Water Baptism
Why Should I Be Baptized In Water?
By Dr. John Wagner
Why Should I Be... Baptized In Water?
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When you ask Jesus Christ to come into your heart you need to be baptized in
water; in this lesson we will discuss water baptism from three perspectives...
- What is water baptism?
- When should water baptism be done?
- Biblical examples of baptized converts
What Is Water
Baptism?
Water
baptism is the outward act of public identification with Jesus Christ as
Lord and Savior. It is the outward testimony of the change that has taken
place inside a person’s heart as a result of believing in Jesus.
In
Luke 3:2
John
the Baptist baptized Jesus:
"When all the people were being baptized, Jesus was baptized too."
Allowing Himself to be baptized in water, even though He had never sinned, Jesus openly and publicly identified with fallen humanity who He came to save.
How Do We Identify With Jesus Christ In Baptism?
1.
We are crucified with Christ
A person believes in Jesus Christ as their Savior, receives Him into their life, and turns from their old life of sin. This is called repentance. It is at this point that the individual "dies" to their old life and is "crucified" with Christ.
Galatians
2:20 says:
“I have
been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me.
The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved
me and gave himself for me.”
Romans
6:6-7 says:
“For we
know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body of sin might
be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves to sin--because anyone
who has died has been freed from sin.”
2.
We are buried with Christ
Normally, when a person
dies, a funeral service is conducted for them and they are buried. This
is also true spiritually. After receiving Christ as Saviour and “dying”
to our old way of life we are “buried” with Christ in the act of baptism.
Romans
6:4 says,
“We
were therefore buried with him through baptism into death in order that,
just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father,
we too may live a new life.”
3.
We are raised with Christ
Just
as Jesus was raised form the dead, we identify with His resurrection when
we come up out of the waters of baptism. Symbolically, when we come up
out of the water after being baptized, we are raised from death to live
a whole new life free from the power of sin!
Romans
6:5, 8 says:
"If we have been united with him like this in his death, we will certainly also
be united with him in his resurrection...Now if we died with Christ, we
believe that we will also live with him."
As a result of this dying, being buried, and being resurrected again,
Romans
6:11-13 says:
“In the
same way, count yourselves dead to sin but alive to God in Christ Jesus.
Therefore do not let sin reign in your mortal body so that you obey its
evil desires. Do not offer the parts of your body to sin, as instruments
of wickedness, but rather offer yourselves to God, as those who have been
brought from death to life; and offer the parts of your body to him as
instruments of righteousness.”
Our daily lives should reflect
the changes that baptism symbolizes. This is why baptism is so important!
It is an outward picture to a lost world of what has happened to us when
we accepted Jesus Christ as our Savior.
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