The baptism of the Ethiopian eunuch

This is the fifth in a series of blog posts in which we are seeking to answer one overarching question—is a properly qualified administrator essential to valid baptism? The first post introducing the series can be found here.

We’re still seeking to answer the more immediate question, is baptism the act which joins a believer to a particular local church? In our last post, we looked at the baptism of John, and we argued that since John the Baptist was immersing prior to the existence of local churches, joining a believer to a particular local church cannot be an inherent function of baptism. Next, we want to consider the baptism of the Ethiopian eunuch by Philip.

But first, we need to talk about an important concept related to local church membership—the concept of voluntary mutual consent.

Baptists have long held that no one can be compelled against his will to become a member of a particular local church. This is a common error of state churches—unbelieving infants are added as members of a state church simply as a result of their being born in a certain country or parish, and the process is completely involuntary. But this is wrong, because addition to church membership must be voluntary on the part of the one seeking admission.

By the same token, no local church can be forced to admit a member against its own wishes. In other words, the reception of members must also be voluntary on the part of the church.

And of course, it isn’t enough for just one party to voluntarily desire such a union, but rather, both parties must agree concerning the candidate who wishes to be admitted to church membership. That is, the decision must be mutual.

Finally, a believer becomes a member of a particular local church by agreement, or consent. And once this agreement has been reached, the relationship is formed, and the candidate immediately becomes a member of that local church.

A remarkable incident in the life of Paul illustrates this principle. Three years after he was miraculously converted on the road to Damascus (Gal. 1:15-18), Paul sought to be united with the disciples of the church at Jerusalem:

And when Saul was come to Jerusalem, he assayed [attempted] to join himself to the disciples: but they were all afraid of him, and believed not that he was a disciple. But Barnabas took him, and brought him to the apostles, and declared unto them how he had seen the Lord in the way, and that he had spoken to him, and how he had preached boldly at Damascus in the name of Jesus. And he was with them coming in and going out at Jerusalem. (Acts 9:26-28)

Although Paul desired to associate himself with the members of the church at Jerusalem, he was initially rejected by the disciples, who obviously remembered that he had once fiercely persecuted the believers. They were still afraid of Paul and thought his claim of conversion was insincere. Nevertheless, after Barnabas interceded on Paul’s behalf before the apostles, Paul was ultimately brought into full fellowship with the disciples at Jerusalem.

Specifically, Paul is said to have been “with them coming in and going out at Jerusalem”, which appears to refer to full communion with the church at Jerusalem. A similar phrase is used earlier in Acts in reference to “these men which have companied with us all the time that the Lord Jesus went in and out among us” (Acts 1:21), where it clearly indicates the most intimate degree of fellowship.

This brief but important account demonstrates that Paul was united to the disciples at Jerusalem by voluntary mutual consent. Although we often take it for granted today, it bears repeating that believers can only be added to the membership of a particular local church with the consent of the congregation.

Now, let’s proceed to briefly consider the baptism of the Ethiopian eunuch by Philip recorded in Acts 8.

The angel of the Lord directed Philip to a specific road that led from Jerusalem to Gaza (v. 26). Having reached the road, he found an Ethiopian man—a eunuch—returning from worshiping in Jerusalem (v. 27). The man was reading a passage in Isaiah 53, and Philip used this text as a springboard to preach Jesus to him (v. 32-35). As a result, the eunuch believed on Christ and asked to be baptized (v. 36). Philip and the eunuch went down into a nearby body of water, and Philip baptized the eunuch (v. 38). Immediately, the Spirit carried Philip to another location, and the eunuch continued on his way back to Ethiopia, rejoicing in his Savior (v. 39-40).

This account furnishes some vital evidence as we seek to understand whether baptism is the act which unites a believer to a particular local church. Actually, we need only ask one simple question—what local church was the Ethiopian eunuch baptized into?

Some have argued that, since baptism is clearly “the door of the church” elsewhere in scripture, it would be right for us to assume that the Ethiopian eunuch was baptized into the membership of the church at Jerusalem, or some other local church. But the fundamental problem with this interpretive approach is that it simply reads into the text what one wishes to find—a blatant case of eisegesis. It’s obvious that the text itself gives no hint that the baptism of the eunuch united him to any particular local congregation.

Another common response is that, although the text does not explicitly say that the Ethiopian eunuch was joined to a local church by baptism, it also does not explicitly say that he wasn’t! In other words, the best case that can be made here that baptism is not the “door of the church” is an argument from silence. However, even this attempt to evade the clear implications of this account just won’t hold water.

In fact, the baptism of the Ethiopian eunuch provides positive and definitive evidence that baptism does not join a believer to a local church. And this is where the concept of voluntary mutual consent becomes important.

We’ve already seen that believers can only be added to a particular local church with the consent of the congregation. But how could the congregation at Jerusalem, or any other congregation, possibly give its consent to receive the Ethiopian eunuch into membership, when they had never even seen him? Even after his baptism, as he was making his way back to Ethiopia, no congregation in the world had ever even heard of his conversion.

Local church membership is a relationship based on mutual agreement, and yet the text of Acts 8 completely rules out the possibility of any such agreement between the eunuch and any local church. Therefore, we must conclude that the Ethiopian eunuch was not united to any particular local church by the act of baptism.

Yet again, a straightforward reading of scripture compels us to admit that baptism does not inherently join a believer to a local church.