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| Anglican/Episcopal ChurchSo, I have started to study the Anglican/Epsicopal Church, and may join it. I feel like everything in my life has been leading up to this moment. I also feel like, as a Baptist, I am ending my Protest and coming home. For those of you, my readers, who may not know Baptist history, Baptists split from the Anglican church over the issue of baptism. So, while most Protestants say that becoming Catholic is like coming home, being at a Catholic church, for me, feels like visiting my grandparents. I don't know what else to say about this, I just wanted to get it in writing and out of my head, to share it with someone besides the Episcopal priest who is helping me study. Please, pray for me. | | |
| October/December 07 Reading ListCurrently Reading
- The Doctrine of the Priesthood of Believers by Walter Shurden
- Baptist Confessions of Faith by William Lumpkin
- Theology for the Community of God by Stanley Grenz
- Lord, Teach Me to Pray in 28 Days by Kay Arthur
- Proclaiming the Baptist Vision: The Priesthood of All Believers
Want to Read
- Hero of Heroes: Seeing Christ in the Beatitudes by Iain M. Duguid
- Wild at Heart by John Eldredge
- The Beginner's Guide to Intercession by Dutch Sheets
- You Are Chosen: The Priesthood of All Believers by Herschel H. Hobbs
- Priests to Each Other by Carlyle Marney
- The Doctrine of the Laity by Findley B. Edge
- A Hunger For God by John Piper
- Proclaiming the Baptist Vision: The Bible
- Proclaiming the Baptist Vision: The Church
- Proclaiming the Baptist Vision: Religious Liberty
- Proclaiming the Baptist Vision: Baptism and the Lord's Supper
- Introduction to Christianity by Pope Benedict XVI
- The Kingdom of God by John Bright
- A History of the Baptists by Robert G. Torbet
- No More Christian Nice Guy: When Being Nice-Instead of Good-Hurts Men, Women, and Children by Paul Coughlin
- Perilous Pursuits: Overcoming Our Obsession with Significance by Joseph M. Stowell
- The Prophetic Imagination by Walter Brueggemann
- To The Golden Shore: The Life of Adoniram Judson by Courtney Anderson
For those of you who might wonder...any from this list that I don't get finished before the end of December carry over and become the beginning of the next list. | | |
| Luke 4:16-21 NRSV"When he came to Nazareth, where he had been brought up, he went to the synagogue on the sabbath day, as was his custom. He stood up to read, and the scroll of the prophet Isaiah was given to him. He unrolled the scroll and found the place where it was written:
'The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor.'
And he rolled up the scroll, gave it back to the attendant, and sat down. The eyes of all in the synagogue were fixed on him. Then he began to say to them, 'Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.'"
A cryptic post, I know. More later.
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| The Priesthood of All BelieversNumber 1 -- August 30, 2007
Experienced Religion
Baptists have always believed in experienced religion. That is, Baptists have always believed that people must encounter Christ for themselves and make their own profession of faith. This belief, which is one of the patches that forms the beautiful quilt of the priesthood of all believers, leads us to affirm a regenerate church membership and believers baptism by immersion.
A regenerate church membership simply means that in order to be a member of a Baptist church you must've made a profession of faith in Christ and be baptized. It is important to note that you must make the profession of faith before you are baptized. This leads me to my next point. Baptists affirm believers baptism by immersion. What that means is that we only baptize those who have made a profession of faith in Christ, which arises from the Baptist understanding that baptism is a public proclamation of the fact that you have accepted Christ as your personal Lord and Savior, a very private thing. We also baptize by fully immersing the person being baptized, as this is the method that most captures the symbolism of baptism. That is dieing to your old self (being lowered into the water) and raised to new life in Christ (being raised from the water). What beautiful symbolism!
So, in short, we believe that each person must accept Christ of their own free will, and that they must then be baptized in order to join the membership of the church. | | |
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