Does it matter who baptized you?

In reference to Matthew 28:19-20 and comments by me:

So you suggest that I stop teaching people Christ's teachings?

If you were right, then the church would have died out and Christianity would have faded away in the 100's -- let alone the "end of the age." Neither Christ nor His teachings would have been remembered.

What is most disturbing about all this is that you seem to actually be serious on all this stuff. It never ceases to amaze me how you will get on this board and try to convince Christians not to do as Christ taught.

I will not stop serving the Lord. I will follow His teachings and promote His teachings.

You can choose not to. If you make that choice permanent, you will face a situation where your time for arguments is all over, and you will cower before an angry LORD Jesus Christ.

Jesus Christ said at Luke 6:46 “And why call me Lord, Lord, and do not the things which I say” (ASV). Contrary to what you seem to think, a person cannot serve Christ while disregarding what He directed us to do.

I am not open to allowing anyone -- including you -- to get me not to follow and promote Christ's teachings. You are wasting your time.

 

Darron Steele:
"If you were right, then the church would have died out and Christianity would have faded away in the 100's -- let alone the "end of the age." Neither Christ nor His teachings would have been remembered."

GE:
The very opposite! All error (and all delay of the end of the age) resulted from exactly those 'Christians' who appointed themselves teachers of Christ - which they never were by His appointment. The Aposteles were teachers of Christ - appointed ones. No one after, ever!

I grew up in a Reformed social structure, wherein 'missionary work' was frowned upon. That milieu changed a lot, where Reformed Churches vie for first position in 'missionary' and 'humanitarian' work and prestige. The results are obvious. They are secular at best. True Christianity is scarcely met. I wonder if one out of a hundred thousand - two, three, hundred thousand, half a million! today do as much as read a Bible verse a day. In those yonder days, everybody lived with the Bible in his heart. Take your local church - it does not matter which church - How many are still reading the Bible? Were they taught to read the Bible? Were you, taught to, and still read the Bible, because: you were taught to? Does not the Word has its own compelling power? Rallies, revivals, missions, the lot, are men, thinking they do God's work. That is just their mistake: NObody can do God's work for Him, and He never told any to.

 

Darron Steele:
"I will not stop serving the Lord. I will follow His teachings and promote His teachings."

GE
This statement of yours - and the one before: Hoe do you reconcile them,fellowman? How can you? You serve the Lord: will He not be served by whom He will - not you or they or I? You follow His teachings --- who survived these millennia you just portrayed His witness would have dwindled away? No one, but He Himself!

I repeat: You may teach His teachings, but you cannot teach His teaching; He does it Himself; He employed not you to do it; He employed His Own Spirit, the Spirit of Christ, to do it.

 

Jeremiah 31:34; 13:21 "Shall not sorrows overtake thee"?

 

Darron Steele:
"You can choose not to. If you make that choice permanent, you will face a situation where your time for arguments is all over, and you will cower before an angry LORD Jesus Christ."

GE
You can depend on your choice; I am certainly not going to depend on mine!

 

Darron Steele:
"Jesus Christ said at Luke 6:46 “And why call me Lord, Lord, and do not the things which I say” (ASV). Contrary to what you seem to think, a person cannot serve Christ while disregarding what He directed us to do."

GE:
Do what He told you, to do; "No one takes the honour to himself"; you are not an Apostle. Christ command you nothing He commanded his Apostles, and you may think you do your duty in their place, which is not yours. So you must needs have neglected your own duty and have left your own post, by now. I tell you now, Christ is not going to ask you in the day of judgment: Have you baptised in my Name? Have you been a teacher to the ignorant? No; He is going to ask you some interesting other questions, far closer your own position in life. The same for me.

 

The last question Jesus Christ shall ever ask you, is, 'How many souls have you saved for me?'! O, how that fear worse than of death haunted me in my youth while I was under the spell of a 'missionary' church, Where are the souls I have won for Thee, Lord Jesus?!

 

So far I have not seen the view which I hold expressed in this thread, so here goes:

Jesus established his church during his earthly ministry, well in advance of the day of Pentecost. When Jesus ascended, his assembly already had been carrying out his commission, had the ordinances, and the 12 had been ordained and sent out.

The Great Commission was given to that assembly and subsequent New Testament congregations, including the authority to baptize and to determine who should be baptized.

