Taking the plunge

If you read our blog regularly, you know that we have been regular attenders at Sherwood Baptist Church down the road in Albany. We love our Sunday School class, Jacob has a great time in the nursery, Tammy serves as a babysitter for the movie we're working on, and I play tuba (and sometimes trombone) in the church orchestra/band/whatever you want to call us. So, we decided we should probably join the church. They accepted Tammy on a statement of faith, but I wasn't allowed to do that. You see, it's a Southern Baptist church and, as the name implies, they are kind of picky on baptism. Tammy was baptized by immersion at age 9, but my baptism by sprinkling didn't count.

They told me a few months ago that if I wanted to join the church, I would have to be baptized by immersion. So, I had to decide what to do. Tammy didn't want to join without me, so that made it a little more interesting. I took my time and put a lot of thought and study into it, and I thought some of you might be interested to read about that process.

First of all, it is important to point out that baptism does not equal salvation. In other words, just because you're baptized, that doesn't mean you are saved. Likewise, no baptism does NOT mean no salvation.

Growing up, I rarely (if ever) saw an adult baptism. I witnessed dozens (if not hundreds) of infant baptisms. But many of those infants were brought in by parents who were almost complete strangers to the church. They came for their baby's baptism, and then we would never see them in church again, except maybe at Easter. They probably claimed to be "C&E Christians" (Christmas & Easter), which I would argue means they weren't Christians at all.

And so I had to look at a comparison between infant baptism and believer's baptism. Infant baptism is exactly what it says -- you are baptized as an infant. Believer's baptism occurs when you are old enough to make your own decision for Christ. A quick Google-ing of "baptism" reveals that this topic is not an easy one to decide. Here's the arguments that were made to me, and how I dealt with each one as I made my decision:

1. All the baptisms described in the Bible are by immersion in a body of water.
-> When we lived in Rincon, we attended (but never joined) Grace Community Church. It was a great place, and we learned a lot while we were there. When we first started there, we attended a class that introduced us to the church, its history, structure, and beliefs. In that class, Pastor Wesley said something that made a lot of sense to me at the time. He said that when the Bible wasn't clear on something, he'd rather lean towards the conservative side. His example was that there are no examples of women leading churches in the New Testament. He said that doesn't mean it's wrong for women to be elders or pastors. But, since we are uncertain based on the Biblical example, Grace Community Church only allowed men to serve as elders "just to be on the safe side." I'm sure that's not a popular thing to say, but it makes sense. In the same way, since there is no Biblical example of infant baptism or of baptism by sprinkling, believer's baptism (by immersion) seems to be the right thing.

Ephesians 1:4-6 says that we were predestined for salvation before the creation of the world. So, shouldn't infant baptism be allowed as a celebration of God's love for all of us, even when we were too young to make our own decision of faith? Maybe. But there are no Biblical examples of such baptisms.

2. The word "baptism" is a transliteration from the Greek "baptizo," which means "to dip; to immerse."
-> This argument wasn't very convincing for me, mostly because there are as many arguments for it as there are against it. I'm not enough of a Greek scholar or historian to really understand this and make my own decision about it.

3. Baptism is an act of obedience.
-> This is based on the Great Commission, Matthew 28:19. I thought I had this covered, since I was baptized. And let's not forget that I did make a public proclamation of faith as a teenager through Confirmation. So by itself, this didn't convince me. But what if, by denying the opportunity to be baptized as an adult, I was being disobedient? That bothered me (based on the logic described in #1).

And so after several weeks of study and thought, I decided I needed to be baptized as an adult - to publicly proclaim my faith in Jesus. But I was waiting for the right moment. It didn't feel right. But when I heard the argument below, I knew I couldn't wait any longer.

4. Salvation and repentence are decisions. They are not feelings. They are choices.
-> We had a Sunday School lesson several weeks ago on Luke 13. In that passage, Jesus says we must repent or perish. It struck me during that lesson that repentance is a choice. Ever since then, it seems that every time I opened my Bible, went to Sunday School, or listened to a sermon, I heard something about making a conscious choice. (Maybe God was trying to get through to me???) We must choose to honor God in our daily lives -- at work, in our marriages, and at church. When I examined myself, I found that I was often making the choice to honor myself. It wasn't on purpose, because I wanted to be a good Christian, set a good example at school, etc., but truthfully, I was only doing that when it was convenient. When I felt like it, I would honor God; the rest of the time, it was all about me. So I chose to change my behavior and to start honoring God in everything.

And so, as a part of that choice, I decided to go ahead with baptism and to join the church. Our Associate Pastor, John Spencer, baptized me at the evening service. Tammy and Jacob were up there with me. After the service, we were presented as new members.

If you made it this far into the blog, you're probably wondering why I went into all this detail. I guess this is my way of describing a difficult decision process. I don't want to discount my baptism as an infant. Not to mention that growing up in the church is an important part of my Christian experience as an adult. At the same time, I believe that I have to be obedient to God, and this was the right way to do that. Trust me, I did not take it lightly! I did a lot of reading and a lot of studying.

By the way, for those of you who may be wondering, Jacob has not been baptized. We're going to let him make a decision for himself when he's old enough. But you can bet we'll be teaching him and leading him towards his own relationship with Jesus (Proverbs 22:6).