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In the Acts of the Apostles there are ten accounts of individuals or groups of people being baptised. In six of them there is either a statement that the candidate for Baptism believed or a reference to belief in what immediately precedes the account of the Baptism. In the other four cases as well, Baptism was obviously preceded by a response of faith on the part of the candidate; the crowd at Pentecost had been told to repent and receive the Word; Saul of Tarsus had just had a most dramatic experience of conscious conversion; Lydia's heart had been opened to give heed to St. Paul's message; and one form of the story of the Ethiopian eunuch describes Philip as demanding belief as a condition of Baptism, and the eunuch as confessing his belief; if this be a later addition, it provides even stronger evidence that in the practice of the early Church the response, of conscious faith preceded Baptism.
page 143 note 1 This is brought out fully in an article by ProfessorTorrance, T. F., ‘One Aspect of the Biblical Conception of Faith’ (Expository Times, January 1957).Google Scholar
page 144 note 1 In A Theological Word Book of the Bible, p. 75.
page 145 note 1 Baillie, J., The Idea of Revelation in Recent Thought, p. 86.Google Scholar
page 146 note 1 J. Baillie, op. cit., p. 97.
page 146 note 2 Snaith, N., I Believe in, pp. 112, 113.Google Scholar
page 147 note 1 J. Baillie, op. cit., p. 108.
page 147 note 2 Knox's Works. Ed. Laing, , vol. VI, p. 14.Google Scholar
page 148 note 1 Expository Times, vol. LXVIII, p. 111.Google Scholar
page 149 note 1 J. Baillie, op. cit., p. 92.
page 149 note 2 Quoted J. Baillie, op. cit., p. 89.
page 150 note 1 Institutes, I, ch. vii, 4.
page 150 note 2 T. F. Torrance, article previously mentioned, to which I owe much in this paragraph.