Articles
Critical Thinking Skills - 7
Another challenge to our critical thinking skills in understanding the will of God is when the Bible seems contradictory. If we truly understand the concept of inspiration, we know that the ultimate source of Scripture is not man but God – or more accurately, the Holy Spirit, who is the divine agent of revelation. What this practically means is that when passages seem to be at odds, the fault is ours. We are missing one or more key components that, when accounted for, will allow the apparent contradictions to harmonize.
But finding those key components might not be easy. Various obstacles obscure the clarity of the text: first and foremost is our own ignorance followed by unfamiliar cultural features or expressions, contextual nuancescri confusing translation issues, misguided assumptions, etc. I have a 600 page book in my library called When Critics Ask (Geisler and Howe), and another 350 page volume, When Skeptics Ask (Geisler and Brooks), both of which deal with difficulties of the text or doctrine. Even among Christians there have been debates since the early centuries on how to rectify various sticking points of Scripture.
There are many ways to illustrate this, but let’s return to the topic addressed in our last article – baptism. How do we reconcile “There is one body … one Lord, one faith, one baptism …” (Eph 4:4-5) with references to John’s baptism (Lk 3:3; Mt 3:1-6); baptism with the Holy Spirit (Ac 1:5; 11:16); Jesus’ own baptism (Mt 3:13-17); Jesus’ baptism of suffering (Mt 20:22-23; Lk 12:50) and the “doctrines of baptisms” (Heb 6:2)? At first glance this may appear to be a hodgepodge of hopeless contradiction. Is there one baptism, or many? If one, which one?
With the exercise of critical thinking, this is not that difficult to work through, but it does take some careful analysis. Consider the following:
1. The basic definition of baptism. The Greek word for baptism is baptisma and means to immerse one in something, whether figuratively or literally. The spelling of the Greek word reveals that it was transliterated into English rather than translated by an equivalent word – like submerge, immerse or plunge. Vine defines baptism as “consisting of the processes of immersion, submersion and emergence (from bapto, ‘to dip’).” Literally, the word means covered beneath a substance: “buried with him through baptism into death” (Rom 6:4) means submerged in water akin to Christ’s own entombment. Figuratively, Jesus was to be inundated with suffering in the events of the crucifixion, a complete overwhelming, not a partial experience. So, the word baptism itself doesn’t suggest the element beneath which one is overwhelmed. Context must determine that.
2. John’s baptism. As noted in our last article, John’s baptism was temporary in time (until the new covenant began in Acts 2) and limited in scope (only for Jews whose hearts John was preparing via repentance to accept the Messiah and His spiritual kingdom). This baptism is no longer valid as it fulfilled its purpose, much in the same way that the Law of Moses is no longer valid since its purpose was realized in Christ.
3. Jesus’ baptism by John. Jesus, in compliance with God’s will, submitted to this baptism even though the purpose of John’s immersion didn’t apply to Him; i.e., He had no sin to repent of, and He was the inaugurator of the kingdom, not a potential citizen of it (cf. John’s hesitation to baptize Jesus in Mt 3:14-15). While we can learn some things from Jesus’ baptism, it does not standardize John’s baptism today.
4. Jesus’ baptism of suffering. Jesus uses this terminology when James and John petition Him for top ranking in the kingdom above their fellow apostles (Mt 20:20-23). Jesus meets this head on: “You do not know what you ask.” Their request was born of ill motives (pride/competitiveness) and completely deficient in understanding of what a leading role in the kingdom meant; i.e., suffering rather than earthly glory. So Jesus questioned them: “Are you able to drink the cup that I am about to drink, and be baptized with the baptism that I am baptized with? They said to Him, ‘We are able.’” Jesus’ reference has nothing to do with obeying a command. Rather, He is merely pointing to the horrors that will befall Him, and any of His “generals” must likewise be willing to suffer. In spite of the apostles’ insistence, they are not as ready as they think they are – evidenced later by their flight when Jesus is arrested.
5. The baptism of the apostles with the Holy Spirit. This is a promise Jesus made to the apostles in order to fully equip them for the tasks He will lay upon them as His global ambassadors. A major mistake some believers make in this regard is to completely disconnect the nature and purpose of the promise from its intended target: the original apostles and two exceptions, one explicit and one implicit. First, the apostles occupied a non-successive role in the early kingdom: they were specially chosen and trained by the Lord, being eyewitnesses of His miracles and teaching (cf. Ac 1:21-26). Their work was exclusive and contemporary with each other, and the Holy Spirit was given to them on the Day of Pentecost as the Lord had promised (Acts 2).
Exception #1: When the first Gentiles were invited into the kingdom, there was a unique outpouring of the Spirit upon Cornelius and his household that Peter describes thusly: “the Holy Spirit fell upon them, as upon us at the beginning … If therefore God gave them the same gift as He gave us when we believed …” (Ac 11:15-17). Exceptions prove the rule, and Peter acknowledges several years after the kingdom came into existence that he witnessed something in this moment that he hadn’t seen since the beginning and which reminded him of Jesus’ promise that “you shall be baptized with the Holy Spirit” (11:16). It was unsought and unexpected.
Exception #2: Paul’s baptism in the Holy Spirit as an apostle “born out of due time” (1 Cor 15:6) is implicit as it is not described anywhere in the NT. It is clear from passages such as 2 Cor 12:12 that he was so endowed.
6. Baptism into Christ via immersion in water. This is the only baptism that is relevant today; it is a command to be obeyed (as noted in our last article). Paul refers to it as the “one baptism” in Eph 4:5 because it was the only one operative when he wrote that epistle. It is universal for believers: “For by one Spirit we were all baptized into one body – whether Jews or Greeks, whether slaves or free – and have all been made to drink into one Spirit” (1 Cor 12:13; cf. also Gal 3:26-27). There is no contingency that makes it temporary; believers today still enter into Christ via baptism.
