Baptizing

[Ariel82]

Not sure if anyone mentioned it but Jesus was baptized when He was thirty....

He spoke in the synagogue at 13,

God can guide us and teach us without water baptism. He is the only one who can give us the Holy Spirit where we can proclaim that we are children of God.

Water baptism is not so we can save our souls but when we feel called to ministry ....when we are moved in our spirit to begin the work God made us to do with our lives. It might not be preaching in a pulpit or mission work in a 393rd world country, but God has a purpose.

It is when we declare to the world both seen and unseen that we belong to Him and will fight against the lies and bondage the world would enslave others to. It is when Satan will renew his attack to turn us away from where God calls us to walk.

It is when we are no longer babes but fully functioning member of the Body of Christ. Learning to walk together.

 

[pwrnJC]

Ok....First and foremost...Salvation is ultimately the goal that JESUS shed His blood for, so that it can be offered freely for the taking to anyone. "IF thou wilt confess with thy mouth and believe in thine heart the LORD JESUS CHRIST, thou shalt be saved". How plain can you make this? GOD never complicates things. Baptism may not be readily available immediately after the Holy Spirit has made His abode in our minds (remember the thief on the cross?). Baptism, as demonstrated in the BIBLE..was IMMERSION. It was not a wave of a wet branch. It was not done to infants in the BIBLE at all. It was not poured from a marble bowl. It was not sprinkling. It was not done to animals (as I've witnessed in my local community).
Why would we not seek it after our salvation experience when the opportunity is available? It shows that we are following JESUS' example..and there are many we could, but we don't. JESUS became a servant and washed His Apostle's feet. JESUS healed, JESUS spoke to those who were castaways, invalids and those of ill repute. Jesus took time to go away, find a place of solitude and commune with His Father. The list goes on, including observing the "Lord's Supper". We just can't stop at baptism and think we've done it all. We cut ourselves short on His extra blessings..and we cut JESUS SHORT if we only stay in a ritualistic mode of fashion.

 

[hornetguy]

Water baptism is not so we can save our souls but when we feel called to ministry ....when we are moved in our spirit to begin the work God made us to do with our lives. It might not be preaching in a pulpit or mission work in a 393rd world country, but God has a purpose.

That's a nice thought... unfortunately, it isn't scriptural.

What I believe, from my reading of scripture... Salvation is a free gift. We cannot earn it. We can only accept it. However salvation is a process... we hear about Jesus, and His sacrifice, we are convicted in our hearts, we repent (turn away from sin) and we accept the free gift of salvation. And BECAUSE we accept that gift, we DO what Jesus taught us to do, and that is to be baptized, in water, by immersion, in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. We receive the indwelling Holy Spirit somewhere during that process... does it really matter WHERE in the process it happens? It's a PROCESS.
Trying to parse it out to the last little detail is simply legalism and nit-picking... unproductive semantics, designed to confuse and to make a very simple process difficult. You cannot take scripture that talks about accepting Jesus and being saved and say "that's all you need to do" any more than you can take a scripture that says baptism now saves us and say "that's all you need to do"
Did I mention, it's a PROCESS? There's MEANING in every step of the process. To leave parts of it out, simply because you don't like them is missing the boat.

 

[4enlightment]

So, the Ethiopean eunuch was baptized..how? Nicodemus and his family were baptized...how?

[SUP]36 [/SUP]As they went along the road they came to some water; and the eunuch *said, “Look! Water! What prevents me from being baptized?” [SUP]37 [/SUP][[SUP][m][/SUP]And Philip said, “If you believe with all your heart, you may.” And he answered and said, “I believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God.”] [SUP]38 [/SUP]And he ordered the [SUP][n][/SUP]chariot to stop; and they both went down into the water, Philip as well as the eunuch, and he baptized him. [SUP]39 [/SUP]When they came up out of the water, the Spirit of the Lord snatched Philip away; and the eunuch no longer saw him, [SUP][o][/SUP]but went on his way rejoicing.

[SUP]4 [/SUP]Nicodemus *said to Him, “How can a man be born when he is old? He cannot enter a second time into his mother’s womb and be born, can he?” [SUP]5 [/SUP]Jesus answered, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. [SUP]6 [/SUP]That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.

Pretty clear to someone truly searching, and not trying to prove their own beliefs....

John 7:38
Whoever believes in me, as Scripture has said, rivers of living water will flow from within them.”

John 14:12 Very truly I tell you, whoever believes in me will do the works I have been doing, and they will do even greater things than these, because I am going to the Father.

2 Kings 5:14 So he went down and dipped himself in the Jordan seven times, as the man of God had told him, and his flesh was restored and became clean like that of a young boy.

Matthew 9:22 Jesus turned and saw her. “Take heart, daughter,” he said, “your faith has healed you.” And the woman was healed at that moment.

