BAPTISM

When someone decides to “get right with God,” part of the “outward sign” of accepting Jesus as their savior is being baptized. It is an exciting time, but there are many questions regarding baptism that should be clarified, since so many conflicting ideas regarding this topic developed over the centuries. The questions often come from four basic areas:

 Can you go to heaven by being baptized?

 What is baptism?

 When should someone be baptized?

 Why should someone be baptized?

Let's take a look at each of these questions.

Can you go to heaven by being baptized?

People are saved (and get to go to heaven) by believing that Jesus is the Christ and putting their faith in Him. Baptism alone does not save. However, salvation (being saved) and baptism are always tied together, as we explain on our “Getting Right With God” page.

What is baptism?

The process of baptism is very simple. You begin by standing, sitting, or kneeling in some water. Another Christian then lowers you under the water and then brings you back up out of the water. You could also literally call this “immersion.”

Because some faiths sprinkle water on people instead of immersing them, the obvious question is whether this is OK. Since the only consistent answer around the world comes from the Bible, we recommend using it to find your answers. It is interesting that nowhere in the Bible does anything but “immersion” take place. That is, baptism is always by immersion.

This makes sense if you realize that “baptize” is a transliteration of the original Greek word baptizw (baptizo). In turn, baptizo comes from the root wordbaptw (bapto), a term used in the first century for immersing a garment first into bleach and then into dye, both cleansing and changing the color of the cloth.[1](Note its similarity to baptism's cleansing of sin and becoming a new person through Christ.) Stated another way, when you process cloth to change its color, you are said to “baptize” it. If sprinkling of any kind was to be practiced, a different Greek word would have been used, but it was not.










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