Articles
More Bible Questions
More Bible Questions
By Paul R. Blake
One visitor to our website asked the following question: "Will God save a person who has faith in Christ as his personal Savior but has never been baptized?"
Answer: Mark 16:16 - “He who believes and is baptized will be saved; but he who does not believe will be condemned.” Did Jesus make baptism necessary for salvation? What are the conditions for salvation in this text? Believe and be baptized. The argument has been made that Jesus didn’t restate baptism in the second part of His statement; therefore, baptism is not a necessary condition for salvation. This is neither sound nor logical reasoning. When one states two conditions of a desired result and one of the conditions has not been met, it is not necessary to restate both conditions in the negative. The loss of a single condition is sufficient to void the desired result.
Consider the following illustration: A young boy is told to behave all evening and take his bath; and if he does, he will be permitted to go to the carnival tomorrow. It is easy to understand that he needs to do both in order to go to the carnival. If he doesn’t behave, he doesn’t get to go; it doesn’t matter at that point whether he takes his bath or not. If he does not take his bath, he will not get to go; it doesn’t matter that he behaved. We understand that based on the instructions, he had to do both. Leave either condition out and the conditions for going to the carnival have not been met.
Jesus said: “He who believes and is baptized will be saved; but he who does not believe will be condemned.” (Mark 16:16) The Divine Son of God put two conditions in that statement: believe and be baptized. Leave belief out of the statement, and it doesn’t matter whether one is baptized. Leave baptism out of Jesus statement, and it doesn’t matter whether one believes. Both conditions must be met if one wants to meet the conditions Jesus set for salvation. I recommend doing what Jesus said without modification. Thank you for your question. I hope this helps.
A young evangelist sent the following question by email: I'd like to know all your thoughts and information about what is meant when Jesus was on the cross and said "My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me." I hear it said a lot that God at that point had to then His back on Jesus because He "became sin" and "took our sins on Himself. I personally don't think that might have been the case or meaning of Jesus saying that. I could be wrong. I'd like your help in studying this. Thanks in advance!
Answer: I will not diminish the cry of our Lord by trying to re-explain it as an intellectual exercise in which He tries to make sure He has check-listed all of the Old Testament prophecies about Him. I believe that just as He was pleading intensely and emotionally in the Garden to avoid the cross, so also He was feeling intensely alone and expressing those feelings on thee cross. The fact that the Psalmists by inspiration expressed their emotions, fears, and doubts to God does not mean that they lost their faith; it means that they were overwhelmed with fear and sorrow and were pleading for help. So also, the fact that Jesus cried out "Why have You forsaken Me?" speaks to how much He was suffering, not whether God had actually left him.
It must be understood that as the sacrifice for sin and as the One who was carrying the burden of our sin, God had to abandon Jesus to that fate. In as much as the Passover lamb is given over to death, and the scapegoat is chased off into the wilderness are both forsaken, so Jesus as the Passover lamb and scapegoat Who carried our sins had to be abandoned to die and sent away. That is Biblical.
I do not subscribe to the two contemporary schools of thought that intellectualize the temptations and emotions of Jesus, or who impose their personal paradigm of Jesus over what is written. Prayer is supposed to be an intensely honest and emotionally invested activity. To pretend to pray to God about being forsaken on the cross without wrestling with the feeling of being forsaken is dishonest. It is up to us to learn why He said it without preconceived notions of who we think Jesus is. I hope this helps.
Hoarding Yesterday’s Hate
People that have trust issues only need to look in the mirror. There they will meet the one person that will betray them the most. The more you talk about it, rehash it, rethink it, cross analyze it, debate it, respond to it, get paranoid about it, compete with it, complain about it, immortalize it, cry over it, kick it, defame it, stalk it, gossip about it, pray over it, put it down, or dissect its motives it continues to rot in your brain. It is dead. It is over. It is gone. It is done. It is time to bury it because it is smelling up your life and no one wants to be near your rotted corpse of memories and decaying attitude. Be the funeral director of your life and bury that thing!
People that hold onto hate for so long do so because they want to avoid dealing with their pain. They falsely believe if they forgive they are letting their enemy believe they are a doormat. What they don’t understand is hatred can’t be isolated or turned off. It manifests in their health, choices, and faith. Their values and religious beliefs make adjustments to justify their negative emotions. Not unlike malware infesting a hard drive, their spirit slowly becomes corrupted and they make choices that don’t make logical sense to others. Hatred left unaddressed will crash a person’s spirit. The only thing he or she can do is to reboot, by fixing him or herself, not others. This might require installing a firewall of boundaries or parental controls on their emotions. Regardless of the approach, we are all connected on this "network of life" and each of us is responsible for cleaning up our spiritual registry.
Blame doesn't empower you. It keeps you stuck in a place you don't want to be because you don't want to make the temporary, but painful decision, to be responsible for the outcome of your own life's happiness. (Shannon Alder)
A Moments Wisdom
--The secret of being interesting is in being interested.
--Blessed are those who can give without remembering and can receive without forgetting.
--Moderately religious people have been inoculated with a mild form of Christianity and are thus rendered immune from the real thing.
--One thing is certain about inviting trouble -- it always accepts the invitation.
--When Samson slept in the lap of Delilah, he was shorn of his power to act for God. A church that naps in the lap of the world will become a contributor to its evil rather than a disturber of its conscience.
--The only people you should try to get even with are those who have helped you.
--If you really want to do something, you will find a way; if you really don’t want to do a thing, you will find an excuse.
--Prayer is not a substitute for work; it is a diligent effort to work further and be efficient beyond the range of one’s own powers. It is not the lazy who are inclined to prayer; those pray most who care most, and who, having worked hard, find it intolerable to be defeated without first soliciting the help of God.
--The Secret of a Good Marriage: To keep your marriage brimming, With love in the loving cup,
Whenever you’re wrong, admit it; Whenever you’re right, shut up. (Ogden Nash)
Upcoming Sermons
6/15/25 AM - “In Everything Give Thanks”; PM - “My Heart is Broken Because of the Prophets”
6/22/25 AM - Ending the War; PM - Aaron the High Priest
6/29/25 AM - Majoring on Minors; PM - Guest Speaker: Doug Sanders - Sermon on the Plain