This is in answer to the user above. He was asking a question that I would like to answer, but a new thread is needed since this is a new topic for debate. Feel free to give your version of baptism. This is my version of baptism, but also the topic of how to both know God in your head and heart. Enjoy:
I had the same skeptical mindset a few years ago I grew up as a committed Christian, then fell away in my doubt, then reemerged later stronger than before. What made the difference? Like you, I had to know God both in my heart and in my head. The heart was not enough. Since that time, I have found the path to both. Seeking God allows His presence to be made known in a literal way. There is a bridge to cross that most of us refuse to cross.
For us to take the name of Christ, we must take the character that goes along with it. That character has little to do with perfection. We are immersed in a place that is out of context with the truth we study. We will continue to sin and be sinful because we are in a place of opposites that demands that we are shown both sides by experience.
For me, the greatest evidence came from taking a step back and looking at where I was. Do I make my hair grow, my eyes see, my body heal, the sun shine or the Earth turn? No. Reduce it all down and we do two things. We think and we move. If you reduce all things to their root position, you can then look slightly deeper and examine the seed of truth. The seeds are the evidence.
Let me give you some examples. Baptism is a symbol we are all familiar with. It is the immersion into water so we can rise to new life. At least, that's the definition we have all heard. We also know that this does not give us salvation, but is only a sign we have a repentant heart. If we take it deeper and reduce this concept to the root meaning, we see the truth from which it comes.
Examine what I said before. You do two things. You think and you move. That's it. The rest is produced so that the bio-mechanical body you live in can exist. You have nothing to do with this. It's a vehicle you possess. Literally, you possess it and animate it with your soul. With that soul, you are also aware of something behind that soul moving it one direction to another. We all sense this duality.
What is the root meaning of baptism?
In the Bible, we have the Word. John 1 claims that this word was what created us. The human body has DNA. As a reflection of the original word, our bodies are created by 22 proteins that form 3 protein roots. Those roots then make other roots when other proteins are added. The Hebrew language has 22 letters and follows this process precisely. Each new word then extends in a sequence of root morphology that forms new words. New words make sentences and sentences make paragraphs. This is the tree of life. That tree extends beyond proteins and branches out to all of our existence as a reflection. Hebrew has 22 letters and Greek has 24. Hebrew is concrete reality and an agro-bio linguistic language. Greek is abstract mathematical. In total, there are 46 letters. The proteins mentioned above come from 2 sets of 22 chromosomes plus 2 sex chromosomes. Those chromosomes make the 22 proteins that render your body to form.
When the proteins have finished rendering the body, you are two halves--Concrete and abstract. Two become one and we are a new creature when the process is finished in the matrix (Womb) of Earth. If the two become one (Spirit and Soul), we rise to new life and evolve. The tree of life drops new seed above on new ground. The ultimate goal is to fall in love with the Spirit and consummate the marriage (joining of two). A new creature is then made. The womb of the mother is a reflection of coming into new light and ability after being veiled from what comes next.
Is the acorn the oak tree or the oak tree the acorn? Neither. They are both the essence of information found in the DNA that renders both. The acorn has a 75 foot oak tree enfolded inside. Likewise, the oak three then produces thousands of acorns. It's an endless process of saved and copied information. You can be saved. That information can be replicated. If we consider a fig tree, grafting new fig branches into the tree allows the tree to be changed over time to a new type of tree. Fig trees require a fig wasp. When a fig tree is merged with enough other trees, it eventually becomes a type of fig tree that can pollinate itself and no longer needs the wasp.
