Acts 2
Be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ.
Pentecost answer
What shall we do?
When the hearers at Pentecost realized what had been done to Jesus Christ, they were pricked in their heart. The apostolic answer was not committee language. It was repentance, baptism in the name of Jesus Christ, remission of sins, and the gift of the Holy Ghost.
Acts 2:37-38
Pricked in their heart.
“Now when they heard this, they were pricked in their heart, and said unto Peter and to the rest of the apostles, Men and brethren, what shall we do? Then Peter said unto them, Repent, and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins, and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost.”
Acts 2:37-38 (KJV)The Son of God had been rejected, crucified, raised, and exalted. The right answer was not to explain away the Son. The right answer was to repent, confess Him, and be buried with Him.
Buried with Christ.
“Therefore we are buried with him by baptism into death.”
Romans 6:4 (KJV)Baptism is not a splash of religious custom. It is burial. The old man goes down. The believer rises to walk in newness of life.
In the name of Jesus Christ.
“Repent, and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ.”
Acts 2:38 (KJV)The name is not decoration. It is confession, allegiance, and entrance into the fellowship of the Father through His Son.
Apostolic pattern1 2 3
The book of Acts keeps naming Jesus.
Acts 8
They were baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus.
Acts 19
They were baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus.
“For by one Spirit are we all baptized into one body.”
1 Corinthians 12:13 (KJV)Ellen White — Vision of August 24, 1850
Baptized as a door into the faith.
Baptism is entrance into a faith, not merely water placed upon a body. Ellen White saw that those baptized as a door into the professed churches would need to come out of that door and into the commandments of God and the faith of Jesus.
“I saw those who have been baptized as a door into the churches, would have to be baptized again as a door into the faith. Those who have not been baptized since 1844 will have to be before Jesus comes. And some I saw would not make progress till the duty was performed.”
Ellen G. White, Spalding and Magan Collection, p. 3.8Manuscript 16, 1850
Out of that door again.
“Those who have been baptized as a door into the professed churches will have to be baptized out of that door again, and into the faith mentioned above... Some will not gain progress now until that duty is done and then they must live anew unto God and serve Him faithfully.”
Ellen G. White, Ms. 16, 1850, p. 2“There are many who will need rebaptizing, but let them never go down into the water until they are dead to sin, cured of selfishness and self-exaltation; until they can come up out of the water to live a new life unto God.”
Ellen G. White, Letter 60, 1906, par. 18Featured book by James White
Baptism: Death and Burial.
Read the pioneer witness in full. James White pressed baptism back to the Bible picture: death, burial, and resurrection with Christ, not a thin religious ceremony.
James White and the modern Moses
Read Modern Moses beside the baptism call.
The same pioneer voice that pressed baptism as death and burial also belongs in the larger record of James White's work: organizing a people, carrying present truth in print, and calling souls to obey the commandments of God and the faith of Jesus.
Pioneer witness
Buried, not sprinkled.
James White connected the Trinity controversy and sprinkling to the same Roman stream of errors when he contrasted them with being buried with Christ in baptism.
“Here we might mention the Trinity, which does away the personality of God, and of his Son Jesus Christ, and of sprinkling or pouring instead of being ‘buried with Christ in baptism,’ ‘planted in the likeness of his death.’”
James White, Advent Review and Sabbath Herald, December 11, 1855Receive the Son
Repent. Be baptized. Receive the gift.
The Father gave His Son. The Son died and rose again. The answer of a pricked heart is surrender, confession, and baptism into Jesus Christ.