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The Baptism of the Holy Spirit
RO67-01© Berean Memorial Church of Irving, Texas, Inc. (1977)
Please turn with me to Romans 6:3-4 once more. Again, we remind you that the apostle Paul begins Romans 6 by answering a false conclusion which
was raised in objection to his teaching that a God of absolute righteousness and perfect justice saves a sinner charged with Adam's guilt and with
his personal sins by grace alone, apart from any human effort on the part of that guilty sinner.
This is a shocking statement. There is a resistance against the idea of such a grace salvation. So, a conclusion is stated to the effect that the
old sin nature should be permitted to reign as supreme sovereign in the believer's life so that grace can super-abound, because Paul has pointed
out that whatever the problems, and the depths of sin that you have been confronted with, and that are your experience, God's grace is super
abundantly amply able to deal with that problem.
People who do not like the idea of being saved apart from human efforts; who do not like the idea of being saved apart from human religious
rituals of some kind; and, who do not like to be saved apart from the fact that they must behave themselves, and act nice, and be good –
people who just do not like the idea of no human element involved in providing salvation, turn around and consistently (even today), and attack
Paul with this same arguments: In that case, just let your sin nature run rampant.
Well, the apostle Paul says that this kind of a conclusion ignores the doctrinal truth that now there reigns within the life of the believer, the
Person of God the Holy Spirit. Therefore, there is a new sovereign authority which has replaced the rule of the old sin nature. This reign of
sovereign authority is the prerogative of God the Holy Spirit in the life of a believer forever. It is never to be relinquished, and it never will
be abdicated. That sovereign authority will be retained forever by God the Holy Spirit once a person is born again.
So, this is a false objection. Paul answers this objection in detail in verse 2-14. Then he takes up, in verse 15, another false statement, he and
answers that in the rest of the chapter.
Every Believer has had this Baptism
So, we're looking at this first Paul subjection. Paul explains that the reason that this is an illogical suggestion is because the Christian has
died once-and-for-all to the authority of the old sin nature, and he has died to the authority of the old sin nature by means of baptism. He
points out that this baptism has been experienced by every believer. That's the first thing you have to remember about this baptism. Every
believer has had this baptism. This is the baptism which has united the believer with Jesus Christ so that the person is saved. This union with
Jesus Christ means that the believer is credited with sharing in Christ's death on the cross in payment for the evil of mankind, along with
sharing and Christ's burial in His resurrection.
Thus, through baptism, the believer died in reference to the old sin nature. That is what verse 1 says: "What shall we say then? Shall we continue
in sin?" And there the word "sin" means "old sin nature." It's singular: "That grace may abound." His answer is in verse 2: "God forbid." The
thought is absolutely unthinkable because it's illogical: "How shall we that died do this in nature live any more under its sovereign authority?"
That is the first answer that Paul gives in verse 2.
Remember that "death," as always, means "separation." The believer is separated from the control of the old sin nature, but death never means
extinction. Death for a human being only means separation. In this case, you are separated from the control of your old sin nature, but it does
not mean the extinction of your old sin nature within you.
Sanctification
The Christian, as he grows spiritually, develops increased controls over the old sin nature so that you are able to resist it. So, all of the
disorientation, and all of the confusion, and all the spiritual deceit that flows out of the sin nature is neutralized. That's called
sanctification, and that's something we're going to come to in a big way in a little bit in this book.
So, when God baptizes a believer into Christ, He also terminates the absolute control of the old sin nature over that Christian.
Seven Baptisms
Now, in the last session, we briefly reviewed the fact that in the New Testament there are seven different baptisms. So, verse 3 says, "Don't
you know that as many of us as we're baptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into His death?" Obviously, in interpreting verse 3, the first
question that comes up is: which of these seven baptisms is he referring to in verse 3? It is the juvenile spiritual mentality that immediately
leaps to the conclusion that this is a ritualistic water baptism. Every time you hear the word "baptism," this is what most people think –
that it's a ritualistic water baptism.
However, we showed you in the last session that there were four dry baptisms in the Bible, and only three wet baptisms: four without water; and,
three with water. And I'm going to try to answer the many questions that you've asked me this week on more of the details of these baptisms,
because you should know them. You should know them well, and you should be prepared to be able to discuss them, because it's always a shock to
people who discover that there is such a thing as seven different baptisms in the Bible.
