to us. We will not fear for God hath willed his truth to triumph through us. The Prince
sure one little word shall fail him. That word above all earthly powers, no
thanks to them abideth. The speed
can dread go this mortal life also the body they may kill God's truth the
for those that receive salvation the Lord.
In Jesus' name, amen.
Amen, our second Psalm is Psalm number 392,
a soul winner for Jesus.
Song number 392, a soul winner for Jesus.
["Song 392"]
Song 392, let's sing it together on the first.
I want to be a soul winner for Jesus every day.
so much for me. I want to aid the law center to leave his airing way and be
from bondage free. A soul winner for Jesus. A soul winner for Jesus.
for Jesus he does so much for me I want to be a soul winner and bring the
lost to Christ that they his grace may know I want to live for Christ ever and
do his blessed will because he loves me so
a soul. Winner for Jesus. Oh let me be each day. A soul. Winner for Jesus. A soul. Winner
for Jesus. He's done so much for me. I want to be a soul. Winner till Jesus calls for
Hear him say, Seren, you've gathered many.
She's received a starry crown, a soul,
winner for Jesus, a soul, winner for Jesus.
Oh, let me be each day, a soul, winner for Jesus, a soul,
He's us, he's done so much for me.
Amen.
Good seeing you this time, we'll have our announcements.
Welcome back, everyone.
The verse of the week is John 5 verse 24.
John 5 verse 24,
Verily, verily I say unto you,
He that heareth my word,
And believeth on him that sent me,
Hath everlasting life,
And shall not come into condemnation,
But his pass from death unto life.
That is John 5 verse 24.
All right, service times are at 10 30 this morning 3 30 this afternoon
Wednesday evening by all city is at 6 30 p.m
So many times just yesterday at 10 30 and today at 1 I know I have jakes
The other groups I didn't get to check were there any other salvatians
Okay, hey still to for today great
All right, so that brings our total to 2 for August and that's a total of 61 for the year
Alright, attendance is down below.
All right, remember next Saturday is the church cleaning day.
It'll be right after soul winning when food will be provided with all the resources.
On the 17th will be a song leaders class between services.
August 23rd will be my wife's baby shower and the registry is posted.
August 30th will be the Cheney soul winning, see Ryan for more details.
And then August 31st will be men's preaching night.
So a lot of things look forward to this month.
A lot of good things.
I heard a couple people say them,
but just so the kids know, Psalms 34 verse 14
is what you need to recite to Miss Kylie
to get some candy if you are younger than I.
All right.
She told me no.
I was like, dang it.
But hey, it's just something nice to look forward to.
All right, tonight, Jason will be preaching.
And then we've done birthdays, adversaries,
the rules are all the same,
tidying information is down below.
And if you have any more prayer requests,
just let the Thompson Sir may know
and we'll get it into the bulletin.
All right, with that, let's turn to Lord in prayer.
Song number 58 he the pearly gates will open
Song 5a let's sing it together on the first love divine so great and one
undressed, deep and mighty, pure sublime,
coming from the heart of Jesus, just the same
through tests of time.
He, the pearly gates, will open so that I may enter in,
Like a dove when hunted frightened, as a wounded fawn was eye, broken hearted yet he healed
me.
so great and wondrous, all my sins he then forgave. I will sing his praise forever for
his blood, his power to save. He the pearly gates will open so that I may enter in
life's even tied at twilight. At his door I'll knock and wait, by the precious love of Jesus I shall end.
my redemption and forgave me all my sin. Amen. Good scene. Brother Paul, would you
bless you often for us?
Thank you so much for all that we have. Let us be thankful for what we have, for what we know, that we have more than we could ever truly appreciate in this life.
Good afternoon everybody. Welcome back to Sure Foundation Baptist Church. If you could go ahead and take your Bibles and turn to Matthew chapter 3.
Matthew chapter 3 and as our custom is here at Sure Foundation Baptist Church, we read the entire chapter before the preaching.
Matthew chapter 3 the Bible reads
In those days came John the Baptist, preaching in the wilderness of Judea, and saying,
Repent ye, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.
For this is he that was spoken of by the prophet Isaiah, saying,
The voice of one crying in the wilderness, prepare ye the way of the Lord, make his paths
straight.
And the same John had his raiment of camel's hair and a leather girdle about his loins and his meat was locust and wild honey.
Then went out to him, Jerusalem, and all Judea, and all the region round about Jordan, and were baptized of him in Jordan confessing their sins.
But when he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees come to his baptism, he said unto them, O generation of vipers, who hath warned you to flee from the wrath to come?
Bring forth therefore fruits, meet for repentance, and think not to say within yourselves,
we have Abraham to our Father, for I say unto you that God is able of these stones to raise
up children unto Abraham, and now also the axe is laid unto the root of the trees,
therefore every tree which bringeth forth not good fruit is hewn down and cast into the fire."
I indeed baptize you with water unto repentance,
but he that cometh after me is mightier than I,
whose shoes I am not worthy to bear.
He shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost and with fire,
whose fan is in his hand,
and he will thoroughly purge his floor
and gather his wheat into the garner,
but he will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire.
Then cometh Jesus from Galilee to Jordan unto John, to be baptized of him.
But John forbade him, saying, I have need to be baptized of thee, and cometh thou to me.
And Jesus, answering, said unto him, Suffer it to be so now, for thus it be cometh us to fulfill all righteousness.
Then he suffered him.
And Jesus, when he was baptized, went up straight way out of the water, and lo, the heavens were opened unto him.
And he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and lighting upon him.
And lo, a voice from heaven saying, this is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.
Brother Paul, could you please pray for the preaching?
are apart, be open to the messages for Christ.
In Jesus' name, amen.
Amen, all right, so we're in Matthew chapter number three.
And the reason why I wanted to have this chapter read
is because this is the first time that baptism
is talked about in the Bible specifically.
And we can see here in verse number six,
it says, and we're baptized of him in Jordan,
confessing their sins.
And then if you skip down to verse number 11, it says,
I indeed baptize you with water unto repentance,
but he that cometh after me is my dear than I,
whose shoes I am not worthy, the worthy to bear,
he shall baptize you with the holy ghost and with fire.
