Context Matters
#RightlyDividing #scriptureexpounded #ContextMatters
Mormons teach a “Vicarious Baptism” or proxy baptism where a living “proxy” stands in for a deceased individual to fulfill a baptismal requirement, based on the belief that the dead can still receive the ordinance’s benefits.
They argue that if there were no resurrection, the act of being “baptized for the dead” would be meaningless.
Partially true. The problem is that the Mormon conclusion deviates from the context that leads up to verse 29.
Baptism is an identification process – (“unto John,” for example, Acts 19:4). NT Baptism is a picture or type (1 Pe. 3:21) of the true Baptism (Eph. 4:5) that saves; Baptism of the Holy Ghost INTO Christ (Rom. 6:3; Col. 2:11-12 “circumcision made without hands”).
Paul is arguing that if Christ did not rise from the dead, being baptized for Christ would be meaningless. There is nothing in the text that remotely suggests “proxy baptism” confers any religious benefits.