We have translated verse 3 this way then, just to get it together: "Or are you ignorant of the fact that all we who were placed into Christ
Jesus were placed into a participation in His death?" So, we looked, first of all, at this word "baptized," and I just very briefly remind you
that "baptize" is simply a Greek word taken letter-for-letter into the English language. "Baptize" has absolutely no meaning. You can say the
word "baptize" until you're blue in the face, and you won't know what it means, because there's no meaning to the word "baptize." It's just a
Greek word in English letters.
So, now, right off the bat, you say, "Oh, well, OK, then if I'm going to know what the word 'baptize' means, I have to know what the Greek
meaning is." And that's exactly the case. So, first of all, you have to come to a hard, specific, definite understanding of what the word
"baptize" means.
Homer
The place to begin would be to go back to where the Greek language began – in its classical period, before the fifth century B.C. And in
the classical Greek, we have this word "baptize" used. We have it used, for example, in the writing of the poet Homer in his monumental work,
The Odyssey. Here he compares the hissing of the burning eye of the Cyclops with the sound that water makes when a blacksmith places
(baptizes) a hot iron in water in order to temper the metal. And the word that he uses is this Greek word for "baptize." It is taking the hot
metal, and placing it into water, and when he places it into water, he uses the word "baptize: "I'm baptizing the metal. I'm immersing it in
water, and it makes a hissing sound as the hot metal hits the water." And he uses that as an analogy to compare what happened when the eye of
the Cyclops was stabbed.
The Odyssey also refers to a character . . . who dreams that he has seen a huge bird shot with a mighty arrow. As it flies high, its blood drips
out upon the clouds, and the word that he uses to describe this covering of the cloud with the blood of the bird is the word "baptize." He
baptizes the cloud with its blood.
In the other writing of Homer, The Iliad, we have a wounded soldier who is said to "baptize" the earth with his blood; that is, his blood
is covering the earth. The word is this word "baptize."
Euripides
Another Greek letter, Euripides uses the word "baptize" to describe a ship which sinks permanently below the surface. And he says that the ship
has just been baptized. It goes under the water and it doesn't come back up.
Xenophon
Another Greek writer of the classical period, Xenophon, in his composition called The Anabasis, uses the word baptize of Greek soldiers
who, before the battle, gather around and dip the points of their spears in blood. And he describes their dipping their spear points in the blood
as "baptizing" the points of the spear. So, again, you're beginning to get a little idea of just exactly what the word "baptize" means.
The Septuagint
We come over into the Greek language, as it had developed after the classical period and before the New Testament period of Greek. We will look at
the Greek language as it existed when the Old Testament was translated into Greek. This was called the Septuagint translation. And in Leviticus 4:6,
we get a very significant clue as to what the word "baptize" actually means: "And the priest shall dip his finger in the blood" (sacrificial blood
which has been gathered): "And the priest 'baptizes' his finger in the blood." And the word which is used in the Greek translation of this Hebrew
word for "dip" is the Greek word "baptizo. It's the word "baptize." Again, this gives you an idea of just exactly what "baptize" means. Very
clearly here it means "to dip."
Then the rest of that verse says, "The priest shall dip his finger in the blood and sprinkle of the blood seven times before the Lord before the
veil of the sanctuary." And the word for "sprinkled" is a totally different Greek word, because there is a Greek word for "sprinkled."
So, here, very interestingly enough, you have an indication of the mode of baptism. And on the basis of what the writers who were translating
the Hebrew into the Greek of the Septuagint version understood about the word "baptize," they would not have thought about using the word
"baptizo" to describe sprinkling. That's a different Greek word. But when they talked about the priest dipping his finger into the blood to put
it on his fingers in order to sprinkle it, then they used the word "baptize," so that it indicates to us that the word "baptize" meant "placing
into something."
In the common Greek, which we call the Koine Greek, which was the Greek that was spoken in the time that the New Testament was written, of the
secular writings of the Koine Greek world, we have the word "baptize" used to describe a boat being submerged. And we have it used of a person
who is being overwhelmed by calamities – a person who's being submerged in calamities.
Baptize means "To Place Into"
So, again, you get an indication, as you pull all these three together: the classical Greek; the Septuagint Greek; and, the Koine New Testament
Greek, and what does the Greek word "baptizo" mean? This word is transliterated as "baptizo," and we change the last letter to an "E," and we get
our word "baptize." What does it mean? It has the basic meaning of "to place into" or "to introduce into." That's all the word "baptize" means.
This is what baptism describes. And you can see, as you think back upon these uses that we have from various writings, that this is exactly what
it meant every time.
