Baptism might be among the most misunderstood teachings that divide the Christian world today. In many modern churches, baptism has been reduced to a symbolic ritual—something optional that has little to nothing to do with salvation itself.
In Scripture, baptism is never treated as a casual ceremony or a public expression of a private decision. It’s consistently tied to faith, repentance, forgiveness of sins, new birth, and union with Christ Himself. Baptism isn’t just an act of obedience—it’s the moment when a believer steps into the story of the gospel, clothed in Christ, raised to walk in newness of life.
The early Christians understood this. From the pages of the New Testament through the first few centuries of the church, baptism was seen as central to the life of a disciple, not an optional act you could choose to do later if you felt like it. The meaning and mode were also always consistent. It was always connected to conscious faith and repentance. It was for the remission of sins, not a mere symbol of a decision already made. It was immersion, not sprinkling or pouring.
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Over time, however, things began to change. As theological concerns evolved—particularly surrounding the doctrine of original sin—so did the practice of baptism. Infant baptism slowly emerged as a widespread practice, shifting baptism away from a personal response of faith to a ritual performed on behalf of another. By the time of the Protestant Reformation, the meaning of baptism had already been profoundly altered.
And yet even the Reformers—Luther, Calvin, and others—maintained a far higher view of baptism than most Evangelical Protestants today. Somewhere between the reaction against Catholic sacramentalism and the rise of “easy-believism” in modern Evangelicalism, baptism was pushed to the margins of Christian thought and practice.
Today, we’ll explore what the Bible teaches about baptism, what the earliest Christians believed and practiced, how and why baptism changed over time, and why the Churches of Christ continue to uphold a view of baptism that aligns far more closely with both Scripture and the earliest testimony of the church than most traditions today.
Baptism in the New Testament
If we want to understand baptism correctly, we have to start with the New Testament itself—not later traditions, modern assumptions, or personal feelings. Scripture not only describes baptism’s meaning but also shows us its mode. We find a picture far more consistent and profound than many Christians today realize.
Mode: Immersion
The word translated “baptize” in our English Bibles comes from the Greek word baptizō (βαπτίζω), which means “to immerse, to dip, to submerge.” It does not mean to sprinkle or to pour. In fact, Greek had different words for sprinkling (rhantizō) or pouring (cheō), but the New Testament writers consistently used baptizō when speaking of baptism.
The biblical witness unanimously confirms this:
* When Jesus was baptized, He “came up out of the water” (Mark 1:10).
* When Philip baptized the Ethiopian eunuch, “they both went down into the water” and “came up out of the water” (Acts 8:36–39).
* Paul describes baptism as a burial with Christ in death (Rom 6:3–4; Col 2:12)—an image that only makes sense if the person is completely immersed and then raised up, just as Christ was buried and raised.
The consistent New Testament witness points to immersion as the apostolic practice. Baptism pictures death, burial, and resurrection. It’s a complete and total submission to the will of God, allowing Him to cleanse us from sin. Anything less than immersion obscures that powerful gospel image.
Meaning: Faith, Forgiveness, New Life
Just as the mode of baptism is clear, so is its meaning. Throughout the New Testament, baptism is directly connected to the critical moments of a believer’s transformation:
* Faith and repentance precede baptism (Acts 2:38; Acts 8:12–13).
* Baptism is for the forgiveness of sins (Acts 2:38; Acts 22:16).
* Baptism is the moment of being born of water and Spirit (John 3:5).
* Baptism unites the believer with Christ’s death, burial, and resurrection (Romans 6:3–5).
* Baptism clothes the believer with Christ and marks their entrance into the people of God (Galatians 3:26–27).
Baptism is not a meritorious work that earns salvation. It is a faith response—when a repentant believer, trusting in God’s grace, obeys Christ’s command and receives what God has promised.
The New Testament never portrays baptism as a minor or optional religious ceremony that can come after salvation. It is the point of transition where the believer leaves the old life behind and steps fully into the grace of Christ. Baptism is deeply tied to salvation, not separate from it, and every biblical example reinforces that pattern.
The question, then, is not whether baptism is essential—that much should be undeniable, given the biblical witness. It’s whether we have remained faithful to what baptism truly is: a death, a rebirth, and a covenant pledge made not by works but by trusting obedience to the God who saves.
