Yes. If you come to us believing that Jesus is the Son of God and ready to turn from your sins, we'll baptize you that same day, and it doesn't have to be a Sunday. Nobody in the New Testament was put on a waiting list. Here at Christians In Honesdale, we won't make you finish a class first or wait while anyone votes on you.
If you were bracing to hear "come back next month," you can relax. You won't.
How Long People Waited in the Book of Acts
They didn't. Luke gives the timing for several conversions in Acts, and every time he does, the baptism follows close behind the believing.
The first was in Jerusalem during Pentecost, a Jewish feast, on the day the church began. Peter preached the risen Christ, and Luke reports, "So those who received his word were baptized, and there were added that day about three thousand souls" (Acts 2:41). Baptizing that many people in one day took real effort. They did it anyway.
Not long after, Philip met a treasury official from Ethiopia on a desert road and taught him about Jesus from the book of Isaiah (Acts 8:27-35). When the official saw water beside the road, he asked, "See, here is water! What prevents me from being baptized?" (Acts 8:36). He didn't wait until he got home. He ordered the chariot stopped, and "they both went down into the water," and when they "came up out of the water," he "went on his way rejoicing" (Acts 8:38-39).
A note on the Greek: "What prevents me?" is ti kōlyei me. The verb kōlyō means "hinder" or "stand in the way." Luke uses the same verb two chapters later, when Peter looks at Cornelius's household and asks, "Can anyone withhold water for baptizing these people?" (Acts 10:47, mēti to hydōr dynatai kōlysai tis). In both stories the question is the same: once someone believes, what could stand in the way? In both stories the answer is nothing.
In Philippi, a jailer heard the good news about Jesus after an earthquake shook his prison open around midnight (Acts 16:25-32). "And he took them the same hour of the night and washed their wounds; and he was baptized at once, he and all his family" (Acts 16:33).
A note on the Greek: "At once" is parachrēma, "on the spot" or "immediately." Luke uses the same word when people are healed in the Gospel (Luke 4:39; 5:25). And "the same hour of the night" (en ekeinē tē hōra tēs nyktos) means it was still dark. The jailer didn't wait for morning.
Saul of Tarsus had spent three days blind and praying when Ananias came to him (Acts 9:9-11). Ananias didn't set up a follow-up visit. He asked, "And now why do you wait? Rise and be baptized and wash away your sins, calling on his name" (Acts 22:16). Luke tells us what Saul did next: "he rose and was baptized; and taking food, he was strengthened" (Acts 9:18-19). He hadn't eaten in three days, and he was baptized before he ate.
A note on the Greek: "Why do you wait?" is ti melleis, from mellō, "to delay" or "to linger." It's a gentle question with a point to it. Ananias isn't scolding Saul. He's telling him there's nothing left to wait for.
Some conversions in Acts don't mention how much time passed. Where Luke does tell us, they were baptized right away.
What Has to Be True Before You Go Into the Water
That speed doesn't mean anyone skipped what matters. The people baptized in Acts believed that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God (John 20:31; Acts 8:12; Mark 16:16). They repented, which means they made up their minds to turn from sin and toward God (Acts 2:38). And they confessed that faith out loud (Romans 10:9-10).
So we won't ask how many Sundays you've sat with us. We'll ask what you believe about Jesus and whether you're ready to leave your sins behind.
Acts 2:38 also explains why nobody in those accounts put it off. Baptism is for the forgiveness of sins. Once a person understood that, delay made no sense.
The Bible Study Beforehand Isn't a Hoop
Before you're baptized, someone will most likely sit down with you and open the Bible. It might be Drew De Grado, our evangelist (he's the one who preaches for us), or another Christian here. We just want to be sure you know what baptism is and why you're asking for it. It's for your sake. Philip did the same thing on that desert road: he "told him the good news about Jesus" before they ever reached the water (Acts 8:35). Sometimes that talk lasts twenty minutes and sometimes an hour, but it won't stretch into weeks unless you'd like more time.
Any Day of the Week, Any Hour
Getting started is simple. Tell Drew, mention it to anyone after worship, or call us at (570) 228-2033 on whatever day you're ready. If you join the Tuesday study online, you can bring it up there too.
When the time comes, you'll change into a baptismal garment, and a towel will be there for you before you put your own clothes back on. Where the baptism takes place is something we'll go over with you directly, so please ask. You'll confess your faith in Jesus as the Son of God, and then you'll be immersed, which means lowered all the way under the water and brought back up. Paul ties that moment to Jesus' own death and resurrection when he writes, "We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life" (Romans 6:4).
A note on the Greek: Baptizō means "dip," "plunge" or "immerse." Outside the Bible, Greek writers used it for a ship going under or cloth being dipped in dye. That's why the Ethiopian official and Philip "went down into the water" and "came up out of the water" (Acts 8:38-39), and why Paul can call it a burial.
The one who baptizes you needn't be the preacher. Paul baptized only a handful of people at Corinth and said his main work was preaching (1 Corinthians 1:14-17). Even during Jesus' ministry, "Jesus himself did not baptize, but only his disciples" (John 4:2). The hour doesn't matter either. That jailer in Philippi went into the water somewhere around midnight (Acts 16:25, 33).
We can only describe how we handle these arrangements. We're one independent congregation, answering to Christ with no denomination or headquarters over us, so another congregation may go about the details a little differently. If you're talking with another congregation, they'll tell you how they do it.
Shouldn't I Get My Life Together First?
A lot of people feel that way. Maybe there's a habit you haven't beaten yet, or something at home you haven't made right, and it feels wrong to be baptized in the middle of it.
Jesus answered that feeling Himself: "Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. I have not come to call the righteous but sinners to repentance" (Luke 5:31-32). You don't clean up before seeing the doctor.
Baptism comes at the start of the Christian life. It's where God washes your sins away, and the growing happens afterward, as you keep learning with other Christians beside you. The new believers at Pentecost "devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching and the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers" once they'd been baptized (Acts 2:42). They didn't have everything sorted out first, and nobody expected them to. Paul wrote to Christians in Corinth who had come out of some hard lives, and he put it in this order: "And such were some of you. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ" (1 Corinthians 6:11). The washing came first.
If you aren't sure yet what you believe about Jesus, keep studying. No one here will hurry you toward the water. Repentance is a real decision, and it's worth taking seriously. But if you do believe and you've made up your mind to turn to God, the question Ananias put to Saul is worth sitting with. Why wait?
A note on the Hebrew: The psalmist said, "I hasten and do not delay to keep your commandments" (Psalm 119:60). "Do not delay" is wəlōʾ hitmahmāhtî, from the verb mahmah, "to linger" or "to drag one's feet." It's the same verb used of Lot on the morning Sodom fell: "But he lingered. So the men seized him and his wife and his two daughters by the hand, the LORD being merciful to him" (Genesis 19:16). The Old Testament knew that putting off what God has asked isn't caution. It's lingering.
Tell Us When You're Ready
You don't need to hold out for Sunday morning or for the song at the end of the sermon. Paul wrote, "Behold, now is the favorable time; behold, now is the day of salvation" (2 Corinthians 6:2). Say the word on a Wednesday afternoon and one of us will make the time. If you'd like to talk it through first, we'd be glad to study the Bible with you. You can also read more about who we are or reach out to us with whatever's on your mind.
Our regular meeting times:
The address to put in your phone is 416 Main Street, Suite D, Honesdale, PA 18431. Pull around behind the building to park, and you'll come in at the rear as well.