Sudsy wrote: ↑Fri Jan 14, 2022 11:49 am
What has full beards got to do with the topic ? Curious.
Well, if you get either poured upon or submersed, a full beard can trap quite a bit of water.
Good reason if one is into conserving water, I guess. Quakers and Salvation Army believers would then be leading the way as they don't baptise in water. I wonder how many water baptised believers would still regard them as Christian.
Sudsy wrote: ↑Fri Jan 14, 2022 11:49 am
What has full beards got to do with the topic ? Curious.
Well, if you get either poured upon or submersed, a full beard can trap quite a bit of water.
Good reason if one is into conserving water, I guess. Quakers and Salvation Army believers would then be leading the way as they don't baptise in water. I wonder how many water baptised believers would still regard them as Christian.
Well, I can't see anywhere in the scripture that you're only born again and a follower of Jesus if you do certain religious sacraments. Of course we should get baptised - but salvation seems to come first. Lots of believers never end up following Jesus 100% in every area of their lives.
For those interested here is General Booth the founder of the Salvation Army on the sacraments -
William Booth on the Sacraments
(from ‘The General’s New Year address to officers’– The War Cry 17 January 1883)
TALKING about churches leads me to another question, which I know is of some interest to all of you, and to many others – viz, the Sacraments.
Here we will make a statement which will help to dismiss any serious anxiety from your minds very considerably, I have no doubt, as it has done with us, and this is one in which I think you will all agree.
The Sacraments must not, nay, they cannot, rightly be regarded as conditions of salvation. If you make them essentials, if you say that men cannot get to Heaven without being baptised with water, or without ‘breaking bread’, as it is called, where there is the opportunity of doing so, then you shut out from that holy place a multitude of men and women who have been and are today sincere followers of the Lord Jesus Christ, who honestly believe his words and earnestly strive to keep them. This would be a very great calamity, and I cannot accept it for a moment.
I think you will perceive that any order from me for the general administration of the Sacraments would be likely to produce grave dissensions. There is a very great and widespread difference of opinion with regard to the modes of administration – one half of the religious world denying in to to the efficacy of the Sacraments as administered by the other half. Our Baptist friends, for instance, contend that baptism as administered to infants by the Church of England, Methodists, and others, is no baptism at all, and when we gave consent for some of our people to take part in the Church of England sacrament, the clergyman who invited them seized the opportunity for showing them that they were only in part qualified to receive the ordinance, seeing that part had been confirmed, and a part not. Another gentleman of very high position recommended that that part of our people who had not been confirmed should go to the dissenters for the ordinance, while the portion who had been confirmed should go to the church. This you will see would have divided us at the very door of the church. Here would have been a very great difficulty at once.
Now if the Sacraments are not conditions of salvation, if there is a general division of opinion as to the proper mode of administering them, and if the introduction of them would create division of opinion and heart-burning, and if we are not professing to be a church, nor aiming at being one, but simply a force for aggressive salvation purposes, is it not wise for us to postpone any settlement of the question, to leave it over to some future day, when we shall have more light, and see more clearly our way before us?
Meanwhile, we do not prohibit our own people in any shape or form from taking the Sacraments. We say, ‘If this is a matter of your conscience, by all means break bread.’ The churches and chapels all round about will welcome you for this, but in our own ranks let us be united, and go on our way, and mind our own business. Let us remember him who died for us continually. Let us remember his love every hour of our lives, and continually feed on him – not on Sundays only, and then forget him all the week, but let us by faith eat his flesh and drink his blood continually; and ‘whatsoever you do, whether you eat or drink, do all to the glory of God’.
And further, there is one baptism on which we are all agreed –the one baptism of the Bible – that is the baptism of the Holy Ghost, of which baptism John spoke as vastly superior and more important than the baptism of water, when he said, ‘I indeed baptise you with water, but One cometh after me whose shoe’s latchet I am not worthy to unloose; he shall baptise you with the Holy Ghost and with fire.’
Be sure you insist upon that baptism. Be sure you enjoy that baptism yourselves, and be sure you insist upon it for your people, not only for the adults but for the children.
I would maintain that baptism is not a sacrament, but rather an observance, or a simple act of obedience. As it is used here, however, it is probably just a difference in definition of terms.
Oxford Lexico:
(in the Christian Church) a religious ceremony or ritual regarded as imparting divine grace, such as baptism, the Eucharist and (in the Roman Catholic and many Orthodox Churches) penance and the anointing of the sick.