The Rise of Infant Baptism
For the first generations of Christianity, baptism was intimately tied to personal faith, repentance, and conscious discipleship. It was never treated as a casual tradition or an automatic ritual. Baptism was the response of a heart that believed in Christ, turned from sin, and surrendered fully to Jesus’s Lordship.
The earliest sources outside the New Testament confirm this. One of the earliest Christian documents outside the New Testament, the Didache (late 1st to early 2nd century), gives clear instructions on baptism. It says:
“After you have reviewed all these things, baptize in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, in running water... before the baptism, let the one baptizing and the one being baptized fast, as well as any others who are able.” (Didache 7)
Notice the assumptions:
* The candidate is taught.
* The candidate is consciously involved, participating in fasting and preparation.
* Baptism is a response of informed faith.
Similarly, Tertullian (c. A.D. 200), a North African Christian writer, explicitly argued against the growing practice of baptizing infants. In his treatise On Baptism, he writes:
“Let them come while they are growing up; let them learn, while they are learning; let them become Christians when they know Christ.” (On Baptism, ch. 18)
Tertullian warns that baptism should not be rushed, especially for children, because faith and repentance must precede it. His concern was not theological hair-splitting—it was a desire to protect the integrity of baptism as a response of conscious faith.
At this stage of Christian history, the dominant understanding was clear: baptism was for believers capable of making a personal, informed commitment to Christ.
By the early third century, however, subtle shifts began. Origen (c. A.D. 185–254) is one of the first known figures to explicitly defend infant baptism. He justified the practice by appealing to a developing doctrine: the idea that even infants bore the guilt of Adam’s original sin and needed immediate cleansing. He wrote:
“Infants are baptized for the remission of sins. Of what sins? Or when have they sinned? … The stain of original sin is removed by the sacrament of baptism.” (Homilies on Leviticus)
This thinking was further entrenched by Augustine (c. A.D. 354–430), who vigorously defended infant baptism as necessary for salvation. Augustine taught that all humanity inherits not just a fallen nature but Adam’s guilt and that even newborns need to be baptized to be delivered from eternal condemnation.
Under Augustine’s influence, infant baptism shifted from an occasional practice to a theological necessity. Baptism was no longer primarily about personal faith and repentance—it was now a sacramental mechanism for removing inherited guilt, applied before a person could even choose to believe.
When we examine Scripture, the Didache, Tertullian, and the earliest practices of the church, it’s clear: baptism followed faith, not the other way around. The movement toward infant baptism was not the natural outgrowth of apostolic teaching—it was a theological evolution driven by concerns about the nature of sin, guilt, and salvation that developed centuries after Christ and His apostles. While well-intentioned, the rise of infant baptism moved the church away from the biblical model. This shift fundamentally changed the theology of baptism from what we find in the New Testament and earliest Christian writings. What had been a faith response became a preventative ritual meant to save the soul from original condemnation rather than to mark the beginning of conscious discipleship.
Baptism Through the Middle Ages and the Reformation
As Christianity became institutionalized in the centuries following the apostolic era, the practice and theology of baptism changed dramatically. While Scripture presents baptism as a faith-driven response to the gospel, over time, baptism was increasingly reinterpreted as a sacramental mechanism—a rite performed primarily to address inherited guilt rather than a personal decision to follow Christ.
Medieval Developments
During the Middle Ages, baptism shifted from an obedient, faith-centered act to a sacrament mainly administered to infants. This change was driven primarily by the growing influence of Augustinian theology, which taught that all humans inherit not just a sinful nature but also Adam’s personal guilt.
As a result:
* Baptism was seen as the necessary cure for original sin.
* Infants were baptized as soon as possible after birth, often within days, to ensure salvation in case of early death.
* The infant’s faith wasn’t necessary; instead, the faith of the church or the parents was used in its place.
* Baptism became a ritual obligation—an ecclesiastical act that automatically removed sin, regardless of the baptized individual’s conscious faith.
By this point, baptism was no longer understood primarily as the believer’s personal entrance into Christ by faith. It was now an institutional safeguard designed to place individuals into the visible church and, more importantly, to secure eternal salvation in the event of death.
