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Our Position on Baptism

Truth Community practices believer’s baptism. All Christians should be baptized after they repent of their sins and believe in Christ for salvation. Scripture teaches that Christ commanded baptism for His repentant disciples (Matthew 28:18-20; Acts 2:38). We baptize in response to His command, as did the early church (Acts 2:41; 8:36-38).

We baptize by immersion in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit (Matthew 28:18-20). The scriptural examples of baptism are consistent with immersion, not sprinkling or pouring. For example, Jesus “came up from the water” at His baptism (Matthew 3:16). In Acts 8:38-39, Philip and the Ethiopian eunuch “went down into the water” and “came up out of the water.”

Baptism by immersion is an outward symbol that testifies to a prior inward reality. It pictures the believer’s death, burial, and resurrection in Christ (cf. Romans 6:3-5; Colossians 2:12). It is a critical step of obedience in which the Christian publicly identifies with Christ and associates with the local body of believers.

Baptism is important, but it does not obtain salvation for us. No outward act can save us from our sins. The Bible says it is “by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God; not as a result of works, so that no one may boast” (Ephesians 2:8-9). We must be saved in order to be baptized, not baptized in order to be saved.

A church’s approach to the symbol reveals what it thinks about salvation itself. Baptism is a joyful and reverent time. We rejoice because we love to see Christ honored by the obedience of His disciples. We are reverent because baptism symbolizes our deliverance from God’s wrath in our salvation.

Our baptisms will usually take place on Sunday. The candidates read their personal testimony of faith in Christ before being baptized. Following the service, the audience will greet those baptized and encourage them for their obedience to Christ.

Have you been baptized since you believed? Talk to an elder if you would like to move forward.