Immersion

I know some ministers who have a log of all the baptisms they have officiated. I don’t know if it revokes my “man of the cloth” card or not but I’ve never logged in, kept records or counted how many hungry souls I have assisted in their new birth. I’m with Paul, “…I don’t remember if I baptized anyone else.) For Christ did not send me to baptize, but to preach the gospel… (1 Corinthians 1:16, 17).” However, I do remember some significant moments like snapshots in a picture album. I have immersed people into Christ in pools, baptisteries, lakes, bathtubs and now for the first time last Sunday in a baptistery where I stood outside and the candidate inside the water. It was also the first time that I set aside my planned sermon and spent my allotted time giving witness to the beauty and meaning of baptism… unscripted and from the heart. Rob, a recovering addict seemed to take it all in and after being immersed and standing next to George Moore who had been instrumental in leading him to Christ gave one of those memorable witnesses to the beauty and power of baptism. Rob whispered to George before he prayed over him, “I didn’t realize that I would feel so good!”
New life… the hope of the resurrection inaugurated… sins remitted… and heaven rejoicing filled the air of the evening as one and all embraced our new brother in Christ. However, lingering in the back of my mind ever so faintly was the scourge of legalism that has tainted many a celebration of the kingdom. You see, I was assured that there was plenty of water in the baptistery but the one filling it had forgotten to calculate that Rob being slight of build would not displace as much water as some of us more cheese burger endowed souls. So, when I immersed Rob the tip of his nose did not go under the water. I remember as a young preacher baptizing a young girl in the Navarro river and someone shouting from the bank, “She’ll have to be immersed again her hair floated to the top and didn’t go under!” Whether it was the right thing to do or not, I’m not sure, but I shouted back, “She’ll go to heaven bald!” My point is that even though some know that baptism is not about externals their attention to details makes them swallow camels while they strain out gnats (Matthew 23:24).
Now, do I think that Rob is going to heaven without a nose? The answer is as my granddaughter says, “Silly, silly Poppies!” Immersion is not in exactness or by ritual it is as Peter so succinctly writes, “…baptism that now saves you also –not the removal of dirt from the body but the pledge of a good conscience toward God. It saves you by the resurrection of Jesus Christ, who has gone into heaven and is at God’s right hand –with angels, authorities and powers in submission to him (1 Peter 3:21, 22)” It’s about submission powered by a heart that’s at peace because it knows Jesus is the way, the truth and the life! -DAN