This sacramental view fundamentally changed the nature of baptism. Rather than focusing on the individual’s repentance and trust in Christ, baptism became a mechanism of ecclesial control and a marker of belonging to Christendom as a whole.
The Protestant Reformation
When the Protestant Reformation erupted in the 16th century, Reformers like Martin Luther and John Calvin challenged many errors of the medieval church—especially the idea that salvation was earned by works or purchased through indulgences. Yet, interestingly, they did not abandon infant baptism. Instead, they reinterpreted it.
Martin Luther maintained that baptism was a means of grace. He rejected the idea that baptism was a human work; instead, he insisted that it was a divine promise attached to water, through which God saved. Luther wrote:
“To put it most simply, the power, effect, benefit, fruit, and purpose of baptism is to save.” (Large Catechism, Baptism)
Luther did not consider the infant’s lack of conscious faith a problem because he believed God could create faith even in the infant through baptism.
John Calvin retained infant baptism but framed it differently, tying it to covenant theology. Just as infants were circumcised under the Old Covenant, Calvin reasoned, infants should be baptized as part of the New Covenant community. However, Calvin still stressed that baptism pointed to faith—and that baptism, apart from later personal faith, was incomplete.
Thus, the Reformers upheld a high view of baptism. They continued to see it as a necessary part of the Christian life, deeply connected to salvation—not merely a symbol or public demonstration. Ironically, Reformers like Luther and Calvin rejected the medieval abuses of baptism; they still affirmed that baptism was essential in a way that would shock many modern Evangelicals today, who have essentially detached baptism from any saving significance at all.
Zwingli’s Long Shadow
While Martin Luther and John Calvin maintained a strong connection between baptism and salvation, Ulrich Zwingli—a lesser-known but highly influential Swiss Reformer—planted the seeds of a radically different view that has quietly shaped much of modern Evangelical thought.
Unlike Luther and Calvin, who saw baptism as a means through which God grants grace, Zwingli taught that baptism was purely symbolic. In his 1525 treatise Of Baptism, Rebaptism, and Infant Baptism, Zwingli declared:
“Baptism cannot contribute in any way to the washing away of sins.”
(Zwingli, Of Baptism, 1525)
He went even further, admitting that he was breaking from the consensus of earlier Christian tradition and even saying that everyone who came before him had it wrong and that he had just figured it out:
“In this matter of baptism — if I may be pardoned for saying it — I can only conclude that all the doctors have been in error from the time of the apostles.”
(Zwingli, Of Baptism, 1525)
Rather than seeing baptism as the biblical moment of forgiveness and new birth (Acts 2:38; Romans 6:3–5), Zwingli redefined it as merely an outward sign of inward faith—a symbolic gesture, no more spiritually significant than a handshake or a ceremony.
Modern scholarship confirms how significant this break was:
* Everett Ferguson notes that Zwingli “broke decisively with earlier Christian tradition,” rejecting the belief that baptism was tied to the forgiveness of sins (Baptism in the Early Church, p. 857).
* Alister McGrath emphasizes that Zwingli’s symbolic theology marked a “major departure” from both Scripture and historic Christian consensus (Reformation Thought, p. 221).
* Philip Schaff records that Zwingli stood almost alone among the early Reformers in so radically minimizing baptism’s meaning (History of the Christian Church, Vol. 8, p. 87).
While Zwingli’s contemporaries like Luther and Calvin rejected this view, his influence grew over time—particularly in American Evangelicalism, where a symbolic-only understanding of baptism became standard.
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Modern Evangelical De-emphasis
Today, many Evangelicals unknowingly inherit Zwingli’s innovation, treating baptism as a “nice outward symbol” but stripping it of any real theological connection to salvation, forgiveness, or union with Christ. Yet this view has far more in common with Zwingli’s 16th-century breakaway theology than with the apostles’ teaching or the early church.
By the 19th and 20th centuries, baptism was no longer seen as a defining moment of faith and salvation but as an optional ceremony—something good to do but in no way essential. This shift wasn’t towards something more biblical; it was driven largely by cultural sentiment.
