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How about this, I reject the Baptist doctrine that I grew up around that to be saved meant you had to be baptized.
Yeah, that's silly.
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Specifically referencing 1 Peter 3:21, it mentions baptism symbolically and then at the end says, 'it saves you by the resurrection of Jesus Christ.'
No, it does not. St Peter speaks about the flood, and that during the flood eight were saved through water, and that the flood water is an image (literally anti-type,
antitypon) the water of baptism which saves (literally
sozei baptisma, "saving baptism"). The baptism is what is saving in that passage.
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Putting your faith in Jesus is the central tenant here. What about the thief who defended Jesus on the cross? He wasn't baptized but Jesus told him straight up that he would see paradise.
I don't believe that baptism is a "requirement." I already said that. But clearly it is salvific, one of the "precious and magnificent promises, so that through these you might become partakers of the divine nature," again quoting St Peter (2 Peter 1:4). As St Paul says, "He saved us through the washing of regeneration" (
loutron means bath, the water itself vs the container and regeneration is
paliggenesia literally again+genesis, re-generated, re-begun, re-birthed) "and the renewal of the Holy Spirit." (Titus 3:5). He also writes "but you were washed, but you were sanctified, but you were justified, in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God." Again,
apolouo, bathed or washed away, sanctified is literally to be made holy, justified is to be made righteous. Not by faith, it says, but in the name of the Lord and by the Spirit. Again, in literal scriptural terms, baptism is salvific, regenerative, sanctifying, justifying, rebirthing.
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It's all about Jesus, not our rituals. Not that they aren't important, but they are fruit of the spirit, not admittance into the spirit.
Baptism is not our ritual. It was commanded by Jesus Christ, and is scripturally the entry point into the Church. Using the scriptural sense, the Church is the ekklesia, the assembly of believers.You join to the body of Christ through baptism, you participate in His death and resurrection through baptism -- "For as many as have been baptized into Christ have put on Christ" and "we were buried with Him through baptism into death, so that, just as Christ was raised up out from the dead by the glory of the Father, so we also should walk in newness of life" and "having been buried with Him in baptism, you were raised with Him through your faith in the power of God, who raised Him from the dead" and "Therefore if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old things have passed away; behold, the new has come into being." and "put on the new man, having been created according to God in righteousness and holiness of truth." See the common language? participation, renewal, new creation, into Christ, new life, new man, re-created, righteousness and holiness.