Dr Paul Allen

In the New Testament and across Christian tradition, baptism signals at least three realities: Identification with Christ in his life, death, and resurrection (Romans 6:3–4; Colossians 2:12) Purification from sin and its effects, which have separated us from our Maker (Acts 22:16) Incorporation into the body of Christ, the church (Acts 2:41; 1 Corinthians 12:13) Given these connotations, and given the assumption that Christian baptism is new with John the Baptist’s initiation — a baptism received by Christ at the beginning of his earthly ministry to signal its inauguration and association with the dawn of the new covenant — how does Christian baptism relate to Old Testament practices? Where did the idea of baptism come from? After overviewing the meaning of Christian baptism, this article seeks to briefly explore the connections between baptism and Old Testament ritual washings. Buried and Raised with Christ When considering the meaning of baptism, it is essential to distinguish the wo...

Imagine standing before Peter at the pearly gates, waiting to find out if you will be let into Heaven or not. After looking over your resume and commenting about how well you kept the Roman Catholic rules, he double-checks your baptism. You were 8 days old. Your parents took you right away like they were supposed to. The priest sprinkled / poured water on you just like he was taught to do. You thought you were purified from your original sin, but then come to find out the priest did something wrong! Instead of saying “I baptize you in the name of the Father, and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit” he said, “We baptize you in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.” And just like that Peter informs you that your baptism was invalid and that you didn’t partake in an essential sacrament which is the only way that the Roman Catholic Church knows of by which a man can be saved! You might be tempted to think of this as a farfetched idea, one that no one believes, but y...

Some people avoid 1 Peter 3:14–22 since it’s just too strange yet this passage is one of the most compelling in the New Testament—if you understand what it’s saying. 1 Peter 3:14-22 "But even if you should suffer for righteousness’ sake, you will be blessed. Have no fear of them, nor be troubled, but in your hearts regard Christ the Lord as holy, always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you; yet do it with gentleness and respect, having a good conscience, so that, when you are slandered, those who revile your good behavior in Christ may be put to shame. For it is better to suffer for doing good, if that should be God’s will, than for doing evil. For Christ also suffered once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, that he might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh but made alive in the spirit, in which he went and proclaimed to the spirits in prison, because they formerly did not obey, when God’s patience ...

Let's explores the meaning of baptism and how those baptized form a beautiful picture of Jesus and a “present-tense” sign of the gospel—the good news that he has arrived in the world. The apostles read the Old Testament as a preview of Jesus, full of blurry snapshots of the coming Savior. Jesus is the last Adam (Rom 5:12–21). He’s the seed of Abraham, a resurrected Isaac (Heb 11:17–19), the living temple of God (John 1:14; 2:13–22), the son of David (Rom 1:1–4), a prophet like Moses who leads his people in a new exodus from the Egypt of sin and death (Luke 9:31; Acts 3:22; 7:37). Jesus is the key to all the puzzling riddles of the Old Testament. The second-century Greek bishop Irenaeus used a beautiful image to explain this: the Old Testament contains the fragments of a mosaic; when you put all the pieces together, the mosaic portrays the face of a handsome prince, Jesus, the Prince of Peace.1 The church fathers called the Old Testament fragments “types” (from the Greek, typoi) and...

You’ve been baptized. But do you understand what it means? All Christians use water to baptize. But the sacrament that is meant to unite us is often a spring of division instead. Peter Leithart reunifies a church divided by baptism. He recovers the baptismal imagination of the Bible, explaining how baptism works according to Scripture. Then, in conversation with Christian tradition, he shows why baptism is something worth recovering and worth agreeing on. All Christians use water to baptize. All invoke the triune name. Beyond that, there’s little consensus. Talk about baptism and you’re immediately plunged into arguments. Whom should we baptize? What does baptism do? Why even do it at all? Is water baptism necessary for conversion or salvation? This question arises because baptism in water features in every initiation story, at least after the Pentecostal coming of the Spirit on the one hundred and twenty. This apparent lacuna we explained was probably because Luke is describing the si...

I was baptized before conversion. Should I be baptized again after coming to faith? No one is ever required to be baptized again. Baptism, by its very nature, can only happen once. Now, of course, the people who want to baptize you after you come to faith don’t believe you’ve really been baptized before. They would say that they are not promoting being baptized again; they are promoting being baptized, properly, once. There are some groups who actually do talk about being baptized again, but that is to misunderstand the fundamental nature of baptism. Baptism is a sacrament that speaks of the reality that the Christian life has a beginning. You pass from death to life. You pass from unbelief to faith. The sacrament of baptism marks that reality in a profound way for the Christian. To say you could be baptized over and over again would implicitly say that you could pass from death to life over and over again, which is not at all what we believe. So, the singularity of baptism as the sacr...