The Rise of Easy-Believism
The roots of this shift trace back to the revivalism of the 18th and 19th centuries, particularly figures like Charles Finney and the broader Second Great Awakening. Revival preachers, in an effort to produce quick conversions, began emphasizing emotional decisions rather than deliberate, obedient faith.
Salvation was increasingly reduced to “praying the sinner’s prayer,” “asking Jesus into your heart as your personal savior,” and responding to altar calls at tent revivals.
Baptism was no longer the moment one entered Christ—it was simply a public act after a private decision. The deep connection between faith, repentance, and baptism in the New Testament was lost entirely. This shift opened the door to easy-believism—the notion that salvation doesn’t require any significant level of understanding, no covenantal commitment, and certainly no obedient response beyond a few words spoken in a moment of emotion.
One common and shallow objection to baptism’s importance that arose in this environment is the argument about the thief on the cross. People claim, “The thief wasn’t baptized, so baptism must not matter!” But this objection really only serves to portray how deeply rooted the issue of biblical illiteracy is in modern American Christianity.
Jesus, while on earth as the incarnate Word of God, had the authority to directly forgive sins (Mark 2:10). Christian baptism—baptism into Christ’s death, burial, and resurrection (Rom 6:3–5)—was only instituted after the resurrection, under the Great Commission (Matt 28:18–20). The thief on the cross lived under the Old Covenant, not the New Covenant, inaugurated by Christ’s death and resurrection. To use the thief as an argument against Christian baptism is to misunderstand the entire framework of biblical covenants and redemptive history.
This argument exemplifies how far many modern Christians in America have drifted from a biblically informed understanding of salvation. Instead of seriously examining what Scripture teaches, people cling to feel-good slogans and emotional appeals. In the world of easy-believism, baptism became an optional extra—nice if you want it, but certainly not something to tie too closely to salvation.
Anti-Catholic Sentiment
Another major reason for the Evangelical de-emphasis of baptism was deep anti-Catholic sentiment, especially in the post-Reformation and post-Enlightenment periods.
Many Protestants reacted strongly against perceived abuses of Catholic theology—particularly the medieval system of indulgences, sacramental rituals, and the corruption of the Roman hierarchy—and developed an instinctive suspicion toward anything that sounded sacramental. Because of its central place in Catholic practice, baptism became one of the casualties of this reaction.
Instead of carefully re-examining baptism through the lens of Scripture, many Protestant groups simply threw out sacramental language altogether, assuming that anything that wasn’t purely internal, emotional, or mental must necessarily be “works-based salvation.”
In this environment, baptism was increasingly viewed not as a gift of grace or an act of obedient faith but as a “work” of human effort. Salvation became framed almost entirely as mental assent—believing in Jesus internally—with any outward response (like baptism) treated as an unnecessary or even dangerous addition.
Ironically, even Catholics themselves, when properly understood, do not teach that salvation is earned by human works alone. The official Catholic position (especially after the Council of Trent and reaffirmed at Vatican II) is that salvation is by grace alone, through faith working in love—not by mere human effort divorced from divine grace. In Catholic theology, baptism is seen as the ordinary means by which grace is initially applied—not a meritorious act that earns salvation.
Nevertheless, many Evangelicals have created a strawman version of Catholic teaching, caricaturing it as though Catholics believe they can earn heaven through their own goodness or rituals. In reality, both historic Catholicism and historic Protestantism agreed that salvation is fundamentally a work of God’s grace—even though they disagreed sharply about how that grace is applied and how human cooperation relates to it.
By misunderstanding Catholic theology and reacting against it emotionally rather than biblically, many Protestants ended up rejecting baptism’s biblical role simply because it sounded “too Catholic.” The tragedy is that in doing so, they often discarded clear New Testament teaching (Acts 2:38; 1 Peter 3:21; Rom 6:3–5) in favor of a culturally shaped theology more concerned with being non-Catholic than being truly biblical.
Suspicion of sacraments, which has been fueled more by polemics than Scripture, has left the majority of Evangelical American Christianity untethered from the apostolic faith—and with it, they lost the biblical understanding of baptism as the moment of obedient, saving faith.
A Return to Biblical Baptism
In a religious world where baptism has either been elevated into a sacramental ritual detached from personal faith or minimized into a symbolic afterthought, the Restoration Movement sought to cut through the confusion. The goal was simple but radical: Return to the New Testament itself. Let the apostles, not later councils or modern trends, define baptism’s meaning, purpose, and practice.