Those who argue that the ordinances are Christian ordinances rather than church ordinances, are ignoring Paul's instructions to the congregation at Corinth to "guard the ordinances" (I Cor 11:2).

Individual believers who claim the right to baptize a new convert independently of a local congregation rely on their membership in the "Universal Church." The problem is, the Universal Church doesn't exist. The scriptures know only of local assemblies. These local bodies of believers do personal witnessing, send missionaries, aid the poor, and do corporate worship. The Universal Church, if it did exist, does none of these.

Baptism, therefore, is to be done by individuals (usually pastors) authorized by a congregation, to picture the gospel, demonstrate outwardly what has happened inside, as a public identification with Jesus Christ--all as a prerequisite to membership in a local church.


Scriptural baptism is for believers only (non-sacramental), by immersion, as a personal testimony of salvation, administered by a congregation.

To snub local church authority is to snub that for which Jesus shed his blood on the cross (Acts 20:28)

 

Tom Butler,

In truth, the ONLY church is the "universal church".

God only has one church on this earth. Not millions of churches.

He has ONE church. All of the christians here on earth make up Gods one church.

The Universal Church

When Paul, for example, writes a letter to the "church" at Corinth, he is adressing the members of Gods one church who happen to live in Corinth.

Really?. Christ speaking...

He said "My Church"...not "My churches" He said the gates of hell "will not prevail against "IT", not "will not prevail against "THEM"

The universal church is ALL OF THE CHRISTIANS world wide. How can you possibly say that the universal church does NONE OF THOSE THINGS???? The "universal" church is all the christians on earth.

If christians arent doing those things, then who is doing them? (((The Shriners???))) :tonofbricks:

Christ again....

A glorious CHURCH, not glorious CHURCHES.

Paul speaking...

For the sake of His body (singular), not bodies.

Which is the CHURCH...not CHURCHES.

There is ONE body of Christ...not millions of them.

There is ONE church...not millions of them

Local assemblies are just small parts of Gods worldwide universal church.



:godisgood:

 

Tom

I forgot this...

Agreed.

Agreed

Usually, but not always. It doesnt necesarrily have to be.

Phillip. The Ethiopian Eunuch. Out in the middle of nowhere. No assembly. Under no authority but God.



:godisgood:

 

I recognize that my view is not a popular view, and that folks get bent out of shape over it. But consider this:

When Jesus chose the twelve, he brought his church into existence. It was a small, traveling group, but a group nonetheless. He ordained them, sent them out to preach. (Mark 3:14), He gave them marching orders (Matt 10. He told them to baptize those who gave evidence of repentance. He gave them instructions on how to deal with church discipline within a congregation. (Matt 18). He established the Lord's Supper as an ordinance. Before his ascension, he gave the Great Commission to an assembled group.

A distinguishing feature of the early congregations was that they assembled. They came together regularly. Stephen and Philip were members of the congregation at Jerusalem. When Philip preached in Samaria, Peter and John were sent down to examine the results, and authenticated what they had heard.

Saul of Tarsus was taken by Ananias to a congregation at Damascas, where he was baptized.. Paul and Silas (and later Barnabas) were sent out by the congregation at Antioch. They reported back to the church there at the completion of their missionary journeys. During those journeys, Paul established churches (assemblies), and later corresponded with them.

You are correct, the gates of hell did not prevail. That first congregation grew (3,000 in one day), duplicated itself, and New Testament churches still exist today, patterned after that first congregation.

One may speak of "the church" in a generic or institutional sense, in the same way we speak of "the family." When one speaks of the breakdown of the family, it must take concrete expression through individual families. The same with "the church." It takes expression through real, live, individual assemblies.

There will be a time when "the church" will exist as all believers everywhere. That will be at the great General Assembly in heaven. Then we will be one.

Until then, we cannot be one. The "Universal Church" is hopelessly fractured and divided. Its "members" never had a meeting, never assembled, never engaged in corporate worship, never sent a missionary, never took an offering.

Many of those "members, " though they may be true believers, are parts of local groups which preach heresy, engage in all sorts or error.

When Paul wrote to the Corinthians, he wrote to a congregation. He instructed them on how to behave when observing the Lord's Supper. That ordinance was to be observed "when ye come together in one place.' (I Cor 11:20) The Universal Church cannot come together.