When the priest was going to sprinkle the blood, he had to baptize his finger. That meant that he had to place it into. He had to introduce it
into the blood in order to do that. When the ship went below the surface of the water, it had to be placed into the water. It had to go beneath
the surface. So, that the translation of the word "baptize" is "to place into" or "to introduce into."
Now if the translators of our Bible had treated the word "baptizo," like they treated other Greek words, they would have translated it. They
would not have just transliterated it. All they did was pass the Greek spelling into English spelling, because it's such a controversial word.
But if they had translated it, they would have said "to place into" or "to introduce into." And that would have clarified a lot of the confusion
in itself, because suddenly you would realize that "baptism" is being said to do something that many times, obviously, a ritual cannot perform.
It would be very clear that this ritual baptism of water could not do what this word says it's doing. But when you just pass Greek letters into
English, you can get away with a lot of murder, because the word "baptize" has no meaning whatsoever in English. It's just a hazy word that we
have to give its translation from the Greek so that we understand what it's saying.
The New Testament
In the New Testament, you also have, of course, the word "baptize" used. And it might be interesting to run through this a little bit. A word
that's related to this basic word "baptizo" is another Greek word. It's "bapto." It's just a variation of "baptizo." This word is used in
Luke 16:24. It has the same meaning as baptized. They're related words. They just have different forms. And in Luke 16:24, you have the story of
Lazarus and the rich man, and you have him asking Abraham to permit Lazarus to baptize his finger in water, and bring a cool drop of water over
to the rich man. Again, that would very, very clearly mean "to place into." The only way that Lazarus could have baptized his finger in water was
to place it into water. So, "bapto" or "baptizo" means "to place into."
In John 13:26, you have Jesus Christ saying, "I'm going to identify the traitor among us by handing to him this morsel of food that I'm about to
dip here into this substance (whatever they had). He said, "I'm going to give him the sop. I'm going to give him this morsel of dipped food. And
the word used to describe the dipping is "baptizo:" "The one to whom I give this baptized piece of bread." That is, in effect, what He was saying.
What did He mean? He said, "I'm going to give this bread which I have dipped into (which I have placed into) this liquid. I'm going to give to the
traitor."
In Revelation 19:13, we have the expression "dipped in blood." And again, the Greek uses the word "bapto," meaning "placed into blood."
In Hebrews 9:10, you have the noun form "baptisma," from which we get our English word "baptism." There in Hebrews 9:10, it's used of ceremonial
washings required by the rituals of Judaism, where an item was simply immersed beneath water and just shaken off, and it was a ceremonial washing.
It's used also in Mark 7 of ceremonial washings of cups, and pots, and glass vessels, and tables.
Also, of course, it's used of the ceremony of water baptism, which now should give us a pretty good clue, as far as the form goes, what that consists
of. It's used in Matthew 3:7 in the ritual of water baptism, as well as in Matthew 3:16, John 4:1, Acts 16:33, 1 Corinthians 1:14, and 1 Peter 3:21.
And on the basis of what we have seen, when the New Testament talks about the ceremony of water baptism, it must mean placing into. A person is
placed into water. A person is introduced into water. And that's all the word means.
Modes of Baptism
So, when you come to modes baptism, it's obvious that you cannot, in any way whatsoever from the Greek language, distort the mode into a
sprinkling pattern as is so commonly followed today – a method which was simply invented because babies don't like being dunked under water.
So, they decided they had to start baptizing babies, because regeneration was attached with baptism. That's the logical conclusion. It is foolhardy:
if water baptism is critical to salvation, then you better get your babies baptized just as fast as you can. And babies are not good candidates for
immersion. So, they went to sprinkling, and settled for that. And some just went to pouring it on their heads and settled for that.
Identification
That gives us the meaning of baptism. This is the translation: "to placenta into" or "to introduce." What's the word to explain what this amounts
to? I think the one word would be "identification." This is the single meaning of baptism – identification. The dipping into or the placing
into is to identify one object with another so that a relationship has been changed from its original state.
Now, let's go back in view of what we've said: "Or are you ignorant of the fact that all we who were placed into." And there the word "baptized"
is used: "placed into Christ Jesus were placed into a participation of His death?" So, by pulling out the word "baptism," and putting the meaning of
the word "baptism" in there, you can see that what verse 3 is talking about is some kind of identification to Jesus Christ that resulted in your
having credited to you His death for sin. It was some kind of placing in relationship to Jesus Christ. It was some kind of identifying with Jesus
Christ that gave you, (to your credit) before Almighty and holy God, the death of Christ for your sins.
