Because I said so… and other good reasons not to get baptized.

I heard it my fair share of times when I was young: Because I said so, that’s why. After all, she was my mom. If she told me to do the dishes, I did the dishes. If she told me to fold laundry, I folded laundry. If she told me to vacuum the living room carpet, I did.

But when I sat down with Nathan and asked him why he wanted to be baptized, because you told me to, was the last thing I wanted him to say. Fortunately, that’s not what he said. But for many of the people I’ve counseled on baptism, most of what they know—or don’t know—is based on what their dad, or pastor, or church, or friend, or catechism says about baptism.

Getting baptized because someone told you that you should is a bad plan.

In fact, simply parroting the old Sunday school song, for the Bible tells me so, is also inadequate. Instead, consider a simple survey of what the Bible actually does say about baptism. If your Bible has a concordance in the back, it will direct you to some of the most common passages that refer to baptism. For a more complete list, search on biblegateway.com for the word “baptize.”

Take time to read the stories surrounding these New Testament references and ask the following questions for each story:

1. Who in the story is being baptized? or Who does this passage say should be baptized? Try and identify as many characteristics of these people as the text provides.
2. Why does it say they should be baptized? Look for key words like “for” and “so.” These indicate a reason for the action will follow.
3. When were they baptized? When was it in relationship to the occasion of their belief?
4. What was the result? What happened after they were baptized?

Don’t take my word for it, or your church’s. Take a look for yourself at what the Bible really says about baptism.

Getting baptized because your friends are is even worse.

As I got older, I started coming home from hanging out with my friends with some brilliant ideas. I wanted a mohawk. I wanted to spray paint my 1982 Ford Escort sunset yellow with cheap paint from the hardware store. I wanted to go skydiving.

All my friends were doing all these things. So, why shouldn’t I?

And my mom had something to say about that too. She posed her response as a pretty matter-of-fact question: “If all your friends wanted to jump off a bridge, would you do that too?” Of course, we had considered jumping off bridges, but the answer she was looking for was a resounding no.

And she was right. Doing other things, even if they seem like a good idea, because your friends are doing it, is a bad plan. And getting baptized because all the people in your youth group, or Sunday school class, or small group are doing it, is even worse.

Here’s how I know that to be true: because, on many occasions, I’ve sat in my office with 19- and 20-year-olds who have said to me something like, “Eric, when I was a kid, everyone my age got baptized… so I did too… but I didn’t really know what I was doing… I didn’t do it because I wanted to or because I thought it was right. I did it because I didn’t want to be the only person who didn’t.”

Now to be fair, a lot of churches only make baptismal services available at certain times or to certain ages of kids. But if you’re at that place, asking that question, make sure it’s your decision and no one else’s.

Getting baptized so you will be saved is bad theology.

Baptism does not save you. I’ll repeat it: baptism does not save you.

Ephesians 2:8 says, “For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God.”

Our salvation is a gift from God. It is offered to us by His grace, meaning that we get it even though we don’t deserve it. And salvation comes through faith: believing that Jesus died to pay the penalty for our sin, and was raised to life to overcome the grip of death, and trusting in that alone.

Jesus Christ is the only way of salvation.

For ten years I worked in campus ministry with Matt Schantz. He was the first person who directed me to the Scriptures to study baptism. In fact, he baptized me. But he also cautioned me with this on more than one occasion: “If baptism saved people,” he said, “if water and words saved people—then we’d set up a sprinkler and sound system on the sidewalk on campus. But baptism doesn’t save people, Jesus does.”

 

Have you been baptized? Why did you decide to do it?