Baptism and the Early Church

We have raised a generation that knows nothing of Christianity.

The early church new nothing of an unbaptized believer.

Baptism was not a foreign concept.

The Old Testament connected ceremonial washing to cleansing and removal of sin.

The idea of washing with water particularly in the Old Testament was not a particularly novel idea even to gentiles. There are numerous examples of ceremonial washings in the OT.

2 Kings 5:10 ESV

And Elisha sent a messenger to him, saying, “Go and wash in the Jordan seven times, and your flesh shall be restored, and you shall be clean.”

Zechariah 13:1 ESV

“On that day there shall be a fountain opened for the house of David and the inhabitants of Jerusalem, to cleanse them from sin and uncleanness.

The future coming of the Messiah was associated with the washing and cleansing of sin. John 1:25

John 1:25 ESV

They asked him, “Then why are you baptizing, if you are neither the Christ, nor Elijah, nor the Prophet?”

seems to indicate that one of the signs and reasons that thought John was perhaps Elijah or the Messiah was partly atleast because of his baptisms.

There were even within Jerusalem at the time of Christ multiple pools that were used for washings, and we read about in the Gospels the pool of Bethesda, and the pool of Siloam. Infact there were superstitions that had a risen that the first person to enter into the waters of the pool after the angel had stirred the waters would be healed, of their ailments. Jesus comes to the man who had been an invalid for almost 40 years and he healed him without the water.

In John 9 Jesus anointed the eyes of the man born blind with mud and commanded him to go and wash in the pool of Siloam. It was not the waters that healed Him but faith in the person and work of Christ. The washing was an act of faith but not the power that healed him. In other words there is nothing magic or mysterious or holy about the water itself. It is the thing that it represents and the power of the object of that faith namely Christ that saves.

The High Priest every year when he

It is very clear that these rituals were not just practical, like take a bath because you stink, but were symbolic for the cleasing and putting away of sin.

It should be noted that Baptism is an initial rite of the believer and not a perpetual rite such as the Lord’s supper. In the Old Testament however these things were repeated because they were imperfect, and unable to fully cleanse that one who desired to worship. But we have a perfect and complete sacrifice that is able to

Question: Why does the idea of baptism seem like such a foreign concept to us?

Context: We have done a bad job of discipleship. We live in a day when Christianity and baptism has become a revolving door.

The Preacher’s Notebook: The Collected Quotes, Illustrations, and Prayers of John Stott (The Collapse of Organized Religion Is due to Cheap Grace)

Dietrich Bonhoeffer (The Cost of Discipleship, 1937): “The price we are having to pay today in the shape of the collapse of organised religion is only the inevitable consequence of our policy of making grace available at all too low a cost. We gave away the word and sacraments wholesale; we baptised, confirmed and absolved a whole nation without asking awkward questions, or insisting on strict conditions. Our humanitarian sentiment made us give that which was holy to the scornful and unbelieving. We poured forth unending streams of grace. But the call to follow Jesus was hardly ever heard. Where were these truths which impelled the early church to institute the catechumenate, which enabled a strict watch to be kept over the frontier between the church and the world, and afforded adequate protection for costly grace?” (p. 47).

I remember in college the first time I baptized someone in class. We have slathered a thin veneer of Christianity and when we baptize that veneer has created such a water tight barrier we hardly even break the surface tension of the water.

you have heard baptism by fire. a temptation or struggle that we undergo that strengthen or like wise weakens our faith.

Thats why John warned the religious rulers in Matthew 3 calling them brood vipers. He says “who warned you to flee from the wrath to come? Bear fruit in keeping with repentance.

We live in a day and age where our christian faith has enjoyed the blessing of the freedom, and where we need not fear retribution or persecution from others because of our faith. But this is not the case in most of church history and even today in many countries. People died and gave their lives for their faith.

Baptism was closely connected to repentance and faith.

Mark 1:4 ESV

John appeared, baptizing in the wilderness and proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins.

Acts 1:5 ESV

for John baptized with water, but you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now.”