And so,
Excuse me. So we can see here that the Bible is talking about, you know, two different
baptisms. There's a, you know, there's the baptism, you know, I guess we would call it
water baptism. And then there's the baptism of the Holy Ghost.
And so I just wanted to go through this evening and, you know, answer some questions about
baptism.
And again, the title of my sermon is, What Does the Bible Say About Baptism?
And the reason why I wanted to preach is because somebody recently asked me what my opinion
was on whether or not baptism was a command from God and whether or not baptism would
be a requirement before taking communion.
a perfect opportunity to go, okay, let's just ask the question, what does the Bible say? Because at
the end of the day, you know, the Bible should be our final authority in all manners of faith
and practice, amen? The Bible is the boss. So if the Bible says something, then that is what I'm
going to believe. You know, whether or not that flies in the face of, you know, what people have
traditionally believed, or whether or not that flies in the face of, you know, whatever organization
Saint said that that none of that stuff matters at the end of the day. The only thing that truly matters is what does the Bible say?
Amen, and you know baptism is a pretty big subject in the New Testament now baptism
Of course is a New Testament doctrine, right?
But it is it is a it is a fairly big doctrine in the Bible
I mean we even call ourselves
Fundamental Baptist amen, and so you know having the correct doctrine about baptism
You know is something I believe is very important right and so this this is the first chapter where it's mentioned
We see that John is baptizing people and they're confessing their sins and he's telling them that hey
I'm baptizing you with water under repentance
But there's somebody coming after me that he's going to baptize you with the Holy Ghost
with fire, right? And you know, people have wondered, well, you know, what's this
fire thing about? Well, that's that question is easily answered in the next
verse. It says, whose fan is in his hand, and he will thoroughly purge his floor
and gather his wheat into the garner, but he will burn up the chaff with
unquenchable fire. So that's where your fire is at. It's basically, it's look,
you're either baptized with the Holy Ghost or you're going to hell.
Right? So, you know, that's what that being baptized with fire is. That's not a good deal if you end up in that position, right?
But anyway, but let's let's continue on this in this chapter
Look at verse number 13. It says then cometh Jesus from Galilee to Jordan
unto John to be baptized of him
But John forbade him saying I have need to be baptized of thee and comeest thou to me
And Jesus, answering, said unto him,
Suffer it to be so now, for thus it
becomeeth us to fulfill all righteousness.
Then he suffered him.
And Jesus, when he was baptized, went up straight way
out of the water.
And lo, the heavens were opened unto him.
And he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove
and lighting upon him.
And lo, a voice from heaven saying, this is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased.
So we can see here that Jesus Christ, he comes to John the Baptist to specifically get baptized,
right?
He has to get baptized by John the Baptist in order to fulfill all righteousness.
He came to John the Baptist to get baptized, but yet Jesus never baptized anybody and the Bible is actually specific about that
that Jesus never physically baptized anybody.
That was actually something that John the Baptist
and the disciples and basically saved people were doing.
Right, is normal people were baptizing other people
and normal people were baptized Jesus.
You know, if you consider John the Baptist normal,
I mean, he was wearing camel hair and eating bugs,
but you know, hey, it was a different culture back then,
right?
but but that but that job was given to normal people right and and Jesus
actually never baptize anybody but why why is it you know what what is baptism
anyways well go and turn to Romans chapter number six if I could get a glass
of water that would be fantastic you know I've got a I've got a lot more notes
than I normally do for the sermon and and I'm recovering from from being sick
Maybe that's why I sound so funny. I don't know but
So in Romans chapter number six
We get
Even more information as to what baptism is okay, and it says in Romans chapter number six verse number one
It says what should we say then shall we continue in sin that grace may abound God forbid?
How shall we that are dead to sin live any longer therein?
Know ye not that so many of us, as were baptized into Jesus Christ, were baptized into His death?
What shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound? God forbid. How shall we, that are dead to sin, live any longer therein?
Know ye not that so many of us were baptized into Jesus Christ, were baptized into His death?
Therefore, we are buried with Him by baptism into His death.
that like as Christ we raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father even so we also
should walk in newness of life
For if we have been planted together in the likeness of his death
We shall we shall be also in the likeness of his resurrection
Knowing this that our old man is crucified with him that the body of sin might be destroyed that henceforth
We should not serve sin for he that is dead is free from sin
So so this is a great chapter to learn about what is baptism?
What what are we doing here? Like why are we dunking people in water? Well? Here's the reason why is because?
When we dunk somebody in water, it's a representation,
and it's actually a representation of two things.
And I'm going to cover the second one here in a second.
But it's very similar to the first thing.
When we dunk somebody in water, basically,
they're standing in the water.
Their body is, you know,
perpendicular to the water, right? So that kind of represents the cross, and then
they're dunked into the water. That represents somebody being buried, right?
That's where planted with him in baptism, buried with him in baptism. So they're
dunked under the water, and then they're raised up out of the water,
representing the resurrection of Jesus Christ, right? So
baptism is a picture of the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus Christ, right?
But also the second thing that it's a representation of is our physical death,
burial, and resurrection.
Because as Bible-believing Christians, we believe that we're all going to die some day, right?
We're all going to physically die unless we're alive when the rapture happens.
That's a caveat, obviously.
But basically, you know, Christians, ever since Jesus Christ rose again and went up into the heavens,
Christians have been dying, amen?
They have all died.
But we don't believe that we're gonna just our bodies are just gonna stay dead and in the ground. Do we know why?
Because we believe in something called the resurrection
Not only do we believe in the resurrection of Jesus which has already happened
We also believe in the coming resurrection of every single believer go and turn to 1st Corinthians 15 1st Corinthians chapter number 15
So baptism truly is a representation of both of those things. Why do I say that? Well, because in 1 Corinthians 15 it says
Now this I say brethren that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God
Neither death corruption inherit incorruption. Behold, I show you a mystery. We shall not all sleep
But we shall be changed in the moment in the twinkling of an eye at the last Trump
For the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed.
For this corruption must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality."