The Churches of Christ are one of the few modern Christian traditions that consistently uphold the biblical understanding of baptism—as a faith response tied directly to salvation, not as a work of human merit or as a mere symbol.
Baptism by Immersion
Faithful to both the Greek meaning of baptizō (“to immerse”) and the consistent examples of the New Testament, the Churches of Christ have retained immersion as the only valid mode of baptism:
* Jesus came “up out of the water” (Mark 1:10).
* Philip and the Ethiopian eunuch “went down into the water” (Acts 8:38).
* Paul describes baptism as being buried with Christ and raised to walk in new life (Romans 6:3–5)—a powerful image that immersion alone captures.
Sprinkling or pouring, while practiced later in church history, doesn’t match the language or the symbolism of baptism presented by Christ and His apostles.
Baptism Following Faith and Repentance
In every biblical example, baptism follows a personal, conscious decision to believe in Christ and turn from sin:
* “Repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ so that your sins may be forgiven.” (Acts 2:38)
* “They believed Philip as he preached the good news about the kingdom of God and the name of Jesus Christ, and they were baptized.” (Acts 8:12)
Baptism is not administered to infants who are unaware or incapable of belief. It is the faithful response of a heart that has been cut to the core by the gospel (Acts 2:37).
Baptism for the Forgiveness of Sins and New Life
The Churches of Christ affirm what Scripture plainly teaches:
* Baptism is for the forgiveness of sins (Acts 2:38; Acts 22:16).
* Baptism is when one is born of water and Spirit (John 3:5).
* Baptism is when a believer puts on Christ (Galatians 3:27).
* Baptism is when one is buried with Christ and raised with Him through faith (Romans 6:3–5; Colossians 2:12).
Baptism is not an empty ritual or a public celebration of salvation already accomplished. It is the biblical point of transition—where faith meets grace, repentance is sealed, sins are washed away, and new life begins.
Baptism as a Faith-Response, Not a Meritorious Work
Critics often accuse those who teach baptism’s importance of promoting “works-based salvation.” But Scripture teaches that baptism is not a work of man—it is the working of God (Colossians 2:12):
* In baptism, believers do not earn forgiveness; they submit to God’s promises.
* Baptism is an act of faithful obedience, not of personal merit.
The Churches of Christ emphasize that salvation is entirely by God’s grace. Baptism is where that grace is received by faith—not a work done to earn it.
Consistency with the New Testament and Early Church
When we look back through Scripture and early Christian writings like the Didache, Tertullian, and even much of the early patristic witness, we see a view of baptism that matches what the Churches of Christ continue to teach:
* Baptism as immersion.
* Baptism tied to personal faith.
* Baptism as necessary for forgiveness and union with Christ.
Rather than inventing something new or reacting to other traditions, the Churches of Christ simply seek to restore the original teaching and practice—the call to be born again through water and Spirit, in full submission to the gospel.
Conclusion
Baptism is not a human invention. It wasn’t created by church councils, theologians, or revival preachers. It was commanded by Christ Himself, practiced by His apostles, and faithfully embraced by the early church as the moment when faith meets grace, the old life dies, and the new life begins.
The New Testament never treats baptism as optional, symbolic-only, or disconnected from salvation. It ties baptism directly to repentance, forgiveness, rebirth, and union with Christ. The earliest Christians understood this and practiced it—consistently, faithfully, and urgently.
Over the centuries, theology and tradition obscured the original clarity of baptism. Infant baptism arose out of fear and doctrinal development, not apostolic command. Revivalism and anti-Catholic sentiment in later centuries reacted so strongly against perceived errors that they abandoned biblical teaching in the process. Today, many sincere believers are unaware of how far modern views of baptism have drifted from Scripture and the practice of the early church.
The Restoration plea—the heartbeat of the Churches of Christ—is simple: Go back to the Scriptures, to the apostles, to the original faith, once for all delivered to the saints (Jude 1:3).
Baptism is not about getting wet. It’s about dying to sin and being raised with Christ by faith. It’s about trusting the Word of God enough to obey it.
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