December 15, 1999

EDITORIAL:
Don't water down belief in baptism
___Baptists need to make more of a splash about baptism if we're going to retain our identity in a new century.
___See Managing Editor Mark Wingfield's package of articles on Baptist doctrine during the 20th century. None of the historians and theologians who lent their insights to these articles named baptism as one of the key Baptist issues during the past 100 years. Historically, they are correct. Their perspectives echo silence from the pews, where rank-and-file Baptists seemingly take baptism for granted and don't talk about it very much.
___Baptists must return to the water.
___That's because baptism is in danger of being watered down. Not by infant-baptizing Roman Catholics, who battled our doctrinal forebears in the Reformation. Not even by the Churches of Christ, who commandeered Baptist congregations in the last century, requiring baptism for eternal life and thus teaching salvation by works.
___No, baptism faces threats from within Baptist churches. The practice of baptism is not about to dry up, but its meaning and vibrancy are in danger of evaporating unless Baptists make an effort to recapture its primacy for this and coming generations.
___The first threat to baptism is ignorance. With only tiny fractions of Baptists participating in discipleship study, our people are not learning historic doctrines and their scriptural bases. This is compounded by the absence of doctrinal preaching on baptism from many of our pulpits.
___This silence may be related to the second threat, an open-admissions policy at many churches. More and more people are joining our churches by "statement." Traditionally, this means they have experienced believer's baptism by immersion but are coming from another denomination with a similar doctrine of baptism. More and more, it can mean they are Christians who join from other evangelical churches. But if churches are not circumspect, it can mean they are Christians who are joining from any other denomination who don't want to go through believer's baptism. This seems to be a threat for fast-growing congregations in burgeoning areas, especially the suburbs, where many people from an array of backgrounds feature-shop for churches like they select health plans or new automobiles.
___A quote from a pastor whose congregation recently received a person from a Church of Christ illustrates the problem: "She doesn't have to be baptized. She's been baptized in Jesus' name."
___This raises a question: How did she understand her baptism? Churches of Christ dictate baptism is necessary for salvation, which is at odds with Baptists' symbolic understanding of baptism. This is just one example.
___If churches do not carefully discuss and explain the nature and meaning of baptism, we will find ourselves admitting without scriptural baptism believers who have been sprinkled or baptized as infants. In a generation or less, the meaning will be lost and the significance voided.
___This raises another question: So what? Haggling over the fine points of baptism sounds as out-of-touch as debating how many angels can dance on the head of a pin, you might say. To the contrary, what we believe about baptism is vital for Baptists. It helps us define what we say about:
___ Our salvation. We do not believe baptism saves our souls. Salvation comes by grace through faith in that which baptism symbolizes--the crucifixion, burial and resurrection of Jesus, who died in our place and defeated death.
___Because we believe baptism is voluntary but does not save, we do not baptize infants, and we do not baptize on behalf of the dead. Because we believe God honors and appeals to the competency of every soul, we willfully walk into the water ourselves.
___ Our identity. We take our name from this ordinance of the church. We are "Baptists." In participating and affirming baptism, we identify with these beliefs and the Savior who commanded we live out our faith in reflection of and obedience to him.
___ Our heritage. Baptism also marks us with valiant forebears of the faith. We stand with baptized brothers and sisters who were drowned in the rivers of Europe for refusing to recant their beliefs. Standing with them, we perpetuate their memories and strengthen our witness.
___ Ourselves. Baptism reminds us who we are to be--people who have died to sin, buried our old lives and daily walk upright, resurrected in a new life, offered to us by our Savior.
___ --Marv Knox

E-mail the editor at marvknox@baptiststandard.com.

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