paul, emphasizing the new unity of humanity that is in Christ Jesus, writes in I Corinthians 12:13, “For in the one Spirit we were all baptized into one body—Jews or Greeks, slaves or free—and we were all made to drink of one Spirit.” 

We’re no longer who we were. We are now part of a new flock, a new family, and the old categories no longer apply. In case there’s a question, Paul writes it again in Galatians 3:27,  “As many of you as were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. 28 There is no longer Jew or Greek; there is no longer slave or free; there is no longer male and female, for all of you are one in Christ Jesus.”

Baptism is the rite by which God’s Spirit begins a new life in a person, adopting him or her into the family of God. John Wesley again writes, “And this regeneration which our Church in so many places ascribes to baptism is . . .  being “grafted into the body of Christ’s Church, we are made the children of God by adoption and grace.” This is grounded on the plain words of our Lord: “Except a man be born again of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God.”

So, I needn’t worry about who baptized me. It had next to nothing to do with him. It was first and foremost an act of God’s grace. And there was never a need for me to be re-baptized, either. God’s grace was sufficient regardless of Brother Michaels’ (or whatever his name was) fitness for ministry.

But what about the mode of baptism? Immersion? Sprinkling? Pouring? What about the proper age of baptism? Infants? Adults?

That’s what we’re discussing tonight in Bible Study! In a Pastor’s Note, I can barely scratch the surface of so deep a topic, so that’s the value of in-person studies. But, if you can’t make it and ask nicely, I’ll write about that in next week’s Pastor’s Note! 

Blessings,

Pastor Terry