Necessity of Baptism?

1 Corinthians 1:17 and Necessity of Baptism

Written by Mike Hisaw via Facebook 7/31/2022.

Some point to 1 Corinthians 1:17 as proof that baptism is not essential to salvation. It reads, “For Christ sent me not to baptize, but to preach the   gospel: not with wisdom of words, lest the cross of Christ should be made of none effect” (1 Cor. 1:17). Their argument is that Paul dissociates baptism from the gospel; and since the gospel saves, then baptism has no part in salvation.

Actually, this claim is not new. Tertullian, a leader in the church in Carthage, spoke against some who were making that very argument in about the year 200 A.D. He writes: “But they roll back an objection from that apostle himself, in that he said, ‘For Christ sent me not to baptize;’ as if by this argument baptism were done away! For if so, why did he baptize Gaius, and Crispus, and the house of Stephanas? However, even if Christ had not sent him to baptize, yet He had given other apostles the precept to baptize. But these words were written to the Corinthians in regard of the circumstances of the particular time; seeing that schisms and dissensions were agitated among them, while one attributes everything to Paul, another to Apollos. For which reason the ‘peace making’ apostle for fear he should seem to claim all gifts for himself, says that he had been sent ‘not to baptize, but to preach.’ For preaching is the prior thing, baptizing the posterior. Therefore the preaching came first: but I think baptizing to withal was lawful to him who preaching was (“On Baptism,” chapter 14).

The answer to this objection is found in the context of 1 Corinthians 1. Since some were claiming allegiance to the one who baptized them, Paul did not want anyone to consider themselves to be a “Paulite” because they were baptized by him. Acts 18:8 shows that many were receptive to Paul’s message and were baptized because of it, but 1 Corinthians 1:14 says that he only personally baptized a handful of them. Paul intentionally tried not personally to baptize many “lest any should say that I had baptized in my own name” (1 Cor. 1:15). The point Paul is making here is that he was commissioned by Christ to be an apostle by His appearing to him (1 Cor. 9:1). As such, Paul was commissioned personally to preach his apostolic testimony. Only he could do that. There were others who could baptize those who believed Paul when he preached his eye-witness testimony of the resurrected Jesus. A parallel example is that of Jesus and his disciples. Jesus did not personally baptize anyone; Jesus’ disciples baptized for Him (John 4:1-2). Jesus did the preaching, and his disciples did the baptizing.

Actually, Paul inextricably tied baptism to the gospel. To the Romans he wrote, "Or don't you know that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life" (6:3-4 NIV). The heart of the gospel is Jesus' death, burial and resurrection (1 Cor. 15:1-4). Paul says that one contacts the power of those redemptive acts in baptism. One can't obey the gospel apart from baptism (cf. 2 Thess. 1:7-9).