p. 439 | Question Corner

Pacific Press Publishing Association · Mountain View, California · Jul 21, 1914

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 41, No. 28.

Question Corner

4327 — TRINE IMMERSION

Will you please explain Matt. 28: 19? Does it mean that one should be dipped into the water three times, as some claim?

E. B.

There is nothing in this, nor any other text in the Bible, to justify the practise of dipping three times in baptism. The significance of baptism is to show the believer’s death and burial to sin, and resurrection to a new life. It also shows faith in the death, burial, and resurrection of Christ. When a person is dead, he is buried, but he is not buried three times. And so when a believer is dead to sin, he is buried, but there is no reason for burial more than once. Baptizing into the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, expresses belief in this blessed Trinity; but “these three are one,” and one baptism shows belief in the three as one.