I know this is getting too long, but one or two more observations, please. Paul, writing in I Cor 12:27, described the congregation at Corinth as "the body of Christ." In Acts 20 he counseled the elders at Ephesus to "feed the flock of God, over which the Holy Ghost has made you overseers (the congregation at Ephesus) which he purchased "with his own blood."

This is why I hold that the authority to baptize resides in a local congregation and not with individuals operating independently.

 

Why are you at loggerheads? You are both right; It is one Church consisting of any number of 'local' Congregations. Yet 'local', is also spiritually, 'in heaven', or 'The Kingdom Christ@ or many other names.

It's another thing to assume the role of Apostle for oneself; those are no longer with us, and we, are not they.

 

GE
It sounds to me you and DHK are soul-mates on this one, though I don't think he'll be proselyted!

 

I have given a number of different 'baptisms' in a previous post - incomplete by miles. Here's another for you, so laboured under by your Baptism-dogma: Bury yourself deeper under its weights: "Individual believers who claim the right to baptize a new convert independently of a local congregation rely on their membership in the "Universal Church.""

 

Part of the problem is the confusion between the church and the kingdom. They are different. If you want a universal entity, it's the kingdom. The church must of necessity be local, or else it is a useless fantasy with no reason for existing.

 

So if you and a new convert were next to some water, and s/he asked you to baptize, you would refuse?

Did I misunderstand you?

 

That's correct. It's like Abraham Lincoln's question to someone, "if you call the horse's tail a leg, how many legs does the horse have?"

The answer, of course, is four. Calling a tail a leg doesn't make it one.

Dunking somebody and calling it baptism doesn't make it so without authority from a New Testament Church.

I've heard all the "what if" questions about baptism. If I believe my position os scriptural, then I don't have much choice, do I. The local congregation decides whom it will baptize, and whether someone's previous baptism is scriptural.

 

Matthew 28:19-20a says “Go, therefore, and make disciples of all the nations|. Baptize them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Teach them to obey everything I have taught you” (NASB|NCV).

You are saying you will not obey the Lord's statement here unless your local congregation's leaders tell you that you `can.'

I cannot imagine Scripture teaching that we must have congregation leaders' `okay' in order to do what Christ told us to do.

Local congregation leaderships also do not decide whether or not a baptism is legitimate or not. If a baptism is Scriptural, it is so regardless of whether some mortal thinks it is or not -- ditto un-Scriptural. From what I see in Scripture, congregation leaderships do not have the authority you ascribe to them.

If a baptism is done as Scripture prescribes, it is a baptism. It does not matter what any mortal thinks. For a mortal or group of mortals to claim `You obeying the Lord's command to baptize is not a legitimate baptism because we did not okay you obeying the Lord' is not something I can see being okay with Scripture.

However, I do appreciate your zeal to follow Scripture as best you understand it, and your high respect for baptism.

 

[ Accidental duplicate. I got logged out as I was editing, logged back in, and saw two posts where there were one. Sorry. ]

 

All of the Great Commission must be obeyed, not just a part of it.
Take the example of Paul. What did he do.
Paul de-emphasized baptism.
Here is what he said:

1 Corinthians 1:14 I thank God that I baptized none of you, but Crispus and Gaius;
1 Corinthians 1:17 For Christ sent me not to baptize, but to preach the gospel: not with wisdom of words, lest the cross of Christ should be made of none effect.

Paul would not baptize a person just because he led him to the Lord.
Apparently he did not baptize Onesimus, the runaway slave, though he did lead him to the Lord. That would have been the responsibilty of the church that met in Philemon's house.

The order in which Paul carried out the Great Commission was this way.
He went to a town and preached the gospel--that which the Lord commanded him to do.
He discipled those believers, as the Great Commisstion commanded him to do.
Out of those believers one of them was ordained to be an elder or pastor, one that was chosen, by a consensus of Paul, the congregation, and the Holy Spirit.
Then, that elder was the one that did the baptizing, not Paul.
Then the baptized believers were formed into an assembly, a local church with the baptized believers being the members thereof. It would be able to be organized with purpose, and direction. It just wasn't a gathering with no purpose. It was an assembly of baptized believers that had actual direction to follow the Lord in His commands, and had a pastor to look towarrd for direction.