For excuse me, so when this corruption shall have put on incorruption and this mortal shall have put on immortality
Then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written death is swallowed up in
Victory so the Bible is very clear that we are going to be
Resurrected and our bodies are going to be changed now
You know a lot of people they'll read Romans chapter number six and they'll say you see
That proves you need to be baptized in order to be saved
Right because they say well, you know if you're if you're you know what when you're baptized after you're baptized
You know that stops you from sinning because you know, how shall we live any longer in sin?
Or haven't you been baptized if you're still sinning after you're baptized that means you're not saved well if
You compare that with 1st Corinthians 15 and you realize that
baptism is a representation of
us
When we're resurrected and we have our incorruptible bodies that will no longer sin
then all of a sudden everything makes sense because
You know the the Bible is not telling us that after you're physically baptized
Then you're gonna stop sinning all of a sudden
But it is a representation of the fact that when you're resurrected you will stop sinning
You will no longer be sinning because that you know
Your corrupted body is going to put on incorruption and your mortal body is going to put on immortality, right?
and so, you know
Baptism what it is is a representation and even in Romans chapter number six
You know, it says a couple different times in the likeness right so in the likeness of his death
Right, so it's not it's not literally Jesus's death, and it's not literally your death either
But it's in the likeness of your death
Right, and then you're raised to walk in newness of life and you know as Christians
We should also we should be a good picture of what we're going to be like after we're resurrected
Right that that would that would be the goal, right? That would be that would be what we strive for
I mean kind of like Jesus Christ says hey be perfect as my father is in heaven is perfect
We're not gonna be able to do that. We're gonna fail
But the goal is to be a picture of that. Amen. That should that should how our life
That should be how our life looks like.
Unfortunately, we still have this corrupted body
that needs to be changed into incorruption.
Otherwise, what would be the point of the resurrection, right?
If I was already perfect and sinless,
why do I need a coming to resurrection
to change my corruptible body into incorruption, right?
And so, you know, no, baptism does not save anybody.
And we're gonna cover that a little bit more
later in the sermon.
But no, baptism doesn't save anybody
and it doesn't wash you of your sins.
But it is, it's a representation
of what did wash you of your sins.
And it's a representation of the fact
that you're gonna be raised again from the dead, right?
So that's what baptism is.
It's a picture.
of the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus,
and our coming death, burial, and resurrection.
But go ahead and turn to Mark, chapter number eight,
Mark, chapter number eight.
And so, again, kind of the goal of my sermon
is to kind of answer those questions.
Is baptism a requirement? In other words, is it a command that God requires of us?
Just like we would think of the command to go soul-winning, the command to go to church.
Obviously, we realize that the command to go to church, the command to go soul-winning, those are not salvation issues.
You could never do any of those things and still go to heaven.
But yet God has commanded us to do those things. Has He not?
And so, you know, is baptism, is it a command that we are expected to do, and is it a requirement
before somebody takes the Lord's Supper?
But before I answer that question, you know, I want to look at this idea of baptism of
the Holy Ghost, right?
Because, again, there's seemingly two different types of baptism that we have going on here,
there's an idea that they could be interchangeable like whatever the Bible
says baptism well okay well which one is it talking about is it talking about
you know baptism of the Holy Ghost or is it or is it talking about water
baptism and to find that out you know we should just look at the Bible and see
what it says about you know baptism of the Holy Ghost and there's actually not
a ton of mentions of it in the Bible there's there's there's basically there's
six mentions of the baptism of the Holy Ghost in the Bible so we're just gonna
And we already looked at the first one, which was in Matthew chapter 3.
We're going to look at the rest of them here real quick.
It says in Mark chapter 1 verse 8, it says,
I indeed have baptized you with water, but he shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost.
So very similar to what's going on in Matthew chapter 3.
Luke chapter 3, you go ahead and turn to John chapter 1.
John answered, saying unto them all, I indeed baptize you with water, but one mightier than
I cometh, that latchet of whose shoe I am not worthy to unloosen.
He shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost and with fire
Again very similar to Matthew 3 John chapter 1 verse number 33 says and I know knew him not
But he's he that sent me to baptize with water
The same said unto me upon whom thou shalt see the spirit descending and remaining on him
The same is he which baptizes with the Holy Ghost. So, you know, who is this talking about? Well, John the Baptist, you know
He's talking about Jesus Christ
Right, I mean, I think that's pretty obvious from the verse, you know, the same
Is he you know, which baptizes with the Holy Ghost, right?
The guy that had the spirit descending on him and remaining on him describing exactly what happened in Matthew 3
in Mark 1 and Luke 3
Pretty much exactly the same so that's obviously John the Baptist referring to Jesus Christ and saying hey
He's going to baptize you with the Holy Ghost
Acts chapter number one verse number five it says for John truly baptized with water
But you shall be baptized with the Holy Ghost not many days hence
And we an axe chapter number 11 verse number 13 it says and he showed us
how he had seen an angel in his house, which stood and sent unto him,
send me to Joppa, and call for Simon, whose surname is Peter,
who shall tell thee, words whereby thou and all thy house shall be saved.
And as I began to speak, the Holy Ghost fell on them,
as on us at the beginning, the remembrance
Then remembered I, the Word of the Lord, how that He said, John indeed baptized with water,
but He shall be baptized with the Holy Ghost.
For as much then as God gave them the like gift as He did unto us, who believed on Lord
Jesus Christ, what was I that I could withstand God?
You know especially in the first four that we looked at who is it that is baptizing with the Holy Ghost?
It's Jesus, right?
Jesus is the one that because because John the Baptist says hey, I'm baptizing with water
But the guy coming after me who's Jesus
He's gonna baptize you with the Holy Ghost and in the last couple. I showed you
You know based on what John the Baptist said who was baptizing them with the Holy Ghost?
Well had to have been Jesus right so so there's there's a big difference between the baptism of the Holy Ghost and
Water baptism, you know for one I would say that the baptism of the Holy Ghost is
Basically when somebody receives the Holy Ghost
Amen, because we look at their you know, they're being baptized with the Holy Ghost after they believe several different times
And, you know, when somebody gets the Holy Ghost, right,
we would just say, hey, you received the Holy Ghost.
So the baptism of the Holy Ghost is basically,
in my mind, when somebody receives the Holy Ghost
after they believe, after salvation, right?
Because everybody that gets saved
will receive the Holy Ghost, right?
