Gospel Obedience at Corinth - What Really Happened?

Did Paul preach the same gospel at Corinth that he taught elsewhere? Everywhere else
he taught, as part of the gospel, baptism for the remission of sins. One can go to Acts 16
and read two accounts, in the same chapter, of conversions made by Paul - Lydia and the
Philippian jailer - in which in both instances those being converted were baptized.

Paul himself, in his conversion, was baptized. You may recall the words of Ananias
to him, "arise, and be baptized, and wash away your sins." (Acts 22:16 NAS) I might add
that it is hard to wash away your sins if you do not have any so evidently Ananias felt
pretty sure that Paul still had some that needed to be taken care of. Many modern day
preachers speak as though they know more about it than what Ananias did as they say
men are saved at the point of faith without baptism and thus have no sins to wash away.

There is a troubling passage in 1 Corinthians that cause some trouble on the subject of
baptism - 1 Cor. 1:14. Paul preached baptism, was baptized himself, and yet here he
says, in writing to the church at Corinth, "I thank God that I baptized none of you, except
Crispus and Gaius." (NAS) What gives? That is a good question deserving a response.

We know Paul preached baptism at Corinth. How do we know? In Acts 18:8 we find the
result of Paul's preaching at Corinth. The text says, "Crispus, the leader of the
synagogue, believed in the Lord with all his household, and many of the Corinthians
when they heard were believing and being baptized." (Acts 18:8 NAS) I stop here and
ask a question. If Paul was not preaching baptism at Corinth who was? Someone was as
people were being baptized. But we read 1 Cor. 1:14 and doubt enters our mind.

There is no need for doubt as will be shown. If Paul preached one gospel in one location
that had baptism in it and another gospel in another location that did not then why should
any of us listen to anything he had to say? He says, "even though we, or an angel from
heaven, should preach to you a gospel contrary to that which we have preached to you, let
him be accursed." (Gal. 1:8 NAS) If Paul preached more than one gospel he condemned
himself by his very own words. That did not happen.

In the book of Galatians, Paul says in chapter 3:26-27, "For you are all sons of God
through faith in Christ Jesus. For all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed
yourselves with Christ." (NAS) We need for the purpose of our study to emphasize the
words "baptized into Christ".

What does the word "for" mean? Has Paul not tied faith in Christ directly with baptism?
If you have faith in Christ you are baptized. If you do not have faith in Christ you are not
baptized. It is that simple.

True faith in Christ demands baptism for the reason that Jesus taught it. You cannot have
faith in Christ and yet lack faith in what he taught and commanded. (See Matt. 28:19 and
Mark 16:16 on what Jesus taught on the subject of baptism.)
Let me ask some questions based on this passage - Galatians 3:27. Paul says, again, "for
all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ." What
about those who were not baptized? Did they cloth themselves with Christ? Did Paul
say for all of you who were not baptized into Christ have put on Christ? Is that what he
said?

How does one get into Christ, the only place salvation can be found? Does not the text
tell us clearly if we will only listen?

If Paul preached baptism once he preached it everywhere he went whether the text says
he did nor not. There is absolutely no choice but to infer that he taught baptism to both
Lydia and the Philipian jailer or else how did they know about it and why did they do it?

All of that said we need not make necessary inferences about baptism at Corinth for Paul
in writing to the church at Corinth says in 1 Cor 12:13, "For in one Spirit we were all
baptized into one body." Baptized into what body? The body of Christ as per Gal. 3:27.

Objection may be made and it be said that the body is the church (Eph. 1:22-23) so
baptism is really just about getting into the church. Baptism is about getting into the
spiritual body of Christ and, yes, that is the church but that is also the very thing Christ is
the Savior of. "He himself being the Savior of the body." (Eph. 5:23 NAS) He has not
said a word about saving anything else save his body.

One needs to get himself into Christ where salvation is and the road to doing that is
certainly faith but not faith alone apart from repentance, confession of Jesus, and baptism
for the remission of sins which places one in Christ.

The reader should not confuse being in the church mentioned in the Bible with
denominations. The thing Paul is discussing is not denominationalism which did not
exist when Paul wrote and would not for hundreds of years to come. One is baptized into
the New Testament church, the one Christ established and gave his life for and which will
be saved on the last day. Everyone in the church will be saved provided they live faithful
lives.

Now to the passage at hand which troubles some, 1 Cor. 1:14-17 (NAS), Paul speaking,
"I thank God that I baptized none of you except Crispus and Gaius, that no man should
say you were baptized in my name. Now I did baptize also the household of Stephanas;
beyond that, I do not know whether I baptized any other. For Christ did not send me to
baptize, but to preach the gospel, not in cleverness of speech, that the cross of Christ
should not be made void."

There are two points about this passage that we have to keep in mind lest we be led
astray. (1) The problem at Corinth that Paul is discussing in the first chapter of First
Corinthians is that of men making themselves disciples of various evangelists rather than
of Christ alone creating division. In verse 13 Paul says, "Has Christ been divided? Paul
was not crucified for you, was he? Or were you baptized in the name of Paul? (answer is
no - DS)" (NAS) "In the name of Paul" should read instead "into the name of Paul" (see
the side margin notes in the NASB reference edition which lists the word "into" as the
literal translation).

Baptism is "into Christ" (Gal. 3:27) and not into man. Only in Christ is salvation found.
No one at Corinth was baptized into any man's name other than Christ. Paul was thus
thankful he had not personally baptized but a very few at Corinth "that no man should say
you were baptized in ("into" is the literal translation - DS) my name."

He says that in light of what was going on there. Had he baptized more then the more
likely there would be more claiming to be of Paul and Paul wanted no part of this
division in the church that was occurring. His point is that men are baptized into Christ,
not into a man, and thus should wear the name of Christian only. There is no such thing
as being of Paul, or of Apollos, or of Cephas and it is wrong to claim allegiance to such
and divide the church.

(2) The second thing we must understand is that just because Paul did not do the
baptizing does not mean that his helpers such as Timothy and others did not do so on his
behalf in rendering aid to him in his work. We have another account of this very thing
with Jesus. John says, "When therefore the Lord knew that the Pharisees had heard that
Jesus was making and baptizing more disciples than John (although Jesus Himself was
not baptizing, but His disciples were) he left Judea." (John 4:1-2 NAS)

We need to use our common sense. Paul is not going to preach baptism and then not see
that it is done when people respond to his preaching. None of us think that Peter
personally baptized the 3,000 who responded to his preaching on the day of Pentecost
when he preached baptism for the remission of sins (Acts 2:38). We are sure he had help.
If we were to find Paul had men traveling with him who did this work why should we be
shocked? 1 Cor. 12:13 certainly proves someone was doing the baptizing there.

I think we have pretty much covered the ground that needs to be covered concerning
what happened in Corinth with regards to Paul's preaching and practice. The same thing
happened at Corinth that happened everywhere else he preached, same gospel, same
baptism for those who believed.