“If water baptism has no part in God’s program in the dispensation of grace that was given to Paul, why was he himself baptized?” That’s the question that grace believers often hear when we tell others about the dispensational place of water baptism in Scripture. To answer this question, we must first establish that Paul was not baptized for the reasons that Jews were baptized under God’s kingdom program for Israel.
In our answers to previous questions about water baptism, we saw that, under the Law, Jews in the tribe of Levi were baptized to identify them as priests in Israel, and to initiate them into the priesthood (Ex. 29:1-4). But God promised the people of Israel that someday all the Jews of all 12 tribes would be “a kingdom of priests” in the kingdom of heaven on earth (Ex. 19:6). So when John the Baptist announced that the kingdom was “at hand” (Mt. 3:2), he baptized his brethren to prepare them to assume their duties as God’s priests in the kingdom.*
*The kingdom that would have come had the mystery of the dispensation of grace not interrupted God’s prophetic program.
This cannot be the reason that Paul was baptized, however. Paul was the first member of the Body of Christ, and the Body of Christ will be raptured to Heaven long before the kingdom begins, even before the beginning of the dreaded Day of the Lord (I Thes. 4:13—5:11). So there must be another reason he was baptized.
Well, as we’ve seen, an additional reason that Jews were baptized was “for the remission of sins” (Mark 1:4; Acts 2:38), and there are good grace pastors and teachers who hold that Paul was baptized for this reason. After all, didn’t Ananias tell him, “arise, and be baptized, and wash away thy sins” (Acts 22:16)? That certainly sounds as if he was baptized for the remission of his sins.
But “repent, and be baptized…for the remission of sins” was the gospel of the kingdom (Acts 2:38), and Paul could not have been saved under that gospel. He freely admitted that as an unsaved man he had been “a blasphemer” (I Tim. 1:13), and the Lord had expressed in no uncertain terms that those who blasphemed the Holy Spirit could not be forgiven in the world of the kingdom program (Mt. 12:31,32).
If you are thinking that perhaps Paul blasphemed some other member of the Trinity besides the Spirit, this doesn’t seem likely. We know that Paul would not have blasphemed God the Father, for that was against the Law of Moses, and as Saul of Tarsus, Paul was “blameless” when it came to keeping the Law (Phil. 3:6). And there is no evidence that Saul ever even met God the Son during His sojourn here on earth.
No, it wasn’t until the disciples were filled with the Holy Spirit at Pentecost (Acts 2:4) that Saul blasphemed God by aiding in the stoning of a man who was “full of…the Holy Ghost” (Acts 6:5; 7:58). His complicity in this murder then launched his career as the leader of the persecution of those Spirit-filled disciples (Acts 8:1-3), a career that lowered him yet further into the depths of the unforgivable sin of blasphemy against the Holy Ghost.
A Whole New World
This meant that Paul could not have been saved by the kingdom gospel that included water baptism in the world of the kingdom program. The only explanation for his salvation was that, with his salvation, God introduced a whole new world, a world called “the dispensation of the grace of God” (Eph. 3:2). In this world, the most blasphemous of men can be forgiven of their sins by grace through faith, without religious works such as water baptism (Eph. 2:8,9; Tit. 3:5). Thus we know that it was the simple faith that Paul exercised in the Lord Jesus Christ on Damascus Road that saved his soul that fateful day, and not his subsequent submission to water baptism at the hands of Ananias.
But if Paul wasn’t baptized for the remission of sins, why did Ananias tell him to get baptized to wash away his sins (Acts 22:16)? Well, did you notice that Paul called Ananias “a devout man according to the law” (v. 12)? The Law and the kingdom program were all that Ananias knew! The new program of grace wasn’t given to Ananias, it was given later to Paul. This means that Ananias knew nothing of the new program that didn’t include water baptism, and this is why he baptized Paul. He was simply being faithful to the only program he knew.
Those who hold that Paul was saved by water baptism under the kingdom program often object to this line of thinking by noting that the Lord instructed Saul to go into Damascus where he would be told what to do (Acts 9:6), and then sent Ananias to minister to him. This is true, but it must not be concluded from this that the Lord told Ananias to baptize Saul for the remission of sins. All we know for sure is that the Lord sent him to minister to Saul “that he might receive his sight” (9:12).
If it be argued that the Lord knew Ananias would baptize Saul for the remission of sins, it must be remembered that the Lord didn’t have a lot of options when it came to believers whom He could send to minister to Saul. Every one of the members of the “little flock” of His followers (Lu. 12:32) believed in water baptism for the remission of sins, so it would not have been possible to find a believer to send to Saul who would not have instructed him to be baptized to wash away his sins.