I mean, in the year of our Lord, you know, and of course, this is something that was not true in the Old Testament, right?
And then you have Jesus in John chapter number 14 saying, hey, I'm leaving and I'm gonna send you the Comforter.
So this is something that changes from Old to New Testament and it changed from, you know, before Jesus.
resurrected into heaven and after that, because there was one point where Jesus was on earth
and he said, hey, you're going to get this in the future because you don't have it right
now.
So that is a change from the Old to New Testament, is this baptism of the Holy Ghost, which people
But but I wanted to cover just real quick, you know, there's of course there's in my mind
There's kind of two extremes when it comes to baptism now to be totally honest. I
Had never heard of this other extreme before this idea that
Baptism is not a command that it's not required
And then it's not a requirement in relation to the Lord's Supper.
And honestly, I'd never thought about that before.
This is something that was a new idea to me.
I'd never heard of it before.
But the other extreme, of course, is what all the Catholics and the Protestants believe
is that salvation is a requirement in order to go to heaven.
In other words, if you don't get baptized, you're going to hell.
Now is this, is that idea biblical?
And I would say, of course, no.
I mean, for one, that would invalidate
pretty much every single salvation verse in the Bible.
But they'll use certain verses,
they'll say, see this,
teach us that you have to be baptized in order to be saved.
And I just wanted to look at a couple of them real quick,
just to be thorough in this sermon.
It says in 1 Peter 3, 21, it says the light figure
where to even baptism, doth also know.
Not the putting away the filth of the flesh, but the answer of a good conscience towards
God by the resurrection of Jesus Christ.
You see right there, baptism does also now save us, and they'll use this verse to try
to prove that, but it's not a very good verse for their position because in the beginning
What is that? Well, it's telling you that baptism is a figure of something. What's
that? Well, that's like a picture or a likeness, right? It's just like how we
talked about in Romans 6 that, you know, we're buried him with the likeness of
his death, right? So what is that? Well, that's a picture. And so it's the
How does the picture of baptism save us?
Well, because the picture of baptism, what it pictures is the death burial and resurrection of Jesus Christ.
Now, how are we saved?
We're saved by believing in the death burial and resurrection of Jesus Christ, amen?
I mean, that's what even the 1 Corinthians 15 says is the gospel, is the death burial and resurrection of Jesus Christ.
You know this what this verse is saying is that if the like figure right the picture of baptism saves you
Well, what's the picture of baptism the death, burial, and resurrection?
So
And you know it clarifies it even even further, you know not the putting away the filth of the flesh
But the answer for good conscience towards God by the resurrection of Jesus Christ, right?
So what what is it that's saving people according to 1 Peter 321?
We're saved by the resurrection of Jesus Christ, right? You know, I serve a risen Savior. He's in the world today
I know that he's he's living whatever men might say, you know, I got the resurrection to save me
You know, I don't need some priests somewhere to baptize me
It's a flick some water on my face in order for me to be saved. Okay
But a gun turned to Acts chapter number eight acts chapter number eight
And I'm just going to read one more verse about whether or not baptism is required for salvation.
And this is Mark chapter number one, verse number four, it says,
John did baptize in the wilderness and preached the baptism of repentance for the remission of sins.
And people will take that verse and say, you see,
you have to have baptism in order to receive the remission of sins.
And of course, you know, this is a ridiculous argument because what it says,
you know for the remission of sins it's basically saying because of the remission
of sins and you know I don't want to spend too much time on that point because
brother Ryan is going to be preaching on that eventually and so I don't want to
steal his thunder but to boil it down it's not in order to obtain the remission
of sins it's because of the remission of sins right and you know
Brother Ryan, you know, he's going to be going back to the
What's that guy's name never mind? He's not going back to the Greek, but he's going back to the
Never mind. I can't remember the guy's name and I don't it's gonna it's gonna ruin his sermon anyway, so
all right, so
Go we're in action number eight. So
So baptism is not required for salvation. What's required for salvation is to believe in the death, burial, resurrection of Jesus Christ, right?
But, you know, is baptism, is it a command from God? Is it required by God, and should you do it before you take communion? Okay, well,
you know, to answer this question, obviously we're just going to look at what the Bible says, right?
And, you know, as Baptist, and I've heard this saying many, many, many times throughout my life and I even heard this morning that says,
hey, baptism is the first... I can't even say it. It's because I'm recovering from sickness.
It's the first step of obedience. Yeah, baptism is the first step of obedience.
And, you know, whenever you have some kind of a saying like that,
You should be wary to not just axiomatically believe it, right and
And I just wanted, I don't have my phone, but I was going to look up the definition of an axiom on my phone.
And I covered this quite a while ago, and I talked about the only axiom you need.
And the only axiom you need is that the Bible is true and it came from God, that the Bible is God's Word and it's 100% true, okay?
And, you know, what's an axiom?
It's basically something that is considered to be so true that you don't, there's no need to question it.
Everybody just kind of accepts it to just be true. That's kind of an axiom, right?
well that's what an axiom is but you know is that should we just axiomatically because we have
this saying that says baptism is the first step of obedience should we just axiomatically believe
that or should we scrutinize that saying and say hey what does the bible say obviously we
should be saying hey what does the bible say and scrutinize any saying that we have like that right
You know, there's a few things that we can look at. We can look at the statements in the Bible
And we can also look at different patterns in the Bible and we're gonna look at both of those things
But I wanted to start out with the patterns. What what's the example that we're given in the Bible?
And I think that is a very valuable thing. Okay now
patterns, or, you know, that's not going to be as strong of a foundation to lay as statements
from the Bible, right?
But yet, I believe they are still very valuable, okay?
And if you have a pattern of something going on in the Bible, I think that we ought to
follow that pattern, okay?
We're in Acts chapter number 8. Look at verse number 35. It says,
Then Philip opened his mouth and began at the same Scripture
and preached unto him Jesus. And as
they went out on their way, they came unto a certain water, and the
eunuch said, See here's water, what doth hinder me to be baptized.
And Philip said, If thou believest with all thine heart, thou mayest.
And he answered and said, I believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God.
And he commanded the chariot to stand still and they went down both into the water both Philip and the eunuch and
He baptized him. So what what is the pattern that we see here in this story? Well?
