By Johnnie Godwin
Contributing Columnist, B&R
My “Baptist” dad went forward at invitation time one Sunday night when I was 16. I didn’t have a clue why he might be doing that. All my life Dad had done all the Baptist things the rest of our family did: the whole shebang. Growing up, I had never wondered why Dad took me to the Presbyterian Church in Sandusky, Texas, when we visited his home. But I found out. Dad was still a Presbyterian by church membership even though he practiced Baptist to the bone. I overheard one shocked lady laughingly say, “All these years we trusted Johnnie with counting the church’s money; and he wasn’t even a Baptist.”
Baptism and Baptist membership: In my early years, most Baptist churches seemingly matched my home church’s belief: namely, you had to have the right subject, the right mode, the right baptizer, and do it within Southern Baptist life. Otherwise, it wasn’t Scriptural. Dad got saved by grace through faith and totally immersed in a creek to symbolize that born-again experience. In the Presbyterian church, his baptism had been Scriptural. But Baptist doctrine requiring him to be Baptist-baptized had kept him from joining the Baptist church. Besides baptism symbolizing salvation, we had also made it a symbol of denominationalism and doctrine. Real Scriptural baptism occurs once. Today? Even our International Mission Board just agreed with what I just said. Baptism requires a believer symbolizing his born-again experience in immersion. That’s it. You can get baptized outside Baptist life. The Ethiopian eunuch and Philip proved that in New Testament days. But believer’s baptism only by immersion is biblical! [Read more…]