However, Merriam-Webster says
: a Christian rite (such as baptism or the Eucharist) that is believed to have been ordained by Christ and that is held to be a means of divine grace or to be a sign or symbol of a spiritual reality
I would accept the first part of their definition, but I think that they cross beyond the meaning of the word in the latter part. I understand the part about "imparting divine grace" or "a means of grace" to describe the core meaning, with the church itself as the vehicle for this "transfer of grace". Maybe I'm just influenced by my studies in anthropology and ethnology, because a religious rite would be understood in that way (to my memory, at least). I'm just leery of the idea that the church is imparting grace. I think the focus should be on God alone, as the actor or agent of the benefits that come from obedience.
But is there a fundamental difference between baptism and communion such that adherence to historical practice and biblical meaning is important for baptism but unimportant for communion?
A lot of the Anabaptist groups that have deep-seated disagreement on the question of baptism seem perfectly comfortable swapping out grape juice for wine when it comes to communion. When Jesus was pretty clearly and indisputably talking about wine.
Is not the substitution of sprinkling or pouring for immersion in the same category as substituting juice for wine? In that it is the symbolism and ritual that is important, not the precise historical details? Or are these two rites different in some fundamental way that I don’t understand?
0 x
A fool can throw out more questions than a wise man can answer. -RZehr
Sudsy wrote: ↑Fri Jan 14, 2022 11:49 amWhat has full beards got to do with the topic ? Curious.
I think the first posting about this was to advertise that some people take their convictions seriously, whether it be full beards or submersion.
Others that have neither full beard nor been submersed have convictions that we take seriously also but they are of a different nature.
Come to think of it... This would be an interesting thread/poll...
When it comes to beards: To poll or not to poll, that is the question.
It is of course a less common definition.
intransitive verb: To trim or cut off the hair transitive verb: To cut off; to remove by clipping, shearing, etc.; to mow or crop; -- sometimes with off transitive verb: To cut or shave smooth or even; to cut in a straight line without indentation
Well, if you get either poured upon or submersed, a full beard can trap quite a bit of water.
Good reason if one is into conserving water, I guess. Quakers and Salvation Army believers would then be leading the way as they don't baptise in water. I wonder how many water baptised believers would still regard them as Christian.
Well, I can't see anywhere in the scripture that you're only born again and a follower of Jesus if you do certain religious sacraments. Of course we should get baptised - but salvation seems to come first. Lots of believers never end up following Jesus 100% in every area of their lives.
What would you do with the following scripture?
Mar_16:16 He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved...
Why if immersion is not necessary (I will continue to use the translation to avoid confusion) were all of the new believers immersed immediately on the day of Pentecost and again each time we read of new believers? Seems to be more than just an option, don't you think?
Ken wrote: ↑Fri Jan 14, 2022 1:25 pm
This is an honest question.
But is there a fundamental difference between baptism and communion such that adherence to historical practice and biblical meaning is important for baptism but unimportant for communion?
A lot of the Anabaptist groups that have deep-seated disagreement on the question of baptism seem perfectly comfortable swapping out grape juice for wine when it comes to communion. When Jesus was pretty clearly and indisputably talking about wine.
Is not the substitution of sprinkling or pouring for immersion in the same category as substituting juice for wine? In that it is the symbolism and ritual that is important, not the precise historical details? Or are these two rites different in some fundamental way that I don’t understand?
You nailed it Ken and Jesus commented on it as well:
Mar_7:13 Making the word of God of none effect through your tradition, which ye have delivered: and many such like things do ye.
Ken wrote: ↑Fri Jan 14, 2022 1:25 pm
This is an honest question.
But is there a fundamental difference between baptism and communion such that adherence to historical practice and biblical meaning is important for baptism but unimportant for communion?
A lot of the Anabaptist groups that have deep-seated disagreement on the question of baptism seem perfectly comfortable swapping out grape juice for wine when it comes to communion. When Jesus was pretty clearly and indisputably talking about wine.
Is not the substitution of sprinkling or pouring for immersion in the same category as substituting juice for wine? In that it is the symbolism and ritual that is important, not the precise historical details? Or are these two rites different in some fundamental way that I don’t understand?
The only significant Anabaptist group that requires immersion are German Baptists, and they use wine. Usually one brother ferments it once a year, so it’s “new wine”, often pungent.
Once I was with a group of Brethren discussing favourite smells. One of them said his favourite is that of the communion wine; strong and sour, which reminded him of our Lord’s passion and suffering.
Of course, us Holdemans use grape juice. We also pour. Most Old Orders use wine.
Quakers and Salvation Army believers would then be leading the way as they don't baptise in water. I wonder how many water baptised believers would still regard them as Christian.