Basically the Ethiopian eunuch he believes on Jesus Christ
And then immediately after that, he gets baptized, right?
Does that make sense to everybody?
Basically, he gets saved, he believes in Jesus Christ,
and then right after that, he gets baptized.
That's the pattern we see from that Bible story.
Acts chapter number nine, the next chapter, verse number 17,
it says, and Ananias went his way,
entered into the house and putting his hands on him said brother Saul the Lord
even Jesus that appeared under the in the way as alchemist has sent me that
thou mightest receive thy sight and be filled with the Holy Ghost and immediately
there fell from his eyes as it had been scales and he received sight forthwith
Now I know that there's there's there's an argument out there of whether or not you know
Well, what when was when was Paul saved was he was he saved when it was he all when he was on the road to Damascus when Jesus
Appeared to him or was he saved here in Acts chapter number nine when Ananias when laid hands on him now to me
From from my point here, it actually doesn't matter when he got saved whether or not it was on the road to
Damascus or it was here with Adonis because
you know
Bro was blind right
Like he couldn't see you know
I wouldn't want anyone taken to me out in the water on I can't see right and
So basically he's on the road to Damascus
Right, you know if he got saved on the road to Damascus
Immediately, he doesn't have anybody to baptize him and the first opportunity he gets when
he's with Ananias, he does get baptized.
Now, if he gets saved with Ananias laying hands on him, well then he immediately gets
baptized.
Right?
So again, we see the pattern in the Bible is that he gets saved and he's immediately
baptized.
Or, if you think he got saved on the road to Damascus with Jesus, he got saved at his
first opportunity.
Amen?
And so that's the pattern we see in the Bible.
Acts chapter number 16, verse number 30,
and it's, uh, and brought them out and said,
sirs, what must I do to be saved?
And they said, believe on the Lord Jesus Christ
and thou shall be saved in thy house.
And they spake unto him the word of the Lord
into all that were in his house.
And he took them the same hour of the night
and washed their stripes and was baptized.
He and all his straight way.
And that word straight way,
that basically just means immediately.
Right? So, you know, he's preaching the word of God.
People are getting saved. His family gets saved.
And what are they doing immediately afterwards?
They're getting baptized.
Again, we see this pattern is relatively consistent, we see here.
Acts chapter number 18, verse number 8, it says,
In Christmas, the chief ruler of the synagogue believed on the Lord
with all his house and many of the Corinthians hearing believed and
were baptized. So we can see here that immediately after people are believing,
immediately after people are getting saved, they're getting baptized. Amen. And
so that's the pattern that we see from the Bible, okay, is that people, as
soon as they get saved, they're getting baptized. And you just read through the
You know, that's what you see oftentimes whenever people are getting baptized in the book of Acts
It's pretty much always right after they're getting saved
So in my mind so so now that we see this pattern in the Bible that people are always getting baptized right after they get saved
In my mind, that tells me that God probably wants me to get baptized right after I get saved.
Now, here's the thing. Does that always happen in real life though? Do people always get baptized right after they get saved? No.
And in fact, you know, I got saved when I was 21 years old and then I got baptized in 2019.
I believe I got saved when I was in 2015. So I'm trying to do the math here. So I'll be like four years later
Yeah, so four years later. I was baptized. Okay, so is that immediately after I got saved?
No
No, right, so
That's not always what happens, but I do believe that it that is what God wants
Just solely based on the pattern we see from God's word is that people they're saved. They're immediately
baptized, right
But that's why I think it's unbiblical for churches
to have these 12-week baptism classes.
And I always wonder, why do you have to have a 12-week baptism
class?
The water's not that deep.
You know, I don't get it.
But.
Yeah, but that in my mind that violates the pattern we see in God's Word where people are getting immediately baptized
You know, they're not they don't have to go through some kind of a doctrinal
You know thing of like we have to know this you have to do this you have to be a member of the church first
You have to do that. It's no no no no you just you just find some water and you get baptized right?
So that's what we get from the from the pattern of God's Word
But go ahead and turn to Acts chapter number two, Acts chapter number two.
So what about statements?
Is there any places in the Bible where God basically directly commands us to be baptized?
Or do we have any evidence in the Bible that it is a command?
Well, I believe that we certainly do.
three different verses that I believe are
commands for us to get baptized,
and I'm going to start at the weakest and go to the strongest.
The weakest one here, and I say weakest,
look, this is all Bible.
If the Bible says we're supposed to do something,
then we just do it.
However strongly the Bible says it or whatever,
You know, if the Bible says that we should just do it, amen, because again, the Bible is the boss.
The Bible is our final authority in all matters of faith and practice.
So, if the Bible says something, that's what we're going to do.
It says, therefore, let all of our, excuse me, we're in Acts chapter number two.
Look at verse number 36.
It says, therefore, let all the house of Israel know, assuredly, that God hath made the same
Jesus whom ye have crucified, both Lord and Christ.
Now when they heard this, they were pricked in their heart and set unto Peter and to the
What shall we do? Then Peter said unto them, Repent and be baptized every one of you in
the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins, and ye shall receive the gift of
the Holy Ghost. For the promise is unto you and your children, and to all that are far
off, even as many as the Lord our God shall call."
And with many other words did he testify and exhort, saying,
save yourselves from this untoward generation.
Then they that gladly received his word were baptized,
and the same day there were added unto them about 3,000 souls.
And so I do believe here that in verse number 38,
this is basically a command.
that we can read verse number 38 and take it as a command to be baptized because
they're asking they're like hey men and brethren what shall we do they're asking
what should we do and he says repent and be baptized every one of you right so
they're all supposed to get baptized now somebody could have an argument that
says hey you know this is not talking about
water baptism. This is talking about the baptism of the Holy Ghost. And you know
somebody could have an argument, but I don't, I think that does fly in the face
of what this verse says. And I think that argument doesn't pan out. And
there's, let me give you some reasons as to why I don't believe that that
argument would pan out.
And so if we read verse number 38, it says,
then Peter said unto them, Repent and be baptized,
every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ,
for the remission of sins, and ye shall receive
the gift of the Holy Ghost.
