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Owen Lessard's avatar

i have one question: what about the thief on the cross? we see in Luke 23:39-44 that there were two thieves crucified beside Jesus, one mocked Jesus and the other defended Jesus because he believed in who Jesus said He was. Jesus said to that thief “Truly I tell you, today you will be with me in paradise.”(43b), and we know Jesus can’t sin so he couldn’t have lied to this thief, therefore the thief was saved through belief and without baptism. I do believe baptism is a key part in our faith and that it should be practiced after salvation, and i also understand the Bible to say that baptism doesn’t constitute salvation.

in Romans 10:9 we see “If you declare with your mouth, ‘Jesus is Lord,’ and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.”, this confession and belief is where salvation would lie, we often tie verbal confession and baptism together which isn’t a bad practice at all but it can cause some confusion among denominations.

so instead of “belief and baptism”, i think it’s more biblically accurate to say “belief and confession”, so to conclude my comment i’ll quote Paul in 2 Corinthians 13:14 “May the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all.”

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Diana Merritt Hardin's avatar

Excellent

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