FOLLOWING THE RIGHT BOOKA Missionary once presented a Bible to a young Indian, who possessed a fair knowledge of the English language, and exhorted him to read it and OBEY ITS COMMANDMENTS. The Book was received and read as requested. Some time afterward the Indian met the preacher, and said to him" " I want you to go with me to the river. I want to be baptized." " I can baptize you without going to the river", said the preacher. "Where?" inquired the red man. "Here" replied the preacher. Said the Indian in a tone of surprise" " I don't see how you can baptize me here, where there is no water" " We can have the water brought for the purpose," responded the preacher. But the young Indian man was perplexed: he could not understand how they were to baptize him after the water was brought. The Preacher then explained to him that they could baptize him "by pouring a little water on his forehead." Is that baptism?'' "Yes", said the preacher. Not yet quite satisfied, the young Indian man replied: " well, if that is baptism, you have given me the wrong book".
His idea seemed to be that each denomination had a Bible of its own, and that the minister had, through mistake, given him one that represented baptism to be immersion. The impression that baptism is immersion was made upon his mind by reading the Bible; but if pouring (or sprinkling) is baptism, it must be learned from some other book: that is, the same book cannot teach both pouring and immersion to be baptism. Why not? Because there is such a difference between pouring and immersion that if the one is taught to be baptism, the other one cannot be. ( The Sword of the Spirit Bulletin - 03/31/09)
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