But if we remember from what we read earlier,
whenever John the Baptist says,
hey,
You know, Jesus, He's going to baptize you with the Holy Ghost, or baptize you in the
Holy Ghost, right?
And so, basically the baptism of the Holy Ghost is receiving the Holy Ghost, right?
And so it does not make any sense to say, hey, you know, I'm commanding you to repent
and be baptized, and then you're going to receive the gift of the Holy Ghost.
is receiving the Holy Ghost.
That does not make any sense.
Okay, so here in Acts chapter number two,
You know, he's saying be baptized and then you're going to receive the gift of the Holy Ghost
So if they're they're different things
Which means this must be talking about water baptism in act chapter number two
Which means that water baptism is a command that Peter is giving them and you know
Why would this command apply to the people that Peter is talking to but what an apply to me?
That doesn't make any sense to me. I think it applies to everyone that believes everyone that
get saved, that command goes to them as well, that they should be baptized, right?
And the other thing is that in verse number 41 it says, and they that gladly received his word
were baptized and the same day were added under them about 3,000 souls. And so, you know, in verse
It makes it seem like, you know, they received the word,
you know, basically they're getting saved, right?
By receiving the word of the Lord,
by believing the gospel of Jesus Christ.
You know, they that received it were baptized.
It makes it seem like those are separate things, right?
Basically them getting saved is separate from them
getting baptized, right?
Cause that's an additional step that they took.
And so, it doesn't make sense that in Acts chapter number two it's talking about the
baptism of the Holy Ghost because it's two different steps, they're two different things
and he's commanding them to do one thing and then the other thing is going to happen.
regular water baptism and of course you know the people out there will say well
you see you have to get baptized in order to get remission of your sins in
order to go to heaven we you know we talked about that earlier with you know
Mark chapter 1 it's not to receive the remission of sins but it's because of the
remission of sins basically right that's why you know it's a representation of
the fact that
You believed in Jesus Christ and you're you believe that his in his death, Marilyn resurrection
And you have received remission of sins if you if you've believed right and
So because of that you should get baptized
Because your sins are forgiven you you should be baptized you should identify with Jesus Christ and
Your own coming resurrection too
But let's go ahead and turn to ax chapter number 10 ax chapter number 10
So ax chapter number 10
We have another set of verses that I believe are a command to to be baptized
It says in Acts chapter number 10 verse number 43 it says to him give all the prophets witness
That through his name, whosoever believe in him shall receive remission of sins
You know you can contrast that with Acts chapter number two. Hey, we're receiving remission of sins
Well, how do you do that? Well by
Through the name of Jesus Christ and believing in him, right?
Verse number 44 says, while Peter yet spake these words, the Holy Ghost fell on all of
them which heard the word.
So what's going on here?
Said, hey, believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you're going to receive the mission of
sin.
What's the result of that?
people believing on the Lord Jesus Christ, amen?
I mean, isn't that the result when we go out soul-winning?
We preach the gospel to people, we preach Jesus to people,
and as a result of that, people believe on Lord Jesus Christ.
So people are believing on Him.
What happens?
You know, the Holy Ghost,
yep, I'm in the right place here.
The Holy Ghost fell on all them which heard the Word.
So these people are hearing the Word,
they're believing and the Holy Ghost is coming on them.
And I would say, this is the baptism of the Holy Ghost.
Why? Because they're receiving the gift of the Holy Ghost, right?
Verse number 45, it says,
And they of the circumcision which believed were astonished
as many as came with Peter because
that on the Gentiles also was poured out the gift
of the Holy Ghost. And again, here, you know, this says, this is the gift of the Holy Ghost.
for they heard them speak with tongues and magnify God, then answered Peter,
can any man forbid water that these should not be baptized,
which have received the Holy Ghost as well as we?
He, notice this, he commanded them to be baptized in the name of the Lord,
then prayed they him to tarry certain days.
You know, we can see here that basically a bunch of people get saved and they're specifically gentiles because the Jews are surprised at this.
And then he's like, hey, can anybody forbid them to be baptized?
And the answer of course is no, nobody can forbid them from being baptized, and he commands
them to be baptized.
And so basically he's commanding these people that just got saved to be baptized.
And we know for a fact that this cannot be talking about the baptism of the Holy Ghost
because they already got the baptism of the Holy Ghost.
And so this is a separate baptism.
This is definitely water baptizing, or water baptism,
and he is commanding them to be baptized.
So this is, to me, this is a very clear verse,
and a very strong verse that indicates
that baptism is a command.
And, you know, once again, this also goes along
with the pattern of God's word,
You know basically people are getting saved and then he's immediately commanding them to get baptized
That's the first thing he does after these people are getting saved is saying,
hey, we need to get these people baptized right away.
They're not waiting around and we got to check off this box and check this T right here.
What's that saying?
We got to cross our T's and dot our I's first before we get anybody baptized.
No. What he's doing is immediately having them get baptized.
It goes again with a pattern of baptism that we see in the Bible where it's immediate.
But the last verse I'm going to show you about whether or not it's a command, and I believe
it's the strongest one, is in Matthew chapter number 28.
Go ahead and turn to Matthew chapter number 28.
So the first two commands basically are directed at people that had just got saved.
to people that have gotten saved to be baptized.
But this last one is actually a command to people that are getting others saved, right?
A command to those that are doing the baptism for them to baptize people. And you know, Matthew chapter over 28,
it's an extraordinarily famous
chapter of the Bible.
And of course, you know, Matthew chapter number 28 is where we get the Great Commission from, right?
This is where we get the idea of the Great Commission and where we, you know,
we get basically, there's three different parts of the Great Commission is basically going out and getting people saved,
getting people baptized and
teaching people all the doctrines of the Bible. Okay, those are the three different parts of the Great Commission.
And
Let's let's just read what the Bible says here. It says Matthew 28 verse 18
It says as Jesus came and spake unto them saying all power is given unto me in heaven and on earth
Excuse me
Go ye therefore and teach all nations
baptizing them in the name of the Father
and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I've
commanded you, and lo, I am with you always, even under the end of the world. Amen."
Now, you know, it is verse number 19 when it says, baptizing them in the name of the
You know the only way I could
That I could think of where you could get out of it being a command that's given us that we need to go out and baptize people is
Is it is if this is the baptism of the Holy Ghost?
