Half a Millennium of Believers Baptism
Less than two years from today will bring us to an incredible 500-year anniversary that should be remembered by God’s people: January 21, 1525, was the day that saw many brave Anabaptists receive baptism as believers. Among those baptized at that time were Conrad Grebel, Felix Manz, and George Blaurock. “The newly baptized then pledged themselves as true disciples of Christ to live lives separated from the world and to teach the gospel and hold the faith. Anabaptism was born” on that day.1 This step of Biblical obedience sealed their fate of persecution, imprisonment, and for most of them, death.
For those who stand convinced that baptism is not for infants but for believers, this should be a day to remember and celebrate; it is a day to honor the exemplary courage of those who stood and gave their lives for obedience to Christ’s Great Command.
For those who also live with the conviction that the church must function separately from the state, the day of January 21,1525 should be remembered. This was the real Reformation that needed to take place, sometimes called the “Radical Reformation.”
Those baptized on January 21, 1525 were mostly dead within a few years of that day.
Conrad Grebel died first in August 1526, his health broken by the plague through multiple imprisonments.
Felix Manz was drowned in the Limmat River on January 5, 1527, “the first Anabaptist martyr to die at the hands of Protestants and the first to die in Zurich.” (Ibid, 43.)
George Blaurock was burned at the stake on September 6, 1529.
Many other brave men and women died, some known but most are unknown. The stories we can read of those who died for their faith will inspire God’s people: great men and women like Michael and Margaretha Sattler (died in May 1527), followed by Balthasar Hubmaier and his wife (died March 1528).
I encourage Christian brethren everywhere who stand with the belief that baptism is the immersion of a believer in the water that shines forth their faith in the Gospel of Christ’s death, burial, and resurrection, to make Sunday, either January 19 or January 26, 2025, a special day to remember these brave Anabaptists who led the true reformation that would eventually come to America. Their courage helped to give us the freedoms we have enjoyed for nearly 250 years, and their lives will give encourage you, your family and your church to remain faithful to Christ in this day.
Matt Recker is the pastor of Heritage Baptist Church in New York City.
Photo by arquidis molina on Unsplash
- Estep, William R. The Anabaptist Story, 3rd Edition. Grand Rapids, MI.: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co, 1996, 13-14. [↩]