Baptism is not the removal of sin but the sign.

A few years ago when we went to buy our house, we were already renting and living in it. It was sort of melodramatic, because we went and signed all of the papers and nothing really changed, we didn’t have to move in or have the excitement of driving up and calling it home for the first time. But we still had to go and sign those papers. Those papers with our signature are not the actual house, they are just words on a page, but if there ever was a dispute you would bet that those papers would become important. That paper is not going to keep us warm in the winter and rain off our heads, and it is not going to keep our stuff safe. The title even in one sense doesn’t belong to us until we pay it off and we will have a party and celebration when we finally do in about 20 years.

So it is true that Baptism is the deed the evidence the sign that possession of Christ has taken place. It is not the forgiveness of sin or reconciliation to God, but the sign of the the covenant. It is not the possession of salvation that occured according to the working of the Holy Spirit through regeneration, repentance, and faith. It in one sense is the believers way of settling disputes, that he can in one sense say that he is accountable to this church who hold the deed of his baptism and that the he/she is under the authority and protection and is assured of all of the right and graces that the Church offers through Christ bestowed on believers who are under her charge. The church does not dispense salvation to anyone (that is entirely the work of God) but does bestow on people the benefits of baptism and communion and prayer and fellowship, and the ministry of the word, other benefits as well.

The obstacle (sin) has been removed.

Faith has made the way for forgiveness and cleansing from sin. That’s why John the Baptist came making the path straight and preaching a baptism of Repentance.

It is the point of no return, we take the stone or obstacle of repentance and uncover the path to righteousness and obedience to God. and put it behind us blocking the path back.

Acts 8:36 ESV

And as they were going along the road they came to some water, and the eunuch said, “See, here is water! What prevents me from being baptized?”

Acts 10:47 ESV

“Can anyone withhold water for baptizing these people, who have received the Holy Spirit just as we have?”

Acts 11:17 ESV

If then God gave the same gift to them as he gave to us when we believed in the Lord Jesus Christ, who was I that I could stand in God’s way?”

In one sense Baptism is the key to or the initial step and rite of the believers unlocking the door to obedience and faith.

Diving in vs dipping your toe.

Baptism was done immediately.

CONCLUSION

There are some practical things that are going on. We see in our culture and in our day a dumbing down of the gospel of Christ and therefore some confusion on the issues of baptism, and the Lord’s table. I mention them both because we ought not to disconnect the two, they are both ordinances established by the Lord Jesus Christ while He was here on earth and are neither one optional for the church or the individual believer.

Hebrews 9:6–10 (ESV)

These preparations having thus been made, the priests go regularly into the first section, performing their ritual duties, but into the second only the high priest goes, and he but once a year, and not without taking blood, which he offers for himself and for the unintentional sins of the people. By this the Holy Spirit indicates that the way into the holy places is not yet opened as long as the first section is still standing (which is symbolic for the present age). According to this arrangement, gifts and sacrifices are offered that cannot perfect the conscience of the worshiper, but deal only with food and drink and various washings, regulations for the body imposed until the time of reformation.

Hebrews 10:14 (ESV)

For by a single offering he has perfected for all time those who are being sanctified.

Barbed Arrows from the Quiver of C. H. Spurgeon (Sin, Its Complete Removal)

WHEN Dr. Neale, the eminent Ritualist, took John Bunyan’s “Pilgrim’s Progress,” and Romanized it, he represented the pilgrim as coming to a certain bath, into which he was plunged and washed, and then his burden was washed away. According to this doctored edition of the allegory, Christian was washed in the laver of baptism, and all his sins were thus removed. That is the High Church mode of getting rid of sin: John Bunyan’s way, and the true way, is to lose it at the cross. Now, mark what happened. According to Dr. Neale’s “Pilgrim’s Progress,” that burden grew again on the pilgrim’s back, and I do not wonder that it did; for a burden which baptism can remove is sure to come again, but the burden which is lost at the cross never appears again for ever.

Recovery of the gospel will recover the significance and meaning of baptism