But if we think about it again, you know
This cannot be the baptism of the Holy Ghost because who is supposed to be doing the baptizing in this verse?
Christians, right? Because Jesus, he's preaching to the disciples right before he's taken
up into heaven, and he's telling them, hey, go ye therefore and teach all nations, baptizing
them in the name of the Father and Son of the Holy Ghost, right? So he's telling them
that they need to teach all nations and that they need to be baptizing people in the name
of the Father and the Son and the Holy Ghost. So it's a command given from Jesus Christ
to the disciples, and this command
comes to us as well.
I mean, did the Great Commission just end
when the apostles died?
No!
And the Bible talks about the fact that He has given us the ministry of reconciliation.
So it's our job to go out and preach the gospel to people.
But it's also our job to get people baptized.
And it's our job to teach, right, teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I've
commanded you, and lo, I will see always.
So it's our job to do that.
I mean, is Jesus Christ here himself to teach all the doctrines of the Bible right now?
No, is Jesus Christ himself here to preach the gospel and get people saved?
No, He has given us that job.
He said, hey, all power is given unto me, and now I'm commanding you to go out and preach
the gospel.
I don't want you to go on baptize people. I don't want you to preach all the doctors of the Bible.
So this is a command given directly from Jesus Christ to people that are saved.
It's part of your job to fulfill the Great Commission is to baptize people.
Now obviously not every single individual saved person is going to be baptizing people.
And to be quite frank, the vast majority of individual saved Christians are ignoring the first commandment as well.
They don't preach the gospel to people, which is a command, by the way.
You know what Jesus said, if you follow me, I will make you fishers of men.
And he told Peter, he's like, hey, from henceforth you're not going to catch fish anymore, you're going to catch men.
What is he referring to? Well, he's referring to preaching the gospel.
referring to telling people how to be saved. And so, you know, but, you know, most Christians never do that.
Also, most Christians never baptize anybody, right? But, you know, baptism is something that a church should be doing.
A biblical church should be fulfilling all three different parts of the Great Commission.
You know, the first part of the Great Commission, you know, literally anybody that's saved can participate in that.
Why? Because anybody that's saved can preach the gospel, right?
And you know, there's nowhere in the Bible where there's like a criteria given for somebody in order to be able to baptize somebody.
You know, the only thing we have for that is the example of what we have John the Baptist.
the Baptist baptizing people, we have all the disciples baptizing people,
you know, we've got Paul and Barnum is baptizing people. So all we have is examples for that.
But there's no, there's nowhere in the Bible where I can give you, you know, like, hey, in order,
in order for you to baptize somebody, you have to be, you know, the husband of one wife and
have multiple children. And, you know, we don't have that, right? But, you know, in general,
It seems to make a lot of sense for somebody,
the person to be baptizing, to be part of church leadership.
Right, because at the end of the day,
there's only so many people to get baptized.
And so we're gonna have probably the church leadership
do the baptizing, right?
So obviously I'm not here to make anybody feel bad
if you haven't baptized anybody.
You need to baptize five people this year, brother.
You know, get them on your MLM plan or whatever.
You gotta get them in your downmine or whatever.
I don't know.
So, you know, obviously that's not something that every single saved Christian is going
to do, but you know what?
Every single church organization should be doing that, should be trying to get people
saved.
Why?
Because that's a part of the Great Commission, my friend.
And then, of course, you know, you know, not everybody's going to teach the Bible from
the pulpit.
Like, that's not, that's not, you know, not everybody is called to do that.
So not every single Christian is called to fulfill every single part of the Great Commission
But the church organ at church organization is right
I mean, I mean, is it okay if we just leave out one of these parts?
as a church. We're like, hey, we're a church. We believe in the Bible. God commanded us to preach
the gospel, to get people baptized, and to teach the Bible. But we're just going to not teach the
Bible. At that point, we're basically not a church. We're like, okay, we're just not going to preach
I mean, we're leaving out one third of the Great Commission or if we're just like, hey,
we don't do baptisms.
We don't baptize people.
If you want that, you got to go down to, you know, whatever, baptizing Baptist church,
whatever.
What are you doing?
Like, this is literally, God, Jesus literally commanded you, you need to go out, preach
the gospel, get people baptized and teach them the Bible.
Like that's what the command that Jesus has left us with, right?
I do believe that it's very clear that baptism is a command, that it's not something that's
just kind of optional and you can just kind of do it if you feel like it.
No, it is a command and if you want to be in the will of God, it is something that you
do need to do because it is commanded.
Well, again, we're picturing the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus Christ, and we're
picturing the coming death, burial, and resurrection of all believers.
And Jesus said to John the Baptist, Hey, you need to baptize me.
Why?
To fulfill all righteousness.
You're skipping something that's key in fulfilling all righteousness
Right. We're skipping one of the commands of God and so
Go ahead and turn to 1st Corinthians chapter number 11 1st Corinthians chapter number 11
Now you know I wanted in addition you know to preaching about baptism and whatnot whether or not it's command
I wanted to answer the question of is it a requirement before taking the Lord's supper?
Okay, and so, you know, I've come to the conclusion that, yes, baptism is a command.
And if you look at the pattern of the Bible, it's the first thing that you should do after
you get saved.
So you know, we have that saying that the baptism is the first step of obedience.
I would agree with that statement, basically that it is the first thing that you should
do, right?
How does that relate to the Lord's Supper?
Go ahead you're in 1st Corinthians
11 we're gonna look at verse number 24 it says and when he had given thanks
He break it and said take eat. This is my body which is broken for you this do in remembrance of me
after the same manner also
He took the cup, and when he had sucked, saying,
this cup is the New Testament in my blood,
this do ye as often as ye drink it in remembrance of me.
For as often as ye eat this bread and drink this cup,
ye do show the Lord's death till he come.
Wherefore, whosoever shall eat this bread
and drink this cup of the Lord unworthily,
shall be guilty of the body and the blood of the Lord.
But let a man examine himself, and so let him eat of that bread and drink of that cup,
for he that eateth and drinketh unworthily, eateth and drinketh damnation to himself,
not discerning the Lord's body.
