The Dunkers


An odd thing about Baptists is that our particular branch of Christianity is named and known to others for a single ritual that each believer normally undergoes only once. It’s rather as if Catholics were called Confirmationists. The name goes back to the Protestant Reformation of the 1500s, when some reformers rejected the traditional Catholic practice of infant baptism. Those who wanted to join their new churches were baptized again as adults. Others called them Anabaptists—re-baptizers. Many sects of today besides those known as Baptists are descended from these Anabaptists, notably the Mennonites and the Amish.

Besides rejecting infant baptism, the Baptists insisted that it had to be by full immersion in water, not simply by sprinkling with specially blessed holy water. After all, the Greek word from which we get “baptize” literally means to immerse. Baptists were often called “dunkers” for this reason. A few people still use that term once in a while.

As is usually the case with religious practices, baptism is the object of a good deal of misunderstanding on the part of those to whom it is unfamiliar. A common mistake is the idea that Baptists believe that baptism confers salvation and is essential for salvation. This is not at all the case. In Baptist teaching there are no sacraments; baptism is purely a symbolic act which conveys no supernatural benefit.

What the immersion in water symbolizes is death, burial, and resurrection. Jesus died, was buried, and rose from the dead to save us from our sins. By believing in Jesus, we leave our old life and begin a new one. This is what those odd-sounding expressions “born again” or “getting saved” mean. Baptism symbolizes that. It marks the point at which a new believer joins the church.

There is no traditional age for baptism. When one decides to follow Jesus is up to the individual; it happens when he or she is ready. I’ve heard of children as young as five (but that’s very unusual) and people in their eighties being baptized. Most children who are raised in Baptist churches make a public profession of faith and are baptized between the age of seven and their early teens.

Traditionally baptisms took place anywhere where enough water could be made available—in rivers, in stock ponds, even in large livestock watering tanks. These places had their drawbacks. My grandfather baptized in a stock pond once and realized when he emerged that he had accidentally left his shoes in the mud on the bottom. An uncle who held an old-fashioned river baptism some years back nearly lost one of his candidates for baptism in the current. Most Baptist churches of any size today will have a baptistery about the size of a small Jacuzzi located at the front of the church sanctuary behind the pulpit and the choir loft, mounted high so that everyone can see it.

Baptismal services usually take place near the beginning or end of a regular Sunday service. The actual ceremony is very simple. The minister and the candidate for baptism, fully clothed, enter the baptistery. The minister introduces the candidate to the congregation and gives a very brief talk about the significance and symbolism of baptism—how the candidate has decided to believe in the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus and follow his teachings, and has made a public profession of faith and been reborn into a new life of following Jesus. The candidate has publicly announced “Jesus is my Lord.”

Then the minister places one arm behind the candidate’s back and raises the other in the air. Now comes the only formal liturgy. “I baptize you, (candidate’s name) in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.” Then the minister covers the candidate’s face with one hand and leans him or her back under the water, just long enough to become completely immersed. Then the minister and the new church member go change out of their wet clothes.

And that’s it. Many churches nowadays get fancy and have people wear robes during baptism. In some places the candidate may light a candle as a piece of extra symbolism. I’m told that there are churches that dunk people once each for “Father, Son, and Holy Spirit,” though this is evidently very rare.

I remember my own baptism at age eight vividly. Our little church house had its men’s and women’s facilities clustered on either side of the baptistery, I suppose to save on plumbing. A narrow metal stairway led to the baptistery. The pastor, who was also my dad, and I had come to church that evening in ordinary everyday clothes, instead of our formal church clothes. Our church had never heard of fancy baptismal robes. Dad told me beforehand that he would have a handkerchief in his hand and would cover my nose to keep the water out. I just had to close my eyes at the right moment and hold my breath. We climbed up the metal steps and entered the water.

Dad spoke to the congregation. I waited nervously, at least waist-deep in water. The moment came. He covered my face and all but slam-dunked me. It felt like diving into a pool backwards and then being yanked right out; Dad laid bricks for a living five days a week and had more than enough strength to do the job quickly.

Then we went back and toweled off and changed into dry clothes. Dad took me back out in front of the pulpit, where everybody could come by and shake my hand and welcome me into the church. As an eight-year-old I had only a very basic understanding of what we had just done. But I could tell that my life had changed. As the poem says, two roads diverged in a wood, and I knew that I had taken the one that made all the difference.

I’ve seen many other baptisms over the years, few of them as vigorous as the ones Dad performs. The one I remember best after my own occurred when Dad and I spent two weeks in Guatemala helping to build a Bible school building there. One day we split off from the main work crew and used cinder blocks to wall off a corner of a big outdoor tank to serve as a baptistery. Only a couple of days later, a local church came where we were so we could have Sunday worship together. The congregation had half-a-dozen candidates for baptism who had been waiting for a place to be baptized (the local rivers had become too polluted).

Dad and I watched a bit anxiously, knowing that our work was still rather “green.” Seepage through the porous cinder blocks showed the water level in the new baptistery. But the wall held up fine. Each candidate came into the water in turn and was baptized. Even if I hadn’t known some Spanish, I could not have mistaken the meaning of “El Padre, el Hijo y el Espiritu Santo.” And I realized as never before the kinship I shared with my brothers and sisters there in Guatemala, and all over the world.