One In Jesus

Wendy asked,

Jay, DOES Acts 2:38 “certainly suggest that the simultaneous receipt of water and Spirit would be the normative Christian experience”?  … Where in the Scriptures does it tell us that children of first generation converts or thirty-third generation converts or converts born into an already “Christianised” culture will have the same conversion experience as those on the day of Pentecost? Continue reading →

There is additional significance to the baptism Peter insisted on.

“Be baptized”

“Be baptized” is in the passive voice. We often miss the significance of this fact, but it’s very important.

It’s passive because, unlike a cleansing under the Law of Moses, this cleansing is administered by someone else. Someone wishing to be cleansed in a mikveh would enter and leave by himself, but baptism is administered by a Christian on behalf of God and the church. It’s never expressed in the active or middle voice. You don’t baptize yourself. Continue reading →

The mikveh and uncleanness

The Torah speaks of many kinds of washings that were to be done to remove ceremonial uncleanness from a Jew. We modern Westerners struggle to grasp the idea of cleanness today, and so we tend to overlook these passages, but ceremonial cleanness surely played a big part in the thinking of First Century Jews.

In Jesus’ days, the Temple was surrounded by several large pools used for pilgrims to immerse themselves to become clean before entering the Temple. Many synagogues had small pools designed for the same purpose, called a mikveh. A few homes were elaborate enough to have a private mikveh. Continue reading →

* A better theory. Consider what the gospels really say.

(John 13:8-11 ESV)  8 Peter said to him, “You shall never wash my feet.” Jesus answered him, “If I do not wash you, you have no share with me.”

9 Simon Peter said to him, “Lord, not my feet only but also my hands and my head!”

10 Jesus said to him, “The one who has bathed does not need to wash, except for his feet, but is completely clean. And you are clean, but not every one of you.”  11 For he knew who was to betray him; that was why he said, “Not all of you are clean.”

There an element of this account which I’ve never heard explained. Continue reading →

Jerry asked,

What I was taught growing up in the Churches of Christ (1940′s & 50′s) was that the apostles were baptized by John, who taught men to believe on the one who was to come. There is presumptive evidence of this in two things: (1) Peter and Andrew met Jesus at John’s revival and (2) Jesus made and baptized more disciples than John, his chosen 12 doing the actual baptizing.

As always, I’m glad to offer an opinion or two. Continue reading →

While the blog was down for the holidays, the crash, and all, I typed up notes on the rest of Acts 2. I’ll be posting these every other day for a couple of weeks, until we get to the end of the chapter. And I’ll be taking Acts 2:38 to the end of the chapter phrase at a time. Some phrases will require more than one post.

These are being written for Bible class teachers at my church, and so will often have a series of question to help the teachers. But this is not your usual Bible class material. We’re delving very deeply into the text.

Continue reading →