Baptism and Growing Faith – Acts 19:1-7

A text – Acts 19:1-7

19:1 While Apollos was in Corinth, Paul passed through the interior regions and came to Ephesus, where he found some disciples.
19:2 He said to them, “Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you became believers?” They replied, “No, we have not even heard that there is a Holy Spirit.”
19:3 Then he said, “Into what then were you baptized?” They answered, “Into John’s baptism.”
19:4 Paul said, “John baptized with the baptism of repentance, telling the people to believe in the one who was to come after him, that is, in Jesus.”
19:5 On hearing this, they were baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus.
19:6 When Paul had laid his hands on them, the Holy Spirit came upon them, and they spoke in tongues and prophesied–
19:7 altogether there were about twelve of them.
 

A reflection:

Across the Mediterranean world of Paul, the church was growing, community by community. Jesus’s 12 disciples, Paul, and other early believers traveled and spread the word about Jesus’s life, ministry, death, and resurrection. There were differences in practices and ways of behaving, but the confession that Jesus was Lord held these many groups together, even though they were far apart. 

In this passage, Paul arrives in Ephesus to learn that the small community of believers there has been baptized just the way John the Baptist had baptized people, looking toward the coming reign of the Son of God. Since Paul had been converted by an encounter with Jesus himself, he baptized these new believers as Jesus had taught his disciples to do it, that is “in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.” And this new baptism, according to the story in Acts, gave the community some spiritual gifts.

We shouldn’t be surprised that practices varied in the early church, just as they vary in our day. Deep divisions over practices remain and continue to create church splits. But what is or ought to be consistent and important is not so much how we baptize or when, but what happens in community after a person is baptized. The newly baptized person isn’t magically changed into a Christian but instead raised and educated by elders in the faith, surrounded by caring folks, and given beautiful mentorship in living a faithful life.

The community of 12 in Ephesus and our own congregations have a lot in common. We are baptized, and we help each other live and love like Jesus. Baptism brings us together as followers and begins our ministry in life, just as Jesus’s baptism began his ministry on earth. May your ministry flourish and help you to partner with God in co-creating a trustworthy world.

A prayer:

Lord God, Thank you for loving us. Thank you for helping us to learn the faith in community. Help us to appreciate one another and lift up the ways we can together live and love like Jesus, that we might do something in this world that make your kingdom visible to people who might need to see it.  Amen.