Lesson 14 - Must We Be Baptized For The Forgiveness of
Our Sins?
"Men and brethren
what shall we do?" In Acts
2:38 (KJV), "Then Peter
said unto them, repent and be baptized everyone of you in the name of Jesus Christ
for the remission of your sins." Here people were told to
repent and be baptized for the remission of their sins. Only when we
submit to baptism as the Lord has commanded, that is for the remission of
sins to be saved, do we show our faith in the Lord. Only then will He
save us.
Man today has a sin problem. It is our sins that separate
us from God. We are to repent and be baptized for the remission of our sins.
This is God's instruction on how we solve our sin problem. When Peter told
them to "Repent and be baptized for the
remission of sins," whatever repentance is for in that
verse, baptism is for the same reason. Repent and be baptized are joined by
the coordinating conjunction and, which joins words of equal grammatical
importance. Certainly Acts 2:38
does not teach that lost people are to repent because they have already
received forgiveness of their sins. Neither does it teach that lost people
are to be baptized because their sins are already forgiven. Satan would like
you to believe that baptism has nothing to do with the forgiveness of your
sins. Have you been baptized for the remission of your sins? Again, the
choice is yours; either believe what God has said and be saved, or believe
what men say and you will continue to be lost. We only have two choices, and
the choice that we make will have eternal consequences. But please make the
right choice.
In the book of Acts we have the account of the conversion of the Apostle
Paul. In Acts chapter 9, Paul is traveling on the road up to Damascus to persecute
Christians. The Lord appears to Paul on the road and strikes him blind. In
verse 5 he tells Paul, "I am Jesus
whom you are persecuting." In verse 6 Paul asks, "Lord what do you want me to do? Then the Lord
said to him (Paul), Arise and go into the city, and you will be told what you
must do." The Lord did not tell Paul what he must do, but
that someone in the city would tell him what he must do. In Acts 9:9, after
Paul went into the city, "And he was
three days without sight, and neither ate nor drank." Paul
was worried sick and very upset. He had just found out that all the years in
his zeal, while persecuting the Lord's church, he had actually been
persecuting the Lord. Paul was devastated and broken-hearted in finding out
that he had been wrong all these years.
Let's see now what Paul was told what he must do. In Acts chapter 22, a man
named Ananias, who was sent by the Lord, came to Paul and miraculously
restored Paul's eyesight. Notice what Paul was told by Ananias what he must
do. Acts 22:16,"And now why are you waiting? Arise, and be
baptized and wash away your sins, calling on the name of the Lord."
Paul was not saved three days earlier while on the road to Damascus. Paul up
to this point was still lost, because he still had all his sins that needed
to be washed away. Paul still had a sin problem. Obedience to the Lord's
command to be baptized was necessary to wash away Paul's sins. At the point
of baptism every sin that we have ever committed will be taken away if it is
done for that purpose. Have you been baptized for the purpose of having your
sins washed away? If you have not, then you still have a sin problem. You are
still lost.
Paul was not told "to pray the sinners prayer and ask Jesus to come into
his heart in order to be saved." This is foreign to the scripture. You
cannot find anywhere in the Bible where anyone was ever told to do this.
Since God in the Bible has never told anyone "To pray and ask Jesus to
come into your heart in order to be saved", who else but men could have
come up with such an idea? Forgiveness occurs in the mind of God and not on
the basis of man's feeling in his heart. Only when we have done what God has
said that we must do, will God forgive our sins. We cannot devise our own
plan as to how our sins are to be forgiven.
Do not misunderstand. We do not "earn" our salvation by being
baptized. Salvation is a gift from God. Even though salvation is a free gift
from God, he has laid down certain conditions upon which he will give it. One
condition to receive his gift is faith: Hebrews
11:6,"But without faith it is impossible to
please Him." Another condition of his free gift is
repentance: Luke 13:3, "Unless you repent you will all likewise
perish." Another condition is baptism: Mark 16:16,"He
who believes and is baptized will be saved." Still another
condition is living a faithful Christian life: Revelation
2:10,"Be faithful until death, and I will
give you the crown of life."The conditions include doing all "the will of the Father,"Matthew 7:21. These are God's conditions.
Believing in God and Christ with all our heart, repenting of all our sins,
confessing Christ and being baptized are all equally important to our
salvation. If any of these are lacking, then we will not be saved. You can't
have one without the others.
There is nothing that we can do to merit salvation. Whether it be believing
in Jesus or being baptized, we can never "earn our salvation". The
only way we can show our faith in Christ is if we are willing to accept and
obey what He says. But it is in baptism that God has chosen to impart
his wonderful grace of salvation to us as a willing believer.
According to the Bible, it is at the point of baptism, that we pass from
an unsaved state into a saved state. In other words, at the time of baptism,
we go from being unsaved to being saved. We read in I Peter 3:21 (KJV), "The like figure whereunto even baptism does
also now save us." The Bible says that "baptism does
now also save us," but men say that "baptism does not save
us." This is very similar to the situation of Adam and Eve in the Garden
of Eden. God in Genesis 2:17told them not to
eat of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, "For
in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die." But
Satan told Eve in Genesis 3:4, "Then the serpent said to the woman, you
will not surely die." Satan only added the one word
"not" to what God had said and completely changed the meaning. That
is what men are doing to God's commands today. Who are you going to accept,
the word of men or the Word of God? We are told in Acts 5:29, "We
ought to obey God rather than men." On the Day of
Judgment, the Bible will still say that "baptism
does also now save us." Again the choice is yours, but it
is very serious. We dare not make the wrong choice.
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Questions Lesson 14 Must We Be Baptized For The Forgiveness Of Our
Sins?
1) (Acts 2:38) What were these people in this verse
told to do for the remission of their sins? Pray
to God. Repent and be baptized. Only
believe.
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2) Our sins are forgiven before we repent and are baptized.
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3) (Acts 22:16) What was Paul told to do to have his sins washed away? Accept
Christ as his personal Saviour Only
believe in Jesus. Arise and be baptized.
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4) Until Paul was baptized he still had all his sins.
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5) Where can we find in the Bible that we are told to pray and ask Jesus to
come into our heart in order to be saved? Jude
2:5. 2
John 1:14. It is not there.
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6) We cannot find in the Bible where anyone was ever told to accept Jesus
into his heart in order to be saved
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7) (1 Peter 3:21) What does the Bible say saves us? Faith
only. Baptism. Our
own goodness.
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8) It is at the point of baptism that God has chosen to impart His wonderful
grace of salvation.