When Jesus came 2000 years ago, the fig tree did not bear fruit. Why? It was a juvenile fig tree. It was not ready to bear good fruit. Jesus called them the generation of vipers. The leaders of the Hebrew people were trying to gain faith by works. Jesus turned this around and showed that faith is the work of God in us. The fig wasp is necessary for the fig tree to bear fruit. Every tree has it's own fig wasp. When a husbandman takes the clippings form one tree to another, the tree eventually bears its own fruit. This takes time. The wasp is the prophet and Shepherd. The prophet assisted the nation in bearing fruit and hearing God by comparison. The work of God is as the husbandman. He prunes the limbs and grafts in new limbs. He develops our faith over time by example. In time, the Jewish people will see this work of God in the Gentile nations. When they finally wake up to their savior, they will bear fruit along with us. The last generation is the generation that sees Israel become a nation. The fig tree bloomed in 1948. The church represents the parthenocarpic fig tree.
http://archaeology.about.com/od/domesti ... rees_2.htm
Now, we are ready to reduce the seed of baptism in the Bible by the branch you just read about. The root of baptism is immersion into the water. The seed is the first word that engaged the process. As a reflection, our own words here can show the morphology that is reflected in the mirror of the outer world.
Greek and Latin
Amni - River of Life
Amnio - Bowl that catches the blood of the lamb that is sacrificed
Amnion - Sack that holds the water
Amniotic Fluid - Water of the Matrix (Womb)
Amnesia - Condition of the mind in the water (Forgetfulness)
Amnesty - Forgiveness in the water
The Shepherd (Husbandman) pulls the wool (sin) over our eyes (Amnesia). We are in a wilderness on the other side of the river of life (Jordan) in a wilderness. The Shepherd sheers our wool (Sin), then washes it white as snow. That wool is then given back to us as a new Robe (Body) and Crown (Mind). You must be born again. You will be born again. It's called resurrection from the dead and is what happens when a tree dies and sheds it's new seed on new ground. Amnesty comes from being born again in a new land across the Jordan. The wilderness is comparable to the people of Israel coming out of Egypt. Egypt is a refinery. Read Deuteronomy 4:
19 And when you look up to the sky and see the sun, the moon and the stars—all the heavenly array—do not be enticed into bowing down to them and worshiping things the Lord your God has apportioned to all the nations under heaven. 20 But as for you, the Lord took you and brought you out of the iron-smelting furnace, out of Egypt, to be the people of his inheritance, as you now are.
Our inheritance is the universe (Heavens).
To see this from antiquity, we look at the concept known as involution and evolution. Here is a wikipedia quote:
Clearly, the soul and Spirit of God are together in the wilderness. The true Living Word is not the Bible. The Bible is only a reflection of the true word in our hearts. That word comes out continually. I'll leave you with a humorous example of how that word comes out in movies.Sat, Chit-Tapas, and Delight/Ananda are the three aspects of Satchitananda, and are mentioned in terms of Involution . Spirit or consciousness manifests as these three, and then as the intermediate link of Supermind, which is transitional between the higher and lower (matter, life, and mind) nature.[2]
The reason for involution is Delight - the Delight of Being (the Spirit or Absolute) moving to Delight of Becoming (temporal existence, the cosmos). Being throws itself forward into a multiplicity of forms, becoming lost in the inconscience of matter,[3] and then through evolution it partakes in the Delight of rediscovering the Spirit which had been hidden in the interim.
Evolution is thus the movement forward by which the created universe evolves from its initial state of inconscience (i.e. as matter), evolves animated life forms and mental beings (i.e. humans), and continues to evolve spiritual properties, and in that process rediscovers its Source. Such an Evolution of animated forms is only possible because at each stage of development, the developing entity contains within itself the conception of what it may become. Thus, the evolution of animated life out of matter supposes a previous involution of that animated capacity. This is akin to a seed that already has the essence of the tree that will emerge from it.
Each plane emerges from an earlier plane through the evolutionary process, which takes place in chronological time. But in a parallel construction, each of these new planes can be understood as being a descendent of its corresponding higher order plane from the Infinite. Thus, when mentality emerged in the universe, the universal plane of Mind was implanted to a degree in those beings harboring that mentality.
Changing our understanding of baptism also implies that Jesus was literally saying, "You must be born again." In other words, you will. This makes you your own grandpa. It means Adam was the Father of mankind and also the last Adam of 1 Corinthians 15. It means he was both our Father and we are his forefathers.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cjd__U9RhkI
In this video, the bad guy says:
"Nothing left to do but relax. No power on Earth can stop us now."
"It's impossible. We killed that man."
"Well kill him again. Our future is in his hands."
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