|
|
|
WHAT IS BAPTISM FOR THE DEAD? By Chas. F. Baker "Else what shall they do which are baptized for the dead, if the dead rise not at all? Why are they baptized for the dead?" (I Corinthians 15:29). Dozens of interpretations have been given to this verse. Mormonism founds its practice of baptizing in water a living person as a substitute for one who died without being baptized, so that the dead one will be saved. Surely nothing could be farther from the teaching of the Bible than this heathenish practice. It would be useless to go into all of the speculations which men have made in this verse, but we present herewith an explanation which satisfies our mind. There are many baptisms in the Bible. Water is just one of the many. The most important one is that which Christ spoke about in Luke 12:50, where He called His death His baptism. We are baptized into His death baptism. Our important baptism is the Divine baptism into Christ. Since Christ placed this meaning upon baptism and since Peter puts the same construction on baptism in I Peter 3:18 to 22, it is not out of place to read this thought into the verse now be-fore us. Upon so doing we see the point Paul is trying to make. In I Corinthians 15 Paul sets forth the fact of Christ’s resurrection as the hope of the Gospel, and apart from His resurrection, the hopelessness of the believer in Christ. Read vs. 12-19 especially. Then in vs. 29-32 he undertakes to show that if it is vanity for a person to believe in Christ apart from His resurrection, then it is worse than folly to be such as he was, a preacher of the Gospel, who stood in jeopardy every hour, who died daily, who suffered so much for his stand for the Gospel. It is plain to see in these verses that Paul is using figurative language: He didn’t die daily, although he risked his life daily for Christ’s sake; he didn’t fight with actual beasts at Ephesus, but with men who acted like beasts. It is only natural then to look for a figurative meaning in the baptism, such as Christ Himself placed upon it: a suffering or even death. Paul and other preachers were being baptized daily (dying daily) that others might hear the Gospel. But if these believers were never to rise from the dead, why were the apostles submitting themselves to this death baptism? They might as well "eat and drink; for tomorrow we die." The fact that the apostles did endure such suffering for the Gospel (read II Corinthians 4:8-12; 11:23-33; Colossians 1:24) makes evident the fact that they had complete assurance and knowledge of the resurrection of Christ. If Paul suffered this baptism daily, "always bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus,—always delivered unto death for Jesus’ sake", surely it could be said that at the executioner’s block in Rome, he truly suffered this baptism in order that the truth of the Gospel might continue with us. Thank God for such an one as Paul. by Charles F. Baker, Bible Study
for Bereans, May 1937 |
|
