The 5 Minute Conversation that Changed Everything

A I grew up in a Baptist church. I attended Christian (Baptist) schools from the 2 grade on. I graduated from a Christian college with a 4 year degree in a Christian major. I attended daily Bible classes and weekly chapel services for 15 years, on top of church every time the doors were opened which was a minimum of 3 services a week plus Awana. I completed all requirements of the Association of Christian Schools International for teacher certification in the subject area of Bible. Like most Baptists, I knew what I believed and I was sure that what I believed was right. For 8 years I worked as a summer missionary for Child Evangelism Fellowship, traveling around Northern California harvesting young souls for the kingdom. In my tenure there, I personally lead more than 500 children to Christ. Fast forward a few years and I was happily using my training and experience with my own children and the children in my church and community. As a leader in children’s ministry, I have long promoted a variety of local opportunities for children to those in my sphere of influence. In the early years of our local Awana club, only one local church offered Vacation Bible School. My children attended each year and I gladly recommended it to Awana and church families. In 2008, an Awana parent approached me about the statement of faith that had been sent home from VBS with her son. Since I had recommended the program, I felt it was my responsibility to do a little due diligence to see what specifically was being taught. I sat down with a recent seminary graduate who had only taken the pastorate a few months before. I needed to understand a bit more about the Gospel according to his brand of Christianity. It appeared from the written material that they were probably teaching salvation by baptism. In the course of our brief conversation, he assured me that they did not teach that baptism saves. He in fact believed in salvation by grace through faith. They did practice baptism as the way in which saving faith was demonstrated and a person entered ‘God’s eternal family’ as they phrased it. While he couldn’t really imagine a scenario in which a person would be unable to be baptized, he did concede that a person who demonstrates saving faith with no opportunity for baptism would still be saved. Then he asked me a question that changed my whole world. “How do you do it?” Of course, I knew exactly how I did it. I had my Gospel presentation down to a science with at least a dozen verses and references at my disposal. And I knew exactly how I closed the deal - the sinner’s prayer. But in that moment I realized something for the first time in my life. I had all of those verses to support my Gospel presentation but I had no Biblical foundation for the sinner’s prayer. It was a startling revelation. I could quote all of the verses that support baptism (his method) but not one to support a practice I had accepted without question for my entire life and career in children’s ministry. Ironically, though I had never questioned the use of it, I had personally struggled with the sinner’s prayer from the age of 4. It always left me with doubt which I tried to fix by repeating the process again and again. In my training, we learned to address this issue by attempting to give children the assurance of their salvation using a couple of verses, one of which (Rev. 3:20) everyone admitted had to be taken completely out of context to use in the manner in which we used it. But no matter. We had a formula that worked. Children were easily brought to a saving knowledge of Jesus Christ using this method and wasn’t that all that really mattered? After that encounter with the young vicar, I began to rethink much of what I was taught to do in light of my own experience as a child and I was devastated. Those 500+ children that I had evangelized but never discipled, had I given them bad information? I had no good answers. I took my concerns to a pastor friend. He assured me that God meets us where we are and if we take a step toward Him in faith, He will honor that. Perhaps he was right. What I now know that I didn’t know before is that many Christians who use Baptism as the means of conversion don’t believe that it is Baptism that saves. They believe the same Gospel I believe. They believe as it says in Ephesians 2:8-9 that salvation is by GRACE through FAITH not of WORKS. Baptism is not salvation by works any more than repeating the sinner’s prayer is salvation by works because neither saves. It is faith in the completed work of Christ on the cross for the forgiveness of sins that saves. I can find no Scriptural basis for condemning the use Baptism as a means of demonstrating saving faith any more than I can find Scriptural basis in support of the sinner’s prayer. One could write volumes on the doctrines of both Salvation and Baptism but that far exceeds the scope of this piece. My concern is not with the theology but with Baptists and others who insist that everyone else is getting it wrong while they are getting it right. This came up at summer camp. A Professor of Theology at the school I attended to complete the requirements for my ACSI certification attacked the theology of one of my 16 year old students. He probably didn’t know some of the young people in attendance were affiliated with the churches he was scrutinizing. He probably didn’t understand that he was attacking the most important and meaningful event in her life - the day she was baptized and made the decision by faith to accept the shed blood of Christ for the atonement of her sins and she determined she would live the rest of her life as a committed Christian. I can have grace for his mistake but I do wonder if he would consider it a mistake.

I am not going to debate theology with a professor or anyone else for that matter, but I am going to stand up for my kids. As I’ve said many times before, they are all my kids. This should not have happened. If you want to engage in the practice of undermining Christian theology with which you disagree, do it within the confines of your own church. Not at summer camp. Not with my kids.