Bro Aaron,
There are a few things I'd like to address in you post here. Please don't take this as me bashing you, because it is not. I just want to give you my take on water baptism.
Let me start this by saying that no one is saved by water baptism, but it is more than just a symbol.
1Peter 3:18 For Christ also hath once suffered for sins, the just for the unjust, that he might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh, but quickened by the Spirit:
19 By which also he went and preached unto the spirits in prison;
20 Which sometime were disobedient, when once the longsuffering of God waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was a preparing, wherein few, that is, eight souls were saved by water.
21 The like figure whereunto even baptism doth also now save us (not the putting away of the filth of the flesh, but the answer of a good conscience toward God,), by the resurrection of Jesus Christ:
22Who is gone into heaven, and is on the right hand of God; angels and authorities and powers being made subject unto him.
How can you answer the good conscience toward God, if you haven't done it? I am talking about those who are able to get to the water, and not those who are saved on their death bed, or those who died before they got to the water. The water baptism is not a mere symbol, but a righteous act, IMHO.
Matt. 3:11 I indeed baptize you with water unto repentance. but he that cometh after me is mightier than I, whose shoes I am not worthy to bear: he shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost, and with fire:
12 Whose fan is in his hand, and he will throughly purge his floor, and gather his wheat into the garner; but he will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire.
13 Then cometh Jesus from Galilee to Jordan unto John, to be baptized of him.
14 But John forbad him, saying, I have need to be baptized of thee, and comest thou to me?
15 And Jesus answering said unto him, Suffer it to be so now: for thus it becometh us to fulfil all righteousness. Then he suffered him.
16 And Jesus, when he was baptized, went up straightway out of the water: and, lo, the heavens were opened unto him, and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove, and lighting upon him:
17 And lo a voice from heaven, saying, This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.
Now, Jesus was just as much CHRIST prior to this event than afterwards. This was written of Him and how John would recognize the Christ to come.
John 1:26 John answered them, saying, I baptize with water: but there standeth one among you, whom ye know not;
27 He it is, who coming after me is preferred before me, whose shoe's latchet I am not worthy to unloose.
28 These things were done in Bethabara beyond Jordan, where John was baptizing.
29 The next day John seeth Jesus coming unto him, and saith, Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world.
30 This is he of whom I said, After me cometh a man which is preferred before me: for he was before me.
31 And I knew him not: but that he should be made manifest to Israel, therefore am I come baptizing with water.
32 And John bare record, saying, I saw the Spirit descending from heaven like a dove, and it abode upon him.
33 And I knew him not: but he that sent me to baptize with water, the same said unto me, Upon whom thou shalt see the Spirit descending, and remaining on him, the same is he which baptizeth with the Holy Ghost. Who sent John to baptize with water? It had to be God, correct?
34 And I saw, and bare record that this is the Son of God.
Rom. 6:3 Know ye not, that so many of us as were baptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into his death?
4 Therefore we are buried with him by baptism into death: that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life.
5 For if we have been planted together in the likeness of his death, we shall be also in the likeness of his resurrection:
6 Knowing this, that our old man is crucified with him, that the body of sin might be destroyed, that henceforth we should not serve sin.
Gal. 3:26 For ye are all the children of God by faith in Christ Jesus.
27 For as many of you as have been baptized into Christ have put on Christ.
I think is giving reference to the Holy Ghost baptism(not the one where some claim you start speaking in tongues with that Holy Ghost baptism. When we are saved, we are baptized into Christ Spiritually!!
28 There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor female: for ye are all one in Christ Jesus.
29 And if ye be Christ's, then are ye Abraham's seed, and heirs according to the promise.
So, by the Spirit coming down and aboding(if thats even a word) upon Jesus, it was the sign that John was looking for, to confirm that this was the Messiah to come. So baptism is more than a symbol, but it is the way we put our light on the "candlestick, that it may give light to all that are in the house.
If baptism is a "symbol only", then let's start making the cross any way people want to. How would you feel if a member of your church said this; "Let's put the cross upside down in the church, sideways, make it look like a "plus sign" etc, because the cross we use is not the same cross that Jesus died on, and therefore a mere symbol, and anyway will do"(and I know that no one on here would want any of these things to happen). I feel that that's the way baptism is being handled nowadays. "Anyway is okay with me," is the soup de jour. I am not directing this at anyone, just thinking out loud. No one would want the cross in their church placed upside down, sideways, made to look like a "plus sign", or any other way than the way it looks now. So, why would they want baptism to be anything less than FULL IMMERSION? Any other way than that is not baptism. If baptism was good enough for Jesus, why should we settle for less than what He did, by being baptized??I pray that everyone sees where I am coming from on this.
i am I am's!!
Willis
PS Read Acts chapter 10 where Peter went to Cornelius' house. Peter wanted those gentiles to be baptized the same as the Jews!!ps
