A Brief Book Notice from Books At a Glance
Table of Contents
Introduction
Chapter 1. What Is Baptism?
Chapter 2. Who Should Be Baptized?
Chapter 3. What about Infant Baptism?
Chapter 4. Why Is Baptism Required for Church Membership?
Chapter 5. When Is “Baptism” Not Baptism?
Chapter 6. How Should Churches Practice Baptism?
Selected Quotes
- “Baptism is a church’s act of affirming and portraying a believer’s union with Christ by immersing him or her in water, and a believer’s act of publicly committing him or herself to Christ and his people, thereby uniting a believer to the church and marking off him or her from the world.” (6)
- “What exactly does the church say in baptism? In baptism a church affirms a believer’s profession of faith in Christ. It affirms that someone who claims to be united to Christ in his death and resurrection, so far as they can discern, is. It sets a visible, public seal to an invisible, spiritual reality.” (8)
- “How does a church affirm and portray a believer’s union with Christ? By immersing him or her in water.” (9)
- “This chapter asks the question, “Who should be baptized?” And the answer is, “Every Christian.” No exceptions, no special cases, no ifs, ands, or buts.” (17)
- “The new covenant does not operate by birth but by rebirth. So the sign of the new covenant should only be given to those who give evidence of that rebirth by their profession of faith in Christ.” (31)
- “What does all this add up to? Simply that infant baptism is not what the Bible means by baptism. The Bible neither commands nor implicitly authorizes churches to baptize infants.” (41)
- “Further, immersion best captures the symbolism of being buried and raised with Christ. In both Romans 6:1–4 and Colossians 2:11–12 Paul takes for granted that baptism signifies this union with Christ’s death, burial, and resurrection.” (65)
- “Baptism pictures and promotes the gospel. And baptism designates and draws a line around the people of the gospel—those who have repented of sin and trusted in Christ. Baptism matters because of the gospel it so vividly signifies.” (71)