Political Crossfire Forums

[Jesus_Freak]

If you have faith in Christ but are never baptized will you go to heaven?
Why or why not?

[John]

Jesus_Freak wrote: If you have faith in Christ but are never baptized will you go to heaven?
Why or why not?

The thief crucified next to Jesus did.

But I believe he was baptized by the Holy Spirit and was born again when He accepted Jesus as Lord.

Jesus baptizes with the Holy Spirit and fire..


Luke 3
16 John answered and said to them all, "As for me, I baptize you with water; but One is coming who is mightier than I, and I am not fit to untie the thong of His sandals; He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire.

[Only1shot]

Jesus said you have to be reborn in spirit to enter the kingdom of heaven. To me this means that you do indeed have to be baptised to go to heaven.

[Jesus_Freak]

i believe we are saved by faith alone but baptism is and act of obedience and a public declaration of your faith

[John]

Jesus_Freak wrote: i believe we are saved by faith alone but baptism is and act of obedience and a public declaration of your faith

That's exactly what I believe too. (water baptism that is)

[cap'n queasy]

When you drink of Living Water you are saved. This means baptism by the Holy Spirit.

Water baptism is a ritual. I don't say don't do it. It's a nice thing to show that you are with the rest of the Church. But the ritual in itself has no salvatory power.

That's not "magic" water.

We are justified by Faith alone.

[the truth]

No, not by water

[trefakio]

Only1shot wrote: Jesus said you have to be reborn in spirit to enter the kingdom of heaven. To me this means that you do indeed have to be baptised to go to heaven.

then we are save based on actions and not grace.

[thefranzkafkafront]

Isunt the baptisement just a sybolic cleaning of sin, like a clean slate.

[Aqualung]

Matt 3:15 (cf Mark 1:9; Luke 3:2) - Even sinless Christ had to be baptised to "fulfil all righteousness".

28:19 - Christ commanded his apostles to baptise people. Why would they waste time baptising people when there were like 2 Christians at that time? They needed to spread the word. Why waste time with something if it were truly unnecessary.

Mark 16:16 - This verse says that yes believing is necessary, but that's not the only thing. He that believeth AND IS BAPTISED shall be saved.

Luke 7:30 - If you aren't baptised, you are actually rejecting "the counsel of God."

John 3:5 - Empasizes water baptism and spiritual baptism.

Acts 10:48 - Christ's apostles command baptism, like Christ himself did.

1 Peter 3:21 - Baptism saves us.

As to the theif on the cross: Where in the Bible does it say he WASN'T baptised? Many people will say, "If he is a theif, he wasn't baptised" but consider these two things. They crucified Christ out of spite, not because he did anything wrong. Perhaps the theif was wrongly convicted. Second, baptism does not automatically make it impossible for someone to sin. After all, I've sinned a ton after I got baptised, and I'm pretty sure every single person has, too.

Others will say, "He wasn't baptised, because the Bible does not specifically say he was." Consider this: The Bible says that if even a tenth part of what Jesus did was written, it would be waaay too much to read. And almost nothing of John the Baptist or others is recorded at all. There is one thing, however, that is recorded about John the Baptist. Mark 1:5 - "And there went out unto [John the Baptist] all the land of Judaea, and they of Jerusalem, and were all baptized of him in the river of Jordan, confessing their sins." How do you know the theif wasn't one of them who was baptized?

[cup2006Sens]

Jesus_Freak wrote: i believe we are saved by faith alone but baptism is and act of obedience and a public declaration of your faith

I was baptized as a child but do not believe in Christianity or organized religion. If baptism is based on a public declaration of your faith then why do many churches perform this act on children who are a few weeks or a month old when they can't possible make a public declaration about anything.

Why not when someone is 13, 16, or 20 years old?

[feederband]

cup2006Sens wrote: Jesus_Freak wrote: i believe we are saved by faith alone but baptism is and act of obedience and a public declaration of your faith

I was baptized as a child but do not believe in Christianity or organized religion. If baptism is based on a public declaration of your faith then why do many churches perform this act on children who are a few weeks or a month old when they can't possible make a public declaration about anything.

Why not when someone is 13, 16, or 20 years old?


Yeah I was baptized when I was 6... :roll:

[sparsely]

first, what is heaven?

[feederband]

sparsely wrote: first, what is heaven?

It is a hot bath with 3 cold beers..

[Aqualung]

cup2006Sens wrote: I was baptized as a child but do not believe in Christianity or organized religion. If baptism is based on a public declaration of your faith then why do many churches perform this act on children who are a few weeks or a month old when they can't possible make a public declaration about anything.

Why not when someone is 13, 16, or 20 years old?
I agree with you. The person being baptised must accept that baptism for it to be valid, and babies can't do that. Baptisms come after repentence of sins, for the remission of sins, and babies certainly can't repent of sins.

[Aqualung]

sparsely wrote: first, what is heaven?
Heaven is where we go after we have been judged by Christ after his second coming.

[sparsely]

CrossEyedMary wrote: Matt 3:15 (cf Mark 1:9; Luke 3:2) - Even sinless Christ had to be baptised to "fulfil all righteousness".

28:19 - Christ commanded his apostles to baptise people. Why would they waste time baptising people when there were like 2 Christians at that time? They needed to spread the word. Why waste time with something if it were truly unnecessary.

