What is Baptism? (Romans 6:3-7; Colossians 2:11-12) Baptism Sunday – September 29, 2019 Teaching Aim and Objectives In this lesson, learners will discover the truth about the doctrine of baptism. Using supporting Scriptures, the Southern Baptist doctrine of believer’s baptism by immersion will be explained and defended. The lesson will accomplish the following objectives: 1. Believers discover the meaning of baptism – Identity with Christ 2. Believers identify the proper mode of baptism – Immersion 3. Believers recognize the proper subjects of baptism – Believers 4. Believers respond through the act of believers’ baptism – Discipleship I. Introduction: What Do Southern Baptists Believe About Baptism? Brainerd Baptist Church cooperates with the Southern Baptist Convention. The Southern Baptist Convention has adopted a doctrinal statement, The Baptist Faith and Message 2000, ​ ​ based on its interpretation of the Bible. The Baptist Faith and Message 2000 states the following ​ ​ concerning baptism: Article 7: Baptism and the Lord’s Supper Christian baptism is the immersion of the believer is water in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. It is an act of obedience symbolizing the believer’s faith in a crucified, buried, and risen Saviour, the believer’s death to sin, the burial of the old life, and the resurrection to walk in newness of life in Christ Jesus. It is a testimony to his faith in the final resurrection of the dead. Being a church ordinance, it is prerequisite to the privileges of church membership and to the Lord’s Supper. In their study guide of the Baptist Faith and Message 2000, Dr. Chuck Kelley, Dr. Al ​ ​ ​ ​ Mohler and Dr. Richard Land state the following concerning baptism: The Bible clearly defines baptism as the immersion of believers in water. Baptism is not a ​ ​ denominational eccentricity. Believers’ baptism by immersion is deeply rooted in the nature of the ordinance and in the picture that immersion provides the church. The Greek word used in the New Testament for baptism, baptizo, is most clearly understood to mean ​ ​ submersion in water—the complete immersion of an object or, in this case, a person in 1 water. Sprinkling and partial immersion do not satisfy the New Testament definition of baptism. ​ In fulfillment of the Great Commission, Baptists baptize ‘in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit’ (Matt. 28:19). Thus, baptism is a trinitarian act, reminding believers that our salvation has been promised, accomplished, and applied through the work of the one true God—Father, Son and Holy Spirit (94-5). II. The Meaning of Baptism – Identity with Christ. Read Rom. 6:3-7; Col. 2:11-12. Many Christians today miss the specific meaning of this text, thereby misunderstanding why believers’ baptism by immersion is the Scriptural mode for baptism. Scholars acknowledge that Paul (and the New Testament generally) often speaks of baptism in a metaphorical sense, but in this text, Paul is specifically referring to water baptism. The Holman Bible Commentary explains this for us: ​ ​ …Paul is referring to literal water baptism, and in a way that is unfortunately not emphasized when modern believers are baptized. Several important truths concerning baptism should be noted here: First, Paul is making the assumption that all the believers in Rome had been baptized. When he says all of us who ​ were baptized into Christ Jesus, he is not referring to all the believers who had ​ been baptized as opposed to all the ones who had not. He is referring to all ​ believers as opposed to non-believers who had not been baptized into Christ ​ Jesus. Baptism does not appear to be an optional event in the Christian ​ experience as it is for many modern believers. All believers should know and unite around the truths concerning baptism that Paul presents in these verses. To not understand the connection between baptism and freedom from sin is to miss a critical link between Romans 1-5 (justification based on the life, death, burial and resurrection of Christ) and Romans 6-8 (living sanctified lives based on the imputation of the efficacy and merit of the life, death, burial and resurrection of Christ) (Boa and Kruidenier, 187-88). The commentary exegetes vv, 3-5 working backwards at vv. 3-4, and then doing the same with verses 5-7. First, vv. 3-4: Verse 4b: Jesus Christ’s act of obedience by going to the cross—and his subsequent ​ resurrection—was an act of solidarity in behalf of a human race that had inherited a 2 permanently fatal sentence of death from father Adam (Rom. 5:12, 19). His purpose was to provide a new life for all who would, by faith, identify with him his