What Kind of Baptism is this?
Now, what kind of baptism could possibly do that? It has to be one of these seven. Which one of these seven baptisms can take you, as a guilty sinner,
and identify you in such a way with Jesus Christ, that when almighty God looks upon you, He no longer sees you, but He sees you clothed in the
perfection of the absolute righteousness of His Son. What kind of baptism could satisfy the integrity of God against you, so that you are related to
Jesus Christ in such a way that God has no fault with you anymore? There is no guilt that He holds against you for sin.
The Baptism of Moses
The first baptism that we found in the New Testament was the baptism of Moses in 1 Corinthians 10:1-2. The baptism of Moses has identified Moses
and the children of Israel. The children of Israel were identified with Moses and his mission of leading them to freedom in the Promised Land
through the Red Sea. They were also identified to the cloud. The cloud represented Jesus Christ. That cloud was the "Shekinah" glory that we've
talked about before. This cloud led them through the sea, and led them to freedom. So, the Jews were identified with this cloud, which was the
pre-incarnate Lord Jesus Christ.
So, what does the baptism of Moses do? The baptism of Moses simply did this: it identified the Exodus Jews with Moses in relation to the Red Sea,
through which he led them to freedom, and to the "Shekinah" glory cloud, which was the Lord Jesus Christ leading Moses and the Jews. This is a dry
baptism. This is a baptism that does not use water. But it was a baptism that identified the Exodus generation of Jews with Moses. It identified
them with what? It identified them with the freedom to which they were being led, and it identified them with the leadership of the Lord Jesus
Christ in the form of the "Shekinah" glory cloud.
Now, do you see anything in here, by the wildest stretch of your imagination, that could be associated with the ritual of water baptism? In this
case, there was no water involved at all. It was a completely dry baptism.
The Baptism of the Cross
The second one is the baptism of the cross. In Matthew 26:39, the Lord Jesus Christ uses the word "cup" for the cross. It says, "And He went a
little further, and fell on His face, and prayed, saying, 'Oh, My Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from Me; nevertheless, not as I
will, but as you will.'"
We compare this with Matthew 20:22: "But Jesus answered and said, 'You do not know what you ask. Are you able to drink the cup that I shall drink
of, and to be baptized with the baptism that I am baptized with?' They said unto Him, 'We are able.'" Here, this cup is associated with a baptism
that Jesus Christ was to experience in connection with the cross. This was long after His water baptism that He experienced. This is near the point
of His death. And here He is speaking about a baptism that He is to face – this baptism of the cup (this baptism of the cross). The cup
contained the payment in the form of physical and spiritual death for the sins of the world.
Jesus Christ, Who is the sinless one, as 2 Corinthians 5:21 points out, was to bear the evil of humanity. It was the Lord Jesus Christ who
willingly then drank the cup of sufferings as we have in John 18:11: "Then said Jesus unto Peter, 'Put up your sword into the sheath. The cup
which My Father has given Me – shall I not drink it?'" What was the cup? It was the cup of the cross, or the cup of suffering, or the cup
of being made sin (He who knew no sin) in order to pay for the sins of the world. So, the Father's wrath would fall upon the Son as he bore the
sins of the world. This is what Isaiah 53:4-6 describes for us.
Now I must point out to you that in Matthew 20:22, some of the manuscripts of the Greek texts that we have do not have the last part of verse 22:
"to be baptized with the baptism that I am baptized with." That part about baptism is not in some of the Greek texts. It is in the text from which
the King James was translated, and which many scholars believe is the true and authoritative text. Some of the other manuscripts we have omit that
part about baptism. So, all we will say at this point is, if indeed this was an addition on baptism and should not be in this text, we still have
six different baptisms in the New Testament. But we'll assume at the moment that this is a legitimate text, and that the baptism of the cross
(whether or not you call it the baptism of the cross), the idea is the same. It is God's wrath against sin being poured out on Jesus Christ; Christ
drinking that cup of wrath to the bottom; bearing all our sins; And, the Fathers integrity and justice being satisfied by bringing upon Jesus Christ
the punishment for the sins of the world.
God the Father rejected all of human good as payment for our moral guilt. You and I as individuals may choose to pay for our sins with our own human
good instead of the divine good that Christ provided on the cross. If we are going to stand on our human good, I can guarantee you're going to drink
the cup of wrath and suffering as Jesus Christ drank. And that would be a pity. He's already drunk that cup for you. But the point is that either
you accept the drinking done for you by Jesus Christ of the wrath of God, or you will drink it yourself.
