Quote:
Originally Posted by Chewy
99% of all people baptized, at least in my experience, are scriptural and spiritual infants and thus do not know or understand the the depth of what their baptism means, names being said, what to think, what to say, what to do and all having a cultural point of reference, during the whole process.
Unfortunately, many Apostolics turn baptisms into religious propaganda instead of making it about the person being baptized. They look it as one more person being converted into the church and TRUTH instead of one person starting a brand new life in the Lord Jesus. This is why only a small percentage of folks baptized stick beyond one year or beyond.
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I am on the prayer team for the Monday Night Growth and Healing meetings at the Vineyard Church in Springdale, OH. Springdale is a city in the northern part of Hamilton County here in the Greater Cincinnati area of Ohio. It is to the north and east of the city of Forest Park where I live. A young man (in his forties) is in one of the small groups at the Vineyard and has been going to the Vineyard for several years. We often talk and and some times he asks me to pray for him. A while back he told me that he had been to the Calvary Church on Kenn Road and that he had been baptized there. I asked him what name they baptized him in or what they said when they baptized him and he did not remember. Calvary Church is in Springdale and is near his home in Forest Park. The pastor is Norman Paslay (son of the late Norman and Mary Alice Paslay). It is a UPC church and has been since it was established in 1968. I knew the Paslays. They were assistant pastors in the church where I went from 1957 to 1963 or 64.
My whole point is just to agree with what was posted by Chewy above. This young man was baptized in Jesus' name but had no idea that his baptism was anything different than any other immersion that he had seen any where else.