December 2015

ection, even if it kills me (which
well it might in a country that
doesn’t value the gospel). So
‘believe and be baptised’ should
read like ‘Stake your life on the
Son of God who is the way, the
truth and the life, and demonstrate
this by being baptised into
His death and emerging changed
forever into a Spirit-filled Child of
the Living God and member of
the Kingdom of Heaven’.
Are those who believe in certain
ceremonies willing to stake their
lives on them? I don’t think so.
To stake one’s life - this is the
biblical standard of belief.
Well there, we have dealt with
what the word ‘belief’ ought to
mean to a Christian. Now for
the ceremonies. If we are taking
communion we are, like Jesus,
staking our lives on His, and
eventually our, resurrection from
the dead. He shared his cup
with us at the Passover before
his trial and crucifixion. Crucifixion
before Resurrection! That
was the cup! He gave His life
for us and we as disciples are to
be prepared to follow Him even
to death if necessary. That is
the extent to which we believe in
Him. Less than that is entirely
forgettable.
Belief in certain ceremonies
might include infant baptism –
If your child dies without being
infant baptised it might not go to
Heaven. What biblical evidence
have you for that. There is no
way you can really baptise and
infant anyway, now is there? Do
you really plan to submerge your
baby under water? No. It’s only
a sprinkle and there is no precedent
for that in scripture. Sprinkling
with water means nothing
in biblical terms. It comes under
the category of tradition, and
man-made at that. It’s a lovely
way of committing a child and his
upbringing to the Lord, but when
he is of age he must decide for
himself whether he will follow
Christ and be baptised.
Then, you might say, if he is not
baptised as an adult he will not go
to Heaven? Well, short of being
entirely unable to undergo baptism,
like the thief on the cross
who was saved, yes, he should
be baptised. Scripture requires
baptism if possible of all believers,
and frankly, if a man won’t go
so far as to be baptised, then he
won’t be doing much of anything
else for Jesus, because that is
little enough to ask. In short his
commitment to Jesus is highly
suspect if he won’t even be baptised.
In that case his love of the
Lord may be insufficient to admit
him to the Kingdom.
‘If an adult dies without being baptised
then he cannot be saved.’
There are two ways to look at
this. The thief on the cross was
not baptised, neither could he
be, but yet he was saved. There
will be circumstances where
baptism is impossible but salvation
might ensue anyway, but
they will not include a refusal to
be obedient to that request when
it is quite possible. The thing is
it really revolves around having
an experience with God and
subsequently adoring Him to the
extent that nothing is too much
to ask, and baptism, with all that
it means, is just the beginning.
It’s a statement about how far
one is willing to go to serve the
Lord Jesus – to the death.
Others believe strongly in Holy
Communion . This is a wonderful
little ceremony reminding us
of Jesus trauma in Gethsemane
followed by His mock trial. It is
performed regularly at many
churches. People should not
think of it as sufficient to redeem
a man. In fact there are several
instructions concerning it:
’leave your gift at the altar and
go make certain you have done
everything possible to reconcile
anyone with whom you have had
differences, then come and take
communion,’ Matthew 5:23, 24.
In other words the ceremony of
taking communion has pre-requisites,
namely a gift, and reconciliation
with any person with
whom one has argued, and does
not by itself ensure one’s passage
to Heaven. At the institution
of Holy Communion were people
already baptised and discipled
over several years. It is not for
the faint-hearted, but for those
who will stand with Christ anywhere,
and at any cost, because
the ‘cup’ He shared was the cup
of suffering, and share it they all,
eventually, did.
In short the question of salvation
revolves entirely around the
question of whether a person
believes in Christ (and will stake
his/her life on Him) and therefore
follows all His commandments
including, initially, baptism. The
ceremonies of the Christian
faith make the assumption that
this is the case, and that the
participant has a deep relationship
with Jesus Christ already.
Without that relationship, ceremonies
are meaningless. As
part of that established relationship,
however, the ceremonies
are wonderful expressions and
statements of the faith that we
hold.