Too often, we take for granted the biblical practice of believer’s baptism.
Of course, we see it as something to celebrate, but we’re sometimes in need of a reminder about how important it really is, and why.
Several years ago, a friend asked me about baptism – and not merely out of intellectual curiosity. He came from a Catholic background, and, though he had placed his faith in Christ, he was hesitant to accept believer’s baptism. To do so would come with costs.
Likewise, I’ve known of new believers from around the globe for whom the decision to be baptized comes with costs. For them, baptism means being aligned wholly and publicly with Christ, while also rejecting significant aspects of their upbringing and heritage. Will their families and communities accept them once they cross this line? Will they shun them or persecute them?
Taking time to consider the decision these believers face may help us realize the value of believer’s baptism. As we consider their plight, we may also understand more readily why our forefathers in the faith risked their lives to practice believer’s baptism.
In Soviet-era Siberia, 30 new Christians resolutely walk down a hill to be baptized in a river. “I have decided to follow Jesus, no turning back” were more than words for them.
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In 1516, the Christian humanist Erasmus called for the translation of the New Testament into the vernacular languages of Europe. At the heart of his argument was the baptism common to all Christians: Since all Christians pledged themselves to Christ in baptism, he wrote, they should all be able to read the teachings of Christ for themselves, in their own languages, as found in the New Testament.
Exactly 500 years ago, in 1525, the early English evangelical reformer William Tyndale took up Erasmus’ call and aimed to print his first English translation of the New Testament. Hindered by authorities and forced to flee to another city, he wouldn’t fulfill this task until a year later, in 1526.
A few years later, Tyndale explained why he risked his life to translate Scripture into English. He wanted all English Christians to have access to Scripture in their own language, so they could know in truth the nature and content of their baptismal covenant.
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Unfortunately, neither Erasmus nor Tyndale came to recognize the biblical pattern of believer’s baptism. They still affirmed “pedobaptism”—that is, the baptism of infants. However, they anticipated the need for “credobaptism” – that is, the baptism of believers alone – by recognizing that all Christians should know what their baptism means. It would be for other men, however, to see clearly the New Testament vision of believer’s baptism.
On Jan. 21, 1525, as Tyndale worked on his English New Testament translation in Germany, the Swiss reformer Conrad Grebel put into practice this New Testament vision of baptism. While meeting in the home of Felix Manz, he baptized George Blaurock upon his profession of faith. This was the first known instance of believer’s baptism during the Reformation era.
According to historian Harold Bender, baptism was for these men a matter of discipleship. It was “for them the ‘covenant of a good conscience toward God’ (1 Peter 3:21), the pledge of a complete commitment to obey Christ.”
This vision of believer’s baptism was boldly endorsed in a 1525 treatise by theologian Balthasar Hubmaier, simply called, “On the Christian Baptism of Believers.” For upholding these truths, he was burned at the stake on March 10, 1528, and three days later his wife Elizabeth was drowned in the Danube river – in mockery of her baptism.
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In later decades and centuries, English and American Baptists would likewise come to recognize the truth of believer’s baptism through their own readings of the New Testament. Often at great cost, they also handed down to us the New Testament vision of believer’s baptism.
In his book, Going Public: Why Baptism is Required for Church Membership (B&H 2015), Bobby Jamieson succinctly describes this biblical view of baptism.
“Baptism is how you publicly identify yourself with Jesus and with his people (Acts 2:38–41),” Jamieson writes. “It is how you visibly signify that you are united to Christ in his death, burial, and resurrection (Rom 6:1–4). It is how you become identified before the church and the world as one who belongs to the Triune God (Matt 28:19). It is how you publicly embrace Jesus as your Savior and submit to him as Lord (1 Pet 3:21). Baptism is where faith goes public. …
“Baptism,” he adds, “is a wordless vow, a symbolic promise to follow Christ in the fellowship of his church.”
As many believers across the globe have painfully learned in ages past and present, “going public” with our faith can invite criticism and hardship. A silent, unseen believer never suffers for his or her faith. Then again, going public with our faith through baptism also bears fruit through fellowship with other believers and through lives transformed by our public testimony to the gospel.