Why Only Pastors Can Baptize
In our anti-institutional age that highly values equality, many Christians today are confused about who can perform baptisms. Our modern Western culture has conditioned us to dislike forms of hierarchy that prevent certain people from particular opportunities and activities. After all, we Christians are all one in Christ (Gal. 3:28). And if we are all baptized into Christ and so share equally in the priesthood of all believers (see 1 Pet. 2:9), then any and every Christian can baptize another Christian, right?
Many of us today would not object to this line of thinking. But just because we share an equal status in Christ does not mean we share the same responsibilities in Christ. There are biblical and theological, as well as historical, reasons why only ordained ministers should perform baptisms.
Apparent Exceptions to the Norm
At first, it may seem that there is insufficient biblical warrant for limiting the administration of baptisms to pastors because no passage in the New Testament overtly states such a position. In fact, Scripture might seem to suggest that any Christian can participate in this noble role.
Consider Philip, who baptized the Ethiopian eunuch (Acts 8:36–38), or Ananias, who baptized Paul (Acts 9:19). Neither Philip nor Ananias were among the twelve apostles. But we need to consider these accounts more carefully.
Though Philip was not one of the twelve, he was set apart by them for special service in the church (Acts 6:5), participating in what may be called the “proto-deaconate.” Thus, he occupied a specific office in the early church.
Ananias’s exact role is less certain. Luke describes him as “a disciple at Damascus” (Acts 9:10), and Paul himself describes him as “a devout man according to the law” (Acts 22:12). There is no office tied to his name. Yet even if Ananias was not ordained in the conventional sense, God called him to carry out a specific task: to go to Paul (called Saul in this passage) and minister to him. Still, it is possible that Ananias was a leader of sorts among the disciples in Damascus. But we don’t have all the details. This part of the book of Acts recounts a time when the church was still in its infancy stage, and overseers may not have been installed yet in many places where local churches were beginning to form.
The Norm of the New Testament
When we consider the New Testament as a whole, we detect a pattern that only ministers should baptize. The most obvious starting point for unearthing this doctrine is the Great Commission. Just before Jesus ascended to his Father, he instructed the eleven apostles to make disciples of all people by baptizing them and teaching them (Matt. 28:19–20). The apostolic mission of the church is boiled down to these two activities, and it is on this foundation that the church is built (see Eph. 2:20). Moreover, pastor-teachers continue this apostolic ministry (see Eph. 4:11).
Consider also 1 Corinthians 4:1, where Paul declares that he and his fellow “servants of Christ”—those carrying out the apostolic mission of the early church—are “stewards of the mysteries of God.” Some have understood “mysteries” here to include the sacraments (or ordinances) in addition to the gospel message. This, I believe, is a fair conclusion to draw since the apostles were tasked with advancing God’s kingdom through the preaching of God’s Word and administering of the sacraments, which Protestants have historically regarded as the two primary marks of the true church (to which some add church discipline).
And when we consider the entire narrative of Scripture, we see that baptism and communion are analogous to—or better, the fulfillment of—Old Testament washings and sacrifices. Both Augustine and John Calvin, to name a few, taught that the water and the blood that flowed from Christ’s side (John 19:34) represent cleansing and atonement, the two chief benefits that were mediated through washings and sacrifices under the old covenant and that were secured for us by Christ once and for all. And these benefits—cleansing and atonement—are signified and sealed in the new covenant sacraments of baptism and communion.[1] Therefore, just as the ceremonial activities under the old covenant were stewarded by the priests, so the sacraments of the new covenant are administered by pastors.
The Norm in Church History
While Scripture is rightly the first place we should turn to when making decisions about matters like this one, we would be wise to consider church history as well. After all, Christ has promised to be present to his church and lead her by his Spirit (see Matt. 28:20; John 16:12; Rom. 8:14). And the norm practiced by the one, holy, catholic (universal), apostolic church throughout the ages is that baptisms are performed only by ordained ministers.
Vanguard Protestant theologians and classic Protestant confessions have affirmed this. Martin Luther, for example, explained that “although we are all priests on the same level, not all can serve [in the pastoral office] or administer [the sacraments] or preach.”[2] The Westminster Confession of Faith states that baptism and the Lord’s Supper may be dispensed only by “a minister of the Word lawfully ordained.”[3] The London Baptist Confession likewise teaches that these should be “administered by those only, who are qualified and thereunto called according a to the commission of Christ.”[4] The church leaders who drafted and approved these two documents saw themselves as upholding a biblical truth embraced by the historic church, and they pointed to Scriptures such as Matthew 28:19, 1 Corinthians 4:1, and Ephesians 4:11–12 for support. Yet they also took into account the full trajectory of Scripture, which clearly teaches that God sets apart certain people for the administration of the means of grace.
The Practical Norm
Moreover, our Christian ancestors believed (rightly) that God maintains the order of his church through those he has commissioned as overseers. There is therefore also a practical reason why only ministers should baptize. As Kevin DeYoung explains, “The sacraments (or ordinances) involve the administration of grace and exercise of church power which belong to the office bearers of the church.”[5]
Consider the relation between baptism, the Lord’s Supper, and church discipline: if officers in a local church decide that a baptized member living in egregious, unrepentant sin needs to be placed under church discipline and barred from the Lord’s Table, then it is only consistent that they, as the ones exercising God’s authority in this manner, are the ones who perform baptisms. Baptism is, after all, the rite of initiation into the church. Similarly, if a new convert wants to be baptized but evidences that he or she is still living in ways contrary to the gospel, then church leaders need to discern carefully whether the individual is ready to be baptized and admitted into full fellowship with the church, and therefore admitted to the Lord’s Table.
Order is good, and order is maintained when various responsibilities are delegated to specific people. This is certainly the case when it comes to who is able to perform baptisms. God has granted all Christians an equal status in Christ, yet he sets apart some people for specific duties in the oversight of his church. Scripture and history support this, and we should delight in it, knowing that God is all-wise and all-good and that he knows best how to care for his people.
Note: The views in this article do not necessarily represent any official position of Gospel-Centered Discipleship on the matter, but the article does offer a view we believe is worth consideration.
[1] Augustine, Lectures or Tractates on the Gospel according to St. John, trans. John Gibb, NPNF1 7:434 (120.2); John Calvin, The Gospel according to St. John 11–21 and the First Epistle of John, ed. David W. Torrance and T. F. Torrance, trans T. H. L Parker, CNTC 5 (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1961), 186. See also Kevin P. Emmert, The Water and the Blood: How the Sacraments Shape Christian Identity (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2023), 7–8; The Westminster Confession of Faith 7.5–6, in Creeds, Confessions, and Catechisms: A Reader’s Edition, ed. Chad Van Dixhoorn (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2022), 196–97.
[2] Martin Luther, The Freedom of a Christian: A New Translation, trans. Robert Kolb (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2023), 54–55.
[3] Westminster Confession of Faith, 26.4 (CCC 228).
[4] London Baptist Confession 28.2 (CCC 283).
[5] See Kevin DeYoung, “Who Can Baptize?,” The Gospel Coalition (website), DeYoung, Restless, and Reformed (blog), February 20, 2014, https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/blogs/kevin-deyoung/who-can-baptize/.