For this cause many are weak and sickly among you, and many sleep, for if we would judge
But when we are judged we are chasing of the Lord and that we should not be condemned with the world
So you know the Bible makes it pretty clear here
That there are there there are certain conditions that a saved person could be in
To where you should not take the Lord's supper. Okay?
And, you know, the Bible never specifies when somebody should take the Lord's Supper, how
often somebody should take the Lord's Supper.
All it specifies is it says, hey, when you do take the Lord's Supper, you do it in remembrance
of me, okay?
But it specifies that there are Christians that could be in a condition where they should
not take the Lord's Supper, and they should abstain from that, okay?
Why? Because it says, for he that eateth and drinketh unworthily, eateth and drinketh damnation to himself,
not discerning the Lord's body. Now, the Bible is not extraordinarily specific
what it says, what the conditions, what, you know, what, what condition you're in when you shouldn't take the Lord's supper. It just says
he that eateth and drinketh unworthily, right? Now, what does that mean?
the question. Well, you know, I don't know exactly what that means. It's kind of
in a way, it is up to interpretation. If you just kind of get the feeling that
I don't know, probably best bet is just not to take the Lord's supper, amen? That
would be in my mind the smart thing to do. Because does the Bible lay out any
But there are consequences if somebody does take the Lord's Supper unworthily, okay?
now
Seeing how baptism
You know is a command and
We see the pattern in the Bible that that's the first thing people do
After they get saved and it's the first thing that they're commanded to do after they get saved. I would say
That it's probably not a good idea for somebody to go and take communion
If they have not been baptism, excuse me if they have not been baptized
So, you know, that's something that I that I would stand on I would say hey
Probably not a good idea. I would advise you not to do it. Now. Here's here's what I don't have
I don't have a concrete verse to stand on to say you
Cannot take communion unless you've been baptized
Because the only thing I have here is that for he that eateth and drinketh unworthily
Now you know you could take an interpretation that says well unworthily is just this really narrow situation
That that I'm not in right and so you know just if just as long as I don't feel unworthy
You know, I'm good. I'm just gonna go ahead and take the Lord's supper
but you know
don't think that's a good idea because what if your narrow interpretation is
wrong and then you could end up like the people you know that they do take it
unworthily since for this cause many are weak and sickly among you and many
sleep so you could end up you know being chastised by God right that's not a
situation that I would want to find myself in and so you know honestly out
would say no. If you haven't been baptized, you should not be taking the Lord's supper.
But here's the other thing. If you're not baptized and you're saved, in my humble
opinion, you should just get baptized. Why? Because I believe that's being obedient to the Lord.
Because I do believe the Bible, when Peter says, hey, they ask, what shall we do?
He says, repent and be baptized. He's telling them what to do.
You know, the Gentiles are getting saved in Acts chapter number 10.
Peter says, commands them to be baptized.
And then Jesus says, hey.
All powers have been given unto me, and I'm telling you, go ye therefore and teach all
nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son of the Holy Ghost.
So people that are getting saved are commanded to be baptized, and we as Christians, as part
of fulfillment of the Great Commission, are commanded to baptize.
You should be baptized before you take communion. I say absolutely yes because guess what?
The requirement for baptism is not a 12-week swimming class. The requirement is simply being saved.
You know what the requirement is for water baptism? The requirement is have you been baptized by the Holy Ghost?
Because guess what? Who's baptized by the Holy Ghost?
Saves people.
When do you get baptized by the Holy Ghost?
And so the only requirement for water baptism is Holy Ghost baptism.
So there's nothing holding anybody back from getting baptized who's saved.
Nothing at all.
And if you have a scriptural church, they'll baptize you on the spot.
Well, we got to get out the baptismal and fill it with water, and hopefully it's not
too cold or whatever, or we could just go down to the river, hopefully far away from
the falls or whatever.
You know, the only issue with that is just, literally, it's just logistics.
We just need to find a deep enough pool of water for you to be dunked in, right?
Because that's another thing I didn't really touch on in this sermon, you know,
the fact that the Catholics are not actually baptizing anybody
because there's two problems with their baptism.
For one, none of them are saved, right?
And two, they're not baptizing because they're sprinkling.
They're not being buried in baptism.
Because baptism is buying immersion.
That's why Jesus came straightway up out of the water
because you come up out of the water
when you're down in the water,
not after you've been sprinkled.
And so, when you bury somebody,
you don't sprinkle some dirt on them, do you?
That doesn't make any sense at all.
So we're buried in baptism with Jesus, right?
And so, hopefully the sermon was edifying.
Hopefully I, you know, everything that I said was clear and you know how maybe maybe maybe you guys learned something, you know
You know, I went into studying the sermon
You know, I'm pretty much knowing what the conclusion was that I was going to come to but you know
I'm glad that I did it
Because you know, I feel like I'm you know a lot better a
Lot more knowledgeable on the subject. Let's just put it that way
But you know, but again at the end of the day the
It's what the Bible says that matters, right?
It's, you know, it's, well, it's because we're Baptist.
That's why we believe it.
No, it's because it's what the Bible says.
You know, whether or not other Baptist church believe the same thing, you know,
we don't care about what the church father said.
We just care about what the Bible says.
Let's go ahead and bow our heads in order prayer.
Dear Heavenly Father, I thank you for this day Lord. I thank you for everything you've done for us Lord. I pray that you would please
Help us all to learn about what the what the Bible says about all the different subjects of the Bible
And even if we have a preconceived idea that that that we think is absolutely true
Let us let us be humble enough to go to the Bible to see what it really says about the subject and not not take any
Axioms that we hear just for face value just because the people that we go to church would say those things let us
Let us look up those things for ourselves and see what the Bible really has to say about those things.
And Lord, we pray that you would please bless us as we go. In dear Jesus' name, amen.
Amen.
Last psalm number 353 from Every Stormy Wind.
Song number 353 from every stormy wind
Song 353 let's sing it together on the first from every stormy wind that blows from every
Tis found beneath the mercy seat.
There is a place where Jesus sheds
the oil of gladness on our heads.
A place that all besides more sweet.
Where spirits blend, where...
And sin and sense molest no more
Than him come down our souls to grieve
When glory crowns the mercy seed.
Amen, good scene for the Ryan.
Could you close the water prayer?
Yeah.