Author's Preface
1. Accepting Or Uniting
   
2. Who Is A Christian?
   
3. "Why Don't You Leave The Church of Christ?"
   
4. The Iniquity Of The Fathers
   
5. Our Judicial System
   
6. "You Are My People Now"
   
7. Serving "Otherwise Than As Prescribed"
   
8. Does Baptize Really Mean To Immerse
   
9. Our Relationship Through Baptism
   
10. Those Gospel Meetings
    
11. A Prelude To Worship
    
12. Worshipping In Spirit And Truth
    
13. The Forbidden Prayer
    
14. "I Didn't Hear Nobody Pray"
    
15. Communion Prayers
    
16. Communion With Bread, Wine, And Money
    
17. Thursday Is The Lord's Day Too!
    
18. Not Forsaking The Assembly
    
19. Acts 20:7 One More Time
    
20. Our Father Who Art Where?
    
21. Does Nature Reveal God's Love
    
22. Copyrighted: All Rights Reserved
    
23. Don't Pour Water On Them
    
24. The Remaining Restriction For Women
    
25. Some Questions About Revelation
    
26. Must One Fully Repent Before Baptism?
    
27. Nicodemus In Context
    
28. Our Respected Myths Of Religion
    
29. Hook's Points: A Potpourri
    

Most of us preachers have had persons to come to us requesting rebaptism. They had been led, usually by some preacher, to question the validity of their original baptism on the grounds that they had not fully repented of each and every sin before being baptized. Rather than readily rebaptizing such disturbed persons, I have always tried to relieve their fears and insecurity.

We are called upon to "repent and be baptized." Will partial repentance suffice? Can we be forgiven of sin while still practicing it? A negative answer seems obvious and emphatic, but let us reconsider this matter.

There are two grave problems with such a judgmental view: it demands full maturity at birth, and it insists on accomplished righteousness instead of imputed righteousness.

Repentance is to have another mind. It is a change of mind. Hopefully, this change of mind will lead to a change of action; however, it may not. A person might have the sincerest conviction and resolution today to stop taking drugs or drinking liquor, for example, and then be overcome by the temptation tomorrow when withdrawal trauma is experienced. When a person is converted to Christ, he or she may not even be aware of some of their wrong actions or attitudes. Yet when that person begins his life in Jesus, Jesus' blood cleanses from all unrighteousness as he walks in the light of his fellowship.

The change of mind required is sometimes more general than specific. It may be only a recognition of one's sinful state and an opening of the heart to the will of God. As a newborn baby, that person will begin to learn, grow, and mature, repudiating his sins as they are identified, but he can never claim to be sinless.

Or, the change of mind and deep conviction may be more specific, however. On Pentecost Peter told his hearers that they had rejected, crucified, and slain the Savior whom God had sent to them. "Now when they heard this they were cut to the heart, and said to Peter and the rest of the apostles, 'Brethren, what shall we do?'" This was not a request for information as to what to do to be saved, but it was a terrified cry of helplessness and despair by persons who felt that their sin was so unforgivable as to bring inescapable doom upon them. It was a rhetorical lament implying that there was nothing that they could do to escape God's wrath. Peter assured them, however, that if they would change their mind about rejecting Christ and be baptized they would be forgiven of that awesome trespass. He did not enumerate and define all the specific sins practiced by each and every person present and demand an immediate cessation of the practice of them all. This was a call for repentance of their specific sins of rejecting and crucifying Jesus. Peter was not calling for maturity based upon a full enlightenment that very morning. He was moving them into a saving relationship with Christ. The penitent ones would then proceed in the direction of complete sanctification as they continued in the apostles' teaching, walking in His light.

In order for baptism to be valid, if one must first recognize and turn away from every sin of ignorance, misunderstanding, misdirection, attitude, pride, and prejudice, then none of us would ever qualify for baptism. One may never recognize all doctrinal error that he should repent of for the right side of many controversial issues is never determined. Our new birth is not a leap from depravity to perfection any more than our physical birth was a jump from the womb to a twohundred pound adult on the night of birth.

Truly, the impenitent person will not receive forgiveness in baptism or at other times. He does not change his mind about sin and open his heart to the will of God. He refuses to change when confronted by his sin.

The penitent disciple will grow in sanctification while never reaching perfection in this life. It is not a matter of "I was a sinner; now I am saved by grace," but "I am a sinner saved by grace with Christ's sinlessness given to my account."