Baptism is immersion, of a believer, for the forgiveness of sins.
Not a symbol of a forgiveness already received but the point at which it is received, from Acts 2:38. This is the doctrine that separates the Churches of Christ most sharply from evangelical Protestantism, and it is why the movement has historically not counted the unimmersed as Christians — a position many members now hold more loosely than their grandparents did.
The doctrine that baptism is for the remission of sins, and that immersion of a penitent believer is the point at which sins are forgiven, comes from Alexander Campbell's debate with the Presbyterian W. L. Maccalla in 1823 and from a straightforward reading of Acts 2:38 and Acts 22:16. Its consequences are large: it makes baptism not an ordinance following salvation but the moment of it, which puts the movement outside the evangelical mainstream and has produced two centuries of argument with Baptists. Historically it also meant that Churches of Christ did not regard the unimmersed as saved, and the sermon topic of who will be in heaven was a staple. That hard edge has softened considerably since the 1970s, unevenly and with heat: the argument between the more exclusive and the more open reading is live in congregations and colleges right now, and it is the movement's central internal division apart from worship practice.
The same ground, other faiths
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