With that in mind, it seems more likely that the Lord allowed Saul to be baptized by Ananias to guarantee his acceptance among the Hebrew saints in the kingdom church. When we read how hard it was for the disciples to accept Saul into their midst (Acts 9:26,27), it seems likely that they would have inquired as to whether he had been baptized. Surely if Paul had not submitted to this Jewish rite, it would have been impossible to convince those Jewish disciples that this horrific oppressor of God’s people wasn’t feigning faith in Christ in order to draw them out of hiding so he could slay them.
Finally, there is no evidence in Scripture that Paul was baptized for any of the extra-biblical reasons that men often ascribe to water baptism. For instance, the Bible never says that men should be baptized as an act of obedience after receiving salvation, so we know Paul could not have been baptized for this reason. Nor could he have been baptized as a testimony to the lost, another reason that men often assign to baptism, but a purpose for baptism that is never expressed in Scripture.
The bottom line is, the baptism of Saul cannot be used to justify the practice of water baptism during the dispensation of grace, especially in light of all the evidence we have seen that this Jewish rite has no place in God’s program for today.
Why did Paul practice water baptism?
“If water baptism isn’t a part of God’s program for the dispensation of grace that was given to Paul, why did he baptize people?” That’s another question we are frequently asked when we share our unique view of water baptism with other Christians. We know that Paul baptized some of the Corinthians (I Cor. 1:14-16), as well as Lydia (Acts 16:14,15) and the Philippian jailer (Acts 16:33). That certainly sounds like contradictory behavior for a man who claimed that Christ had sent him “not to baptize” (I Cor. 1:17).
But the answer to this frequently asked question is the same as the answer to the question of why Paul himself was baptized. As we have seen in our answer to the previous question, Ananias baptized Saul because he didn’t know any better. The new program for the dispensation of grace wasn’t given to Ananias, it was given later to Paul. And Paul baptized people in the early part of his ministry for much the same reason. It wasn’t until later in his ministry that the Lord revealed to Paul that baptism was not a part of God’s new program for the dispensation of grace.
Here it helps to remember that when the Lord saved Saul, He did not miraculously impart the entire revelation of the mystery to him in a moment of time. The voluminous information found in his thirteen epistles was rather revealed to him gradually. He told the Corinthians, “I will come to visions and revelations of the Lord” (II Cor. 12:1). By the time he wrote those words, he had already been saved for nearly a quarter of a century, and had likely already penned the Thessalonian epistles. So he had unquestionably already received many revelations from the Lord concerning the new program of grace. And yet, even after all of those revelations, he admitted that there were still things the Lord would have to reveal to him in subsequent revelations. And one of the things that the Lord waited to reveal to him was that water baptism would not have a part in the age of grace.
This is the only plausible explanation for why a man who was sent “not to baptize” would practice water baptism in the early part of his ministry. By the way, did you notice that Paul didn’t say, “I wasn’t sent to baptize”? He rather said that the Lord sent him “not to baptize.” That is, he was specifically told not to practice this Jewish ordinance. And once Paul was given this revelation from the Lord, it was clear to him that water baptism had no place in the dispensation of grace. After that he performed no further baptisms.
The Picture Provided By Peter
I believe Peter’s experience with Cornelius provides us with a snapshot of what Paul’s ministry was like before he learned he was sent not to baptize. Once the Lord convinced Peter to minister to Cornelius and his fellow Gentiles, the apostle delivered a stirring message that ended with these words about the Lord Jesus,
“To Him give all the prophets witness, that through His name whosoever believeth in Him shall receive remission of sins” (Acts 10:43).
After Peter spoke to Cornelius about the remission of sins, it seems clear that he would have gone on to tell him the only means with which he was familiar whereby the man could receive the remission of his sins, that of repentance followed by water baptism (Acts 2:38). It is also clear that the Spirit of God interrupted the apostle, and did not allow these words to leave his lips, for we read,
“While Peter yet spake these words, the Holy Ghost fell on all them which heard the word. And they of the circumcision which believed were astonished…that on the Gentiles also was poured out the gift of the Holy Ghost. For they heard them speak with tongues…” (Acts 10:44-46).
This purposeful interruption on the part of the Spirit of God could only mean that God was using Cornelius to make a point. Peter had seen thousands of Jews saved at Pentecost, and every one of them had received the Spirit after having been baptized with water, in accord with the terms of the gospel he preached in Acts 2:38. So when God gave Cornelius the gift of the Spirit before he was baptized, God was clearly showing Peter that change was in the winds now that Paul had been raised up to introduce a new dispensation. The presence of the Holy Spirit in these men was an indication that they had been saved without water baptism. That made this event the harbinger of an entirely new dispensation, a dispensation in which men would be saved without water baptism.
But none of this was made known to Peter! His next words betray the confusion that this unexpected turn of events had introduced to his mind:
“Can any man forbid water, that these should not be baptized, which have received the Holy Ghost as well as we? And he commanded them to be baptized…” (Acts 10:47,48).