Mark 10:52 “Go,” said Jesus, “your faith has healed you.” Immediately he received his sight and followed Jesus along the road.


It was not the water, but their faith in God, the spirit. See we all seeing the physical aspect in all the stories, but God says to not focus on the physical, but focus on the spiritual meaning. If the eunuch would of asked Phillip to rub mud on his eyes to received the spirit, then it will be done. It wasn't the water that save him, but his faith that has.

 

[hornetguy]

Where's that smiley of the "banging head against the wall" when you need it?

It's ok, brother.. I love you anyway..

 

[4enlightment]

Where's that smiley of the "banging head against the wall" when you need it?

It's ok, brother.. I love you anyway..

Mark 10:38 “You don’t know what you are asking,” Jesus said. “Can you drink the cup I drink or be baptized with the baptism I am baptized with?”

Luke 24:49I am going to send you what my Father has promised; but stay in the city until you have been clothed with power from on high.”

You cannot focus that it is the water that had made him to be conceived the Holy spirit. It just so happen on hearing the word about Jesus' life, it just came to the eunuch mind about what Phillip had said what Jesus had went through,especially about receiving the spirit of God after He was Baptized. And so the eunuch just wanted to reenact what Jesus went through to be this powerful, since Phillip did not had told about what had happened in at the church, that when the spirit had came upon them and they all started speaking in all different languages and which they needed that power in order to spread the Gospel to all the nation. In the OT in order to received the Holy spirit, the ones with the spirit of God in them had anointed them with oil, but now God want the people to mature from the materialism rituals that they performed in the physical nature. Jesus is the bread, the Light, and the rock that had gave them water in the wilderness and which He is the power and the glory of God. But He and His spirit is not the material that manifests His power. Now He wants us to start getting to know Him without using materials to represent Him and His works. We must be circumcise from the natural and move onto the spirit. God has given each one of them certain abilities to teach others, like John, n order to under stand His scriptures, even including Revelations, you must know how to read between the lines, the spiritual nature of the word.

Luke 2:21 On the eighth day, when it was time to circumcise the child, he was named Jesus, the name the angel had given him before he was conceived.

Acts 10:45 The circumcised believers who had come with Peter were astonished that the gift of the Holy Spirit had been poured out even on Gentiles.

Acts 15:5 Then some of the believers who belonged to the party of the Pharisees stood up and said, “The Gentiles must be circumcised and required to keep the law of Moses.”

Romans 2:25 Circumcision has value if you observe the law, but if you break the law, you have become as though you had not been circumcised.

Romans 2:29 No, a person is a Jew who is one inwardly; and circumcision is circumcision of the heart, by the Spirit, not by the written code. Such a person’s praise is not from other people, but from God.


Luke 1:35 The angel answered, “The Holy Spirit will come on you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. So the holy one to be born will be called the Son of God.

John 5:5 One who was there had been an invalid for thirty-eight years. 6 When Jesus saw him lying there and learned that he had been in this condition for a long time, he asked him, “Do you want to get well?”

7 “Sir,” the invalid replied, “I have no one to help me into the pool when the water is stirred. While I am trying to get in, someone else goes down ahead of me.”

John 1:45 Philip found Nathanael and told him, “We have found the one Moses wrote about in the Law, and about whom the prophets also wrote—Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph.”

John 5:46 If you believed Moses, you would believe me, for he wrote about me.

 

[hornetguy]

Thanks for sharing...... refer to post #205

 

[plaintalk]

To: Ahwatukee Baptizing #69
My answer to your question to Kaycie follows: Jesus had the authority to forgive sins, as he wills, in His earthly ministry. (Mark 2: 10) IMO the thief on the cross is one of those straw-man arguments brought up by people who have bought into an agenda. Jesus is the mediator of the new covenant which went into effect upon His death. (Heb. 9: 15- 17) It is His will that the gospel should be preached to every creature, of all nations. He who has believed and has been baptized shall be saved. (Matt. 28: 18- 20; Mark 16: 15,16) IMO Cornelius was saved liked we all are, by the grace of God (Acts 15: 11), only the order of events was changed to convince the Jewish Christians that the gentiles were acceptable to God.

Satan, the great deceiver, has deceived many with the half- truth that baptism is only an outward sign of an inward grace. Baptism, as you point out, is the time when we die with Christ, are buried and arise with Him, a new creature in Christ. At the time of our obedience of faith, as our bodies are washed with pure water, we are sprinkled with the blood of Christ, cleansing our heart and conscience. (1 Peter 1: 2; Heb. 10: 22; 9: 14) Not only is baptism a demonstration of faith and repentance, but repentance and baptism (works of faith) perfects or completes our faith so that it is deemed acceptable by God. (James 2: 20- 24) We are saved by a perfected faith. God bless.