"Then He Rose and was Baptized"

“And immediately, something like scales fell from his eyes, and he regained his sight. Then he rose and was baptized;” (Acts 9:18 ESV)

This scripture is a powerful testament to the transformative power of faith in Christ. It tells the story of Saul, who became Paul, an apostle of Christ.  As Paul later wrote, he became a new creation in Christ when Jesus met him on the road to Damascus. Blinded by the glory of Christ, he remained sightless and fasted until Christ sent Ananias to Paul.

Imagine the fear in Ananias. Saul was infamous in his persecution of the church. Frightful of Saul, Ananias knew of his evil, and that he committed these evils under the authority of the Chief Priests. However, Jesus said to Ananias, “Go, for he is a chosen instrument of mine to carry my name before the Gentiles and kings and the children of Israel. For I will show him how much he must suffer for the sake of my name.”  Paul’s heart was changed. He has found salvation in Christ have the scales fall off his eyes and coming to believe in Christ as the Messiah. and he was then called Paul, a servant of Christ who suffered much in the name of the one he once persecuted. Then he was also baptized.

Which came first, the chicken or the egg? Well, a Christian knows that God created the chicken out of His goodness. Scripture tells us faith comes by grace, not baptism. So, my last question is, how can anyone preach or teach anything different? Yet they do. But we stand firm in our faith in Christ, knowing that it is the cornerstone of our salvation.

Water baptism is not a means of salvation, but rather a symbol of our faith in Christ. As Paul wrote, “For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast. (Ephesians 2:8-9). Sin cannot be erased by water, nor does water baptism make one righteous. For the Christian, immersion baptism is an outward expression of faith in Christ Jesus as their Savior. Again, water cannot save one from sin, but baptism is a only symbol of our faith.

Credo-Baptism (believer's baptism) is not the key to salvation. An example of this is found in the Book of Acts, where Luke wrote, “Crispus, the ruler of the synagogue, believed in the Lord, together with his entire household. And many of the Corinthians hearing Paul believed and were baptized.”  They believed and then were baptized. Salvation comes to one by grace alone, through faith alone.

What is frightening is that some denominations believe that pedobaptism (infant baptism) removes original sin from a child. It implies that they are saved when, in fact, it does nothing but wet the child’s head. A child comes to know of Christ through the Word of God, the examples of their parents and family, not from baptism. When the child is old enough and receives God's grace, they come to faith. In a natural progression of faith, they repent of their sins and begin their walk in faith, and they are then baptized as an outward expression of their inner devotion to God.

John Piper wrote:

“Nowhere in Scripture is there any instance of an infant’s being baptized. The ‘household baptisms’ (mentioned in Acts 16:15, 33, and 1 Corinthians 1:16) are exceptions to this only if one assumes that the household included infants. But, in fact, Luke steers us away from this assumption, for example, in the case of the Philippian jailer (Acts 16:32), by saying that Paul first “spoke the word of the Lord . . . to all who were in [the jailer’s] house,” and then baptized them.” 1

Rituals are just that, man-made rituals. In our birth, we are born in sin, we are “conceived in sin” (Psalm 51:5), and as such, we carry the nature of sin. When we are born of the Spirit, Christ lives in us. Baptism tells all those who witness it that we are born again in Christ, only this time, we are born in the Spirit of God.

Do you know Christ as your Savior? Seek Him now before it is too late. If you have questions about faith in Christ, please contact us here at In Messiah. We can point you to the Scriptures that detail a life in Christ.

Grace and Peace.

1 David Mathis, quoting John Piper, Desiring God, May 27, 2019.