Expert: John of AllFaith - 12/25/2009

Question
I was bought up a Christadelphean but am unconvinced of certain things which they believe. I do believe that there is no salvation without baptism and so find myself wanting to be baptized but feeling i have no religion to be baptized into because i do not agree entirely with all they preach...
Therefore my question is this... if a person understands what it is they are doing and why... can someone baptize himself?

Answer
Hi Jeremy,

Baptism in my opinion/understanding is an evidence that one has been saved. It does not save one. Once a person is saved (once they enter into the New Covenant (B'rit Hadashah) with Jesus as described in Ephesians they are saved:

Eph 2:8  For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God:
Eph 2:9  Not of works, lest any man should boast.
Eph 2:10  For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them.
Eph 2:8  For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God:
Eph 2:9  Not of works, lest any man should boast.
Eph 2:10  For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them.

Baptism is a public declaration of salvation (that one has entered into the New Covenant -- the B'rit Hadashah). Salvation is not of works otherwise we could boast. Baptism is a "work."

There is no example in the Bible of anyone self-baptizing.

Act 10:47  Can any man forbid water, that these should not be baptized, which have received the Holy Ghost as well as we?

Received past tense.

Baptism is a public statement by the person and the baptizer that one has received the Spirit or been saved and entered into the New Covenant relationship with God (and one's congregation/denomination).

As for the Christadelphean denomination, the Church of God is vastly diverse and in my opinion no denomination has everything right. Be honest, seek God, and He will lead you.

Mic 6:6  Wherewith shall I come before the LORD, and bow myself before the high God? shall I come before him with burnt offerings, with calves of a year old?
Mic 6:7  Will the LORD be pleased with thousands of rams, or with ten thousands of rivers of oil? shall I give my firstborn for my transgression, the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul?
Mic 6:8  He hath shewed thee, O man, what is good; and what doth the LORD require of thee, but to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God?

And again,

Mat 22:36  Master, which is the great commandment in the law?
Mat 22:37  Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind.
Mat 22:38  This is the first and great commandment.
Mat 22:39  And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.
Mat 22:40  On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.

Trust God according to the Light you now have and always seek to draw closer to Him. If you have no congregation, pastor or other Believer you feel you can receive the Rite of Baptism from, pray that God will make the opportunity available as he did with the Ethiopian for whom He provided the opportunity in Acts 8:

Act 8:26  And the angel of the Lord spake unto Philip, saying, Arise, and go toward the south unto the way that goeth down from Jerusalem unto Gaza, which is desert.
Act 8:27  And he arose and went: and, behold, a man of Ethiopia, an eunuch of great authority under Candace queen of the Ethiopians, who had the charge of all her treasure, and had come to Jerusalem for to worship,

Act 8:36  And as they went on their way, they came unto a certain water: and the eunuch said, See, here is water; what doth hinder me to be baptized?

Hope this helps,

~ John of AllFaith