When Does Salvation Start? Are we justified before, in, or after baptism? Are we united to Christ? Do we become one with Christ, and does God become 100% for us before, in, or after baptism?” Because in the New Testament, the word saved is used for what happens before, in, and after baptism. Ephesians 2:8: We “have been saved.” 1 Corinthians 1:18: We “are being saved.” Romans 13:11:“Salvation is nearer to us now than when we first believed.” Being saved happened before is happening now, and will happen finally in the future. The word salvation in the New Testament is broad and includes pieces of salvation. But what’s really being asked is “When did it all start? When was the first moment of union with Christ — the moment of justification, which is not a process like sanctification is, but is decisive?” “If God is for us, who can be against us?” (Romans 8:31). When did that start? At what point does God count us a child — not a child of wrath, which we all are by nat...

The term baptism translates the Greek noun baptisma; the verb is baptizo. Baptizo means to immerse or dip. Besides the practice of baptism, baptizo is used in the NT for ceremonial washing (Mark 7:4; Luke 11:38). It is also used metaphorically in a number of ways (Matt 20:22; 1 Cor 10:2; 1 Pet 3:19–21).  1. Background. Christianity was not the only religion to practice baptism. In fact, during the NT era several different groups used some form of baptism in their religious rites to attain the removal of guilt, moral cleansing, and a new birth or start.  The Oriental mystery religions of that day used some form of immersion, at times in blood, as an initiation rite into their communities. The Jews began at about the time of Jesus to require a ritual bath, or baptism, of its Gentile converts seven days after circumcision. Also the sectarian Jewish community of Qumran (famous for the Dead Sea Scrolls) had a highly developed practice of religious washings, which included...

if we were to start reading the New Testament from the beginning, we would not be able to get very far before we encountered something called baptism. As early as Matthew 3:1, we run into a man by the name of John, who is otherwise known as “the baptizer,” and, a few verses later, we see why. This John, we are told, devotes his life to “baptizing” many different people (vv. 6, 7, 11), the Lord Jesus Himself being one of them (vv. 13–17). The baptisms that we encounter in these early chapters of Matthew’s gospel are described simply as occurring. Very little explanation is given as to how they were performed or why they were performed. We are left to conclude that the practice of “baptism,” whatever it is, must have been something that was familiar to Matthew’s Jewish audience in the first century. The same thing can be said for all the baptisms that we see in the New Testament. Thus, when Jesus commands His followers to go and make disciples in Matthew 28:18–20, He instructs them to...

If we were to start reading the New Testament from the beginning, we would not be able to get very far before we encountered something called baptism. As early as Matthew 3:1 , we run into a man by the name of John, who is otherwise known as “the baptizer,” and, a few verses later, we see why. This John, we are told, devotes his life to “baptizing” many different people (vv. 6, 7, 11), the Lord Jesus Himself being one of them (vv. 13–17). The baptisms that we encounter in these early chapters of Matthew’s gospel are described simply as occurring. Very little explanation is given as to how they were performed or why they were performed. We are left to conclude that the practice of “baptism,” whatever it is, must have been something that was familiar to Matthew’s Jewish audience in the first century. The same thing can be said for all the baptisms that we see in the New Testament. Thus, when Jesus commands His followers to go and make disciples in Matthew 28:18–20 , He instructs them ...

Archaeologists recently announced the discovery of a 1,500-year-old pool that may have been the site of the Ethiopian eunuch ’s baptism. Unearthed between 2012 and 2016, the pool was part of a system of pools on the site of an ancient church near Jerusalem. It’s now part of at Ein Hanniya national park. Ancient Pool Unearthed According to the Israel Antiquities Authority , the pools date back from between the 4th and 6th centuries A.D. The excavation director, Irina Zilberbod, said the pools were the most significant finding in the excavation. “This pool was built in the center of a spacious complex at the foot of a church that once stood here. Roofed colonnades were built around the pool that gave access to residential wings.” “It’s difficult to know what the pool was used for — whether for irrigation, washing, landscaping or perhaps as part of baptismal ceremonies at the site,” Zilberbod continued. She noted that the pool’s water drained to a fountain. The fountain is the first o...