In His First Coming, Jesus Christ drank the cup of wrath. At His Second Coming, those who reject His provision will drink their own cup of wrath.
So, the baptism of the cross identifies Jesus Christ with the evil of mankind as the sacrificial Lamb of God to satisfy the demands of God's
holiness. And the picture that we have here is that Jesus Christ is going to be immersed in a pool of suffering. That is the baptism of the cross.
And the baptism in that pool of suffering identifies the Lord Jesus Christ with the evils of mankind for which He died as the Lamb of God.
Now, obviously, you cannot, in any way, by the wildest stretch of your imagination, associate this baptism of the cross with Christian water
baptism. So, now you have two baptisms. Is that the one that Paul is referring to in Romans 6:3?
The Baptism of the Holy Spirit
We have the third baptism, which is the baptism of the Holy Spirit. The baptism of the Holy Spirit did not occur in the Old Testament, or in any
previous dispensation. In Acts 1:5 we're told that this is in the future. The baptism of the Holy Spirit was prophesied by John the Baptist in
Matthew 3:11, Mark 1:8, and Luke 3:16. Jesus Christ described the baptism of the Holy Spirit. He predicted that it was coming in John 14:20 and
Acts 1:5.
In 1 Corinthians 12:13, we had the classic passage which spells out for us the mechanics of the baptism of the Holy Spirit: "For by one Spirit
were we all baptized into one body." What is this baptism do? The baptism by the Holy Spirit places a believer into union with Christ. This
happens at the moment of salvation. It happens automatically. You do not seek this after salvation. You receive it at the point of salvation.
Now, of course, baptism is a factor in religious life that Satan has been able to capitalize on in a great way. The baptism of the Holy Spirit
currently is the one that is the point of the great delusion of the charismatic movement, and which is destroying thousands upon thousands of
people relative to their eternal rewards, as well as, for many of them, their salvation itself – the distortion and confusion on the baptism
of the Holy Spirit.
The baptism of the Holy Spirit happened for the first time on the day of Pentecost. It was a unique church-age relationship for the simple fact
that it unites believers into one body, which is the body of Christ. The baptism of the Holy Spirit joins a believer to Jesus Christ. The baptism
of the Holy Spirit places a believer into Christ. So, he is no longer in Adam, but he is now in Christ. So, he is no longer related to death, but he
is now related to the life that Jesus Christ has provided. This is a fantastically vital, important baptism. It occurs at the moment of salvation.
You might want to consult Ephesians 4:5 and Hebrews 2:11.
Eternal Fellowship and Temporal Fellowship
This is a baptism which joins all believers into one body. Obviously, this is not true of water baptism. If there's anything that water baptism
does, it divides believers into many bodies. What you have here is a description of something that God Himself does for the believer. And what He
does is joins the believer to two factors. We can illustrate this by drawing our two concentric circles. One of them has to do with the death of
Christ on the cross. When God the Holy Spirit places you into Christ, at salvation, He relates you retroactively to what Christ did on the cross.
You now benefit by what was done 2,000 years ago. He also currently places you where you are in eternal fellowship (the outer circle), never to be
lost again (a grace salvation). And He places you into temporal fellowship (the inner circle). This you may go in and out of (the inner circle) as
per sin and confession.
Retroactive Positional Truth
So, here you have retroactive positional truth. You have the position of being on the cross 2,000 years ago. You also have current positional
truth. You are now in Christ. That's what this position is. This is the position of being in Christ, and you cannot again be removed from that
position (the outer circle).
So, the baptism of the Holy Spirit is something that God does. It is not an experience. You do not know that it's happening to you. You don't get
happy when it happens. You do not speak in tongues because of it. It is a once-for-all event. It's in that aorist tense in the Greek language in
1 Corinthians 12:13, which means it happens only once. It is a result of your decision to accept Christ as your Savior, and it happens at the point
of salvation.
So, the baptism of the Holy Spirit. What does it identify you with? It identifies the church-age believer with Christ by placing him into the
body of Christ, the church.
Now, obviously, no water ritual could ever do that. You absolutely have to be the most distorted twister of the Word of God, and of everything that
the apostle Paul is trying to teach here in Romans, to suggest that this kind of a relationship to Jesus Christ could be performed by some human
ritual.
