Arsenios
Well-known member
What If One Is "Baptized" By Water, Before Knowing The "Meaning" ?
Actually, the baptism is done IN water, not BY water...
It is done BY the Servants of God...
Otherwise you could self-baptize by walking into water...
We baptize our infants at 40 days, and thereby enter them into Christ, where their parents and God-parents have the responsibility of raising them as good citizens of the Household of God... The "meaning" is not some understanding, but the crossing of the threshold from the world into the Kingdom of Heaven.
For this is the essence of the Gospel:
Be ye repenting and be baptized, for the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand (here and now on earth) and is suffering violence. And the violent are taking it by force...
Baptism is entry...
The child is entered...
Into the Body of Christ...
The Kingdom of Heaven...
On earth...
But the Jews did not encounter the Giants until AFTER they ENTERED the Promised Land... Where it took an offended and pious shepherd boy to kill Goliath...
Arsenios