Mark 16:16 - This verse says that yes believing is necessary, but that's not the only thing. He that believeth AND IS BAPTISED shall be saved.

Luke 7:30 - If you aren't baptised, you are actually rejecting "the counsel of God."

John 3:5 - Empasizes water baptism and spiritual baptism.

Acts 10:48 - Christ's apostles command baptism, like Christ himself did.

1 Peter 3:21 - Baptism saves us.

lol the timeline is quite revealing.
Just like Moses and the resulting set of laws, it didn't take long for God's word to leave His mouth before man construed it into an organization of prescribed righteousness and ceremonial sanctification.
Seeing you do not see.
God tries to set us free and give us forgiveness, but we keep letting ourselves get convinced we're evil (that's the job of the devil, you know) and we have this little love for ritual (it makes us feel safe), so He gives us some rituals to help us feel like we're playing a part in our redemption, but in reality we're already redeemed.
Jesus tried to draw a line, telling humanity in essence "If you're so stubborn that you require ritual and sacrifice to feel okay with yourself, fine..here's your sacrifice. Now quit it and take care of one another."

[Aqualung]

sparsely wrote: lol the timeline is quite revealing.
Of what? That everybody in early christianity said baptism was necessary?

God tries to set us free and give us forgiveness,[/quote]
He tries to give it to us, be if we don't accept it, that's our fault. He give it to us wrapped up in paper with little pictures of balloons, and we say, "You can't be God. God would wrap it in paper that has teddy bears on it." People want him to offer it to us in the most convenient way, that all we have to do is mentally accept it, but that's not the case at all.

Yes, I agree that God gives us concessions. But I don't believe that one single person on this entire earth is good enough that they don't need the concessions. IF they were, there wouldn't be the concessions. Milk before meat.

I'd like to see somebody take each quote one by one and tell me why I'm wrong to believe that when christ says "unless you are baptised you cannot be saved" it means "unless you are baptised you cannot be saved."

[sparsely]

CrossEyedMary wrote: I'd like to see somebody take each quote one by one and tell me why I'm wrong to believe that when christ says "unless you are baptised you cannot be saved" it means "unless you are baptised you cannot be saved."

okaaay.

In order to understand the meaning, it helps to have a concordance and a little bit of context for the examples.
I'll try to provide that context then offer my conclusions.

In Matthew 3.15 we find Jesus encountering John the Baptist in the wilderness. JB was shocked, he thought himself unworthy to baptize Jesus and that it should be the other way around. Jesus took part in the ritual as he had taken part the customs and traditions of Judaism all his life.
Furthermore, if we look back a bit to Matt. 3.7 we seen JB turning away the Pharisees & Sadducess who had come to be baptized.
"Bear fruits worthy of repentance", he admonished them.

Why would he turn them away? Because they sought to solidify their righteousness through human customs rather than action resulting as the natural fruit of righteousness. They stood behind the shield of looking "good" and following the letter of the law rather than by observing the true spirit of the law.
This is what was meant by "fulfilling all righteousness". He had to be a "good" person in the eyes of the law or the P's & S's would've used that as ammunition to discredit his claims. "He cant be the Christ, he's never been baptized!", they would've accused.

Matthew 28:19 - Actions anchor ideas to reality. Imagine if you will, the apostles running around the countryside giving these sermons and presentations at little churches, and street corners, and in people's homes.
It helps people to have some sort of action they take part in, something to commerate the event of hearing the good news. Something symbolic.
Back then they weren't selling "I rode the highway to Hell" t-shirts...soo baptism is nice. He was giving the apostles the design for their events.

Mark 16.16 it actually says "He who believes and is baptized will be saved; but he who does not believe will be condemned."
Notice the obvious omission in the clause. This attitude is further chronicled in some of the experiences Jesus had with the sick and lame.
"According to your faith, let it be so." , "Your faith has made you well." It was the individuals personal level of belief in the remedy which
overcame their illnesses rather than the method.

Luke 7.30 confirms further the conclusions I suggested in the first instance. Jesus points out the Pharisees and lawyers who had not been baptized by John, saying "Look what snakes these guys are! John did everything right and you accused him of being possessed by a demon, and I hang out with w***s and drink wine and they call me a sinner. We try to deliver the message through traditional means and they spit on it. We try to give them the message by worldly means, they spit on it."
These are the people who come to a party just to appear and look good rather than to enjoy themselves and one another.
They might buy the shirt, but they're not riding the ride.

John 3.5 - "unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God"
This one will take a while, because it's weird.
Jesus is speaking a bit more cryptically, as he expects Nicodemus (a teacher) to understand more deeply.
(well...I think He knew Nicodemus didn't understand, but Nicodemus had to figure that out for himself)
Jesus offered the following as clarification: "The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear sound of it, but cannot tell where it comes from and where it goes. So is everyone who is born of the Spirit."
hmm...like the wind.
Interesting as well is that the word "water" used in 3.5 also has a figurative meaning: "of many peoples".
Even more interesting is that we find similar meaning in the word "cloud", which is where ascensions tend to go.


But go ye and learn what [that] meaneth, I will have mercy, and not sacrifice.

[sLiPpY]

Jesus_Freak wrote: If you have faith in Christ but are never baptized will you go to heaven?
Why or why not?

If you don't have sex? Will you have kids? :lol:

opps, "trick question" :bana: