How My Theology Professor at Bible College Led Me to the Orthodox Christian Church

How My Theology Professor at Free Will Baptist Bible College led me to the Orthodox Christian Church.

It was certainly unintentional and unknown on his part, but true nonetheless. I remember that day vividly. I was in the theology class being taught by Leroy Forlines. He was teaching on the doctrine of Baptism and looking at various scriptures that addressed this subject. We came to I Peter 3: 20-21 where St. Peter is explaining how Noah’s family was saved by passing through the water of the flood and how we are saved by passing through the water of baptism. The professor came to the words, “the like figure of baptism does now save us” and the professor stopped to explain what this means. He said something to this effect: Now we know that baptism does not save us so what we have here is a figure of speech known as a metonymy in which one word is used to stand for another word. The word baptism is a figure of speech that means faith. We know we are save by faith so what St. Peter is saying here is that we are saved by faith which is symbolized by baptism. This is not a word for word quote but a summary of what was said. 

At that moment I remember feeling like I wanted to scream NO, NO, NO! You can’t do that! That is not what the clear and plain words say! If St. Peter had wanted to say faith now saves us he could have but instead he said as plain as day that baptism now saves us just like passing through the water saved Noah’s family. I had great respect for my professor but at that moment I felt betrayed. It was clear to me that he was manipulating Scripture in order to make it say what he thought or wanted it to say in accord with his own preconceived doctrine and the tradition of the denomination. He was interpreting Scripture rather than allowing Scripture to interpret him and his beliefs. I left the classroom that day, never again content just to accept the interpretations of Mr. Forlines or Dr. Picirilli. From there I went on a long ten year search looking for the true, original and authentic One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church as opposed to the sectarian and manipulated interpretations of various denominations that all claimed to “just follow the Bible”. I finally found the One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church which to my surprise had never ceased to exist from the Day of Pentecost.