act of obedience ​ ​ to the glory of the Father. ​ Verse 4a; When Jesus Christ died on the cross and was resurrected on our behalf, he ​ provided a faith focus for the believer. Just as those who looked upon the bronze serpent in the wilderness were saved (Num. 21:8-9), so any who look upon the cross of Christ are saved today (John 3:14-15). We were not crucified and buried; Christ was. But when we are baptized as believers-in-what-he-did, we are baptized into—immersed in—made partakers of—[his] death in order that… we too may live a new life. ​ Verse 3: Don’t you know this? Paul seems to be saying. ‘Don’t you know that you died ​ ​ ​ to sin when you believed in Christ who died to the condemnation of sin that was yours? When you were baptized, you were baptized into his death?’ (Boa and Kruidenier, ​ ​ 188-9). Kelley, Mohler, and Land interpret the text for us: A believer’s immersion in water pictures the death, burial, and resurrection of Christ, thus providing a beautiful picture of our salvation and reminding us of his saving work (see Rom. 6:4.). The picture of life from death us a powerful witness of the gospel and of the promises the Father made to the Son in the covenant of redemption. Baptism pictures a believer’s death to sin and his resurrection to walk in newness of life… The scriptural testimony about this act is rich and powerful. Baptism depicts the complete surrender of life and the transformation only Christ can bring. Through it a believer publicly professes faith in Christ (95). In vv. 5-7, the believer is united with Christ and His resurrection. The Holman Bible ​ Commentary explains, once again, working in a backwards fashion to examine the text: ​ Verse 7: Anyone who has died has been freed from sin. This is a plain, literal ​ statement; its simplicity has caused many to miss its power… Why are there no stone walls crowned with barbed wire, no K-9 corps, no towers with search lights, no armed guards patrolling the perimeters of… cemeteries? Because the possibility of illegal activity by the residents of these underground dwellings is zero? Why? Because the dead have been freed from sin. They are freed from the committing of it. They are freed from ​ ​ the guilt of it. They are freed from sin. That is easy to understand for the dead but Paul is ​ ​ talking about the living. Believers have been crucified with him (Christ) so that we might enjoy, while living, the ​ ​ same benefit that the dead enjoy--freedom from sin. Only one thing can free a person 3 from the temptation, commission, guilt and punishment of sin--death! But all would agree that death is a high price--the ultimate price--to pay. Paul knew it. This is why he cries out, personifying one with no hope who realizes that death is the only exit from sin. “Who will rescue me from this body of death?” (Rom. 7:24). Note his word--rescue. Sin ​ ​ is a one-way journey to death. The only way to be freed from it is to allow it to take its natural course--death--or be rescued. “Thanks be to God,” he says, because “Jesus Christ our Lord” has rescued us from the dominion of darkness and brought us into the ​ ​ dominion of righteousness (Rom. 7:25; Col. 1:13). Verse 5: The benefit of being united with him… in his death is that we will certainly ​ ​ ​ ​ also be united with him in his resurrection. Unlike those in the cemetery who have ​ died in ages past, the believer is resurrected immediately following his or her death with Christ. Again, this is the picture gained through baptism. We die, then we live (Boa and Kruidenier, 190-1). Tom Schreiner and Shawn Wright add these thoughts on the key significance of the understanding of the two texts and how they relate to the theology of believer’s baptism by immersion: Paul refers to baptism in Romans 6 and Colossians 2 because baptism recalls the conversion of the readers from the old life to the new. The grace of God secured their freedom from the power of sin at conversion, and the simplest and easiest way to recall the readers’ conversion is to speak of their baptism. As Shackenburg rightly says, ‘The ​ baptized man is drawn into the once-for-all event of salvation accomplished in the cross and resurrection of Christ, and with Christ he goes through death and the grave to resurrection’ (75). ​ III. The Mode of Baptism – Immersion. Refer to Rom. 6:3-7; Read Col. 2:11-12. As one looks closely at Rom. 6:3-5, the instructions for the proper mode of baptism make logical sense. How is it possible for a person to be “buried with Christ,” unless they are completely submerged under water? One cannot picture death without first being “drowned.” One who is sprinkled with water would not die.