Wednesday, October 12, 2022

Notes from John D. Castelein (Church of Christ) on Baptism in "Understanding Four Views on Baptism"

  

A similar theological prejudice separates forgiveness of sins and the gift of the Spirit from the command to be immersed (baptized) in Acts 2:38-39 and attaches it only to the command to repent. That “repent” is plural and “be baptized” is singular in no way eliminates immersion from the promised gifts. “Repent” may well be addressed to physical Israel from the promised gifts. “Repent” may well be addressed to physical Israel as a nation and “be baptized” to every penitent believer with a body to be surrendered. (John D. Castelein, “Baptist View: Responses: A Christian Churches/Churches of Christ Response,” in Understanding Four Views on Baptism, ed. John H. Armstrong [Grand Rapids, Mich.: Zondervan, 2007], 55 n. 2)

 

When Paul in 1 Corinthians 1:17 states that Christ did not send him to baptize, it is clear from the context that Paul is not denying how very important baptism is; rather, he is denying that baptism bonds the candidate to the person performing it, as if one adheres to the name of the baptizer. In fact, baptism is one of three basic realities that should unite all Christians: (1) all are baptized into Jesus’ name (not into Paul’s name); (2) Christ is not divided; and (3) one and the same Jesus Christ died for all (1 Cor. 1:13). (Castelein, ibid., 55 n. 5)

 

Baptism and repentance are both “for the forgiveness of your sins” (Acts 2:38). In the 1600 occurrences of this preposition [eis] in the NT its meaning is always purposive or consecutive (it expresses the intended result of an activity), except, possibly in four instances where its meaning may be more nuanced. Matthew 26:28 uses the same purposive expression as Acts 2:38 to indicate the purpose of Jesus’ death: “This is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for [eis] the forgiveness of sins.” No one would contend that a person should repent because God has already forgiven that person’s unrepented sins. Until the theological innovation of the sixteenth-century Reformer Ulrich Zwingli, the church for over 1500 years unhesitatingly connected baptism and repentance with the forgiveness of sins. (Castelein, “Believer’s Baptism as the Biblical Occasion of Salvation,” ibid., 159 n. 5)

 

The point of 1 Corinthians 1:17 (where Paul says, “Christ did not send me to baptize”) is not that the act of baptism is not important but that the person performing the baptism is not important. The passage shows just how crucially important the church considered the baptismal ritual to be in that there was even a danger of association salvation with the person performing it. To combat this error, Paul forges powerful links that are not to be broken between the individual’s salvation, baptism, the crucifixion, the name of Jesus Christ, and the unity of the body. (Castelein, ibid., 159 n. 9)

 

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