OBJECTION #8: “NOT ONLY IS BAPTISM NONESSENTIAL TO
SALVATION, EVEN FAITH IS A GIFT FROM GOD TO A PERSON. MAN IS SO DEPRAVED THAT
HE IS INCAPABLE OF BELIEVING.”
Surely, God’s infinite justice would not permit Him to
force man to desire God’s blessings. God’s intervention into man’s woeful
condition was not in the form of causing man to desire help or miraculously
generating faith within man. God intervened by giving His inspired Word, which
tells how He gave His Son to make a way for man to escape eternal calamity.
Faith is then generated in the individual by God’s words which the person must
read and understand (Romans 10:17; Acts 8:30). The individual then demonstrates
his faith in obedience.
Did the walls of Jericho fall down “by faith” (Hebrews
11:30)? Absolutely. But the salient question is: “When?” Did the walls fall the
moment the Israelites merely “believed” that they would fall? No! Rather, when
the people obeyed the divine directives. The walls fell “by faith” after the
people met God’s conditions. If the conditions had not been met, the walls
would not have fallen down “by faith.” The Israelites could not claim that the
walls fell by their own effort, or that they earned the collapse of the walls.
The city was given to them by God as an undeserved act of His grace (Joshua
6:2). To receive the free gift of the city, the people had to obey the divinely
stipulated prerequisites.
Notice the capsuling nature of Hebrews 11:6. Faith or
belief is not given by God. It is something that man does in order to please
God. The whole chapter is predicated on the fundamental idea that man is
personally responsible for mustering obedient trust. God does not “regenerate
man by His call, thus enabling man to respond.” God “calls” individuals
through, by means of His written Word (2 Thessalonians 2:14). In turn, the
written Word can generate faith in the individual (Romans 10:17). How
unscriptural to suggest that man is so “totally depraved” that he cannot even
believe, thus placing God in the position of demanding something from man (John
8:24) of which man is inherently incapable. But the God of the Bible would not
be guilty of such injustice.
Some people approach passages like Romans 10:17 in this
fashion: (1) God chooses to save an individual; (2) God gives him the free gift
of faith; and (3) God uses the Gospel to stir up the faith which He has given
the person. Yet neither Romans 10:17, nor any other passage, even hints at such
an idea. The text states explicitly that faith comes from hearing Christ’s
Word. Notice verse 14, where the true sequence is given: (1) the preacher
preaches; (2) the individual hears the preached word; and (3) believes. This
sequence is a far cry from suggesting that God miraculously imparts faith to a
person, and then the Holy Spirit “stirs up” the faith. Such a notion has God
giving man a defective faith which then needs to be stirred up. The text makes
clear that God has provided for faith to be generated (i.e., originated) by the
preached Word. God does not arbitrarily intervene and impose faith upon the
hearts of a select group of individuals.
According to 1 Corinthians 1:21, mankind did not know
God, so God transmitted His message through inspired preachers so that those
who respond in faith would be saved. Paul wrote in Romans 1:16that this gospel
message is God’s power to save those who believe it. Notice that the Gospel is
what Paul preached (vs. 15). Thus the preached message from God generates faith
and enables people to be saved.
We see the same in Acts 2:37. What pierced the hearts of
the listeners? Obviously, the sermon. Acts 2:37 is a demonstration of Romans
10:17—“faith comes by hearing…the word of God.” God did not change the hearts
of the people miraculously; Peter’s words did. If denominational doctrine is
correct, when the Jews asked the apostles what they should do, Peter should
have said: “There’s nothing you can do. You are so totally depraved, you can’t
do anything. God will regenerate you; He will cause you to believe (since faith
is His ‘free gift’).” Yet, quite to the contrary, Peter told them that they
needed to do some things. And they were things that God could not do for them.
First, they were required to “repent.” Biblical
repentance is a change of mind (Matthew 21:29). A “turning” follows repentance
(Acts 3:19) and consists of some specified action subsequent to the change of
mind. John the Baptizer called this turning activity, which follows repentance
and serves as evidence that repentance has occurred, “fruits” (Matthew 3:8).
After being convicted (Acts 2:37—i.e., believing the truth of Peter’s
contentions), they were told to “repent,” to change their minds about their
previous course of life. What else were they to do?
Peter did not tell them to “repent and believe.” Their
belief was already abundantly evident in their pricked hearts and their fervent
petition for instructions. What was lacking? Peter said (i.e., God said) they
still lacked baptism. Remember, the only difference between dead faith and
saving faith is outward action—compliance with all actions that God specifies
as necessary before He will freely bestow unmerited favor in the form of
forgiveness.
Thus baptism marked the point at which God would count
them righteous if they first believed and repented. Baptism served as the line
of demarcation between the saved and the lost. Jesus’ blood could wash their
sins away only at the point of baptism.