The Baptism of Fire
We have the baptism of fire. The baptism of fire is the divine judgment that comes upon unbelievers when Jesus Christ returns the second time
– upon the unbelievers of the tribulation. Those who are believers go into the millennium in their mortal bodies. Those who are unbelievers
are put to death. This doctrine of the baptism of fire is what we read about in Matthew 3:11-12, Luke 3:16-17, and 2 Thessalonians 1:7-8. In these
gospel passages, it's talking about wheat being separated from the chaff. That refers to believers and unbelievers. You have an analogy made to the
days of Noah in Matthew 24:37-41, when one is taken and one is left.
You have a series of the parables of the baptism of fire illustrating the
judgment of God: the wheat and the tears parable; the good fish and the bad fish parable; the good man of the house parable; the sheep and the
goats parable; and, the wise virgins and the foolish virgins, referring to Israel – believers and unbelievers coming out of the tribulation.
The sheep and the goats refer to gentiles – believers and unbelievers coming out of the tribulation. And when these people face God, those who
are unbelievers face what is described here as the baptism of fire. It is the baptism which identifies them with what? With Hades, and eventually
the lake of fire. So, the baptism of fire identifies unbelievers of the tribulation era with the divine judgment of Hades.
Remember that the church (the Christians) are gone. This is a baptism after the tribulation period. And this baptism identifies these unbelievers
with Hades, and ultimately with the lake of fire.
Well, you can see that this certainly is not what Paul is talking about in Romans 6.
The Baptism of John the Baptist
We come to the wet baptisms. The first one is the baptism of John the Baptist. This is a baptism that we're more acquainted with. John lived,
however, I want to remind you, in the period of the Jewish age (the dispensation of Israel). John the Baptist preached personal repentance in
preparation for fulfillment of the Abrahamic Covenant, because the Messiah Savior was at hand, and He was ready to set up His kingdom. And when
a Jew repented with positive volition to the message of John, then John took him down into the water (usually the Jordan River), and he baptized
him with water.
What was the meaning of this? Remember "placing into water." Water always represented something. What did water represent in the case of John's
baptism? Water, in the case of John's baptism represented identification with the Jewish Messianic Kingdom. It represented the fact that the
person was ready to receive the Messiah promised to the Jewish people, and that he was ready to receive the kingdom that that king of the Jews
was to bring. The believer was put under the water, identifying with the Messiah Kingdom. He comes up out of the water ready to enter the
Messianic Kingdom.
Now, you cannot, by the wildest stretch of your imagination, relate this to what Paul is talking about in Romans 6:3. This was not identifying
with the body of Christ. This baptism identified with the Jewish Messianic Earthly Millennial Kingdom. And it was for Jews, and not for gentiles.
So we have a baptism that's completely different. I want you to pursue it, if you would, on your own, Acts 19:1-6, where Paul comes upon a group
of believers who never had anything but John's water baptism. And Paul notices that there's something wrong with them. He notices that these
people have not come over from the Old Testament era into the New Testament church era. And he says, "Didn't you receive the Holy Spirit when you
were baptized?" And they said, "No." Paul said, "What baptism have you had?" They say, "The baptism of John." Paul said, "Ah, bingo. I know what
your trouble is. You're still on Old Testament ground. You're still in the old era. John's baptism had nothing to do with Christianity. So, the
apostle Paul takes these people, he baptizes them; and, then, as was the order at that point in the development of the church (not now, but at
that point), God the Holy Spirit came upon them by laying on of apostolic hands. And he laid his hands upon them, and they received God the Holy
Spirit following church-age, Christian baptism.
So, here is the baptism of John the Baptist that had nothing to do, again, with what Paul is talking about. But it did identify people with
something. The baptism of John identified Jewish believers with the Messiah Savior and His role as King of the Jews in the earthly kingdom.
The Baptism of Jesus
Then you had the baptism of Jesus. This is a baptism, again, which was unique. It's one-of-a-kind. The baptism by John was functioning, of course,
before Jesus came on the scene. John was already baptizing with his baptism, which identified people with the kingdom that Jesus came to bring.
Now, it was the purpose of Jesus Christ to have his herald, John, baptize Him in order to signal the start of His public ministry at age 30. And
in John's baptism for Jesus, the water had a different meaning. Here the water represented the kingdom of God on earth, which Jesus Christ had
come to rule, and His role as King of the Jews. Here the water represented the mission of Jesus Christ as the Lamb of God for the sins of the
world, and to be the King of the Jews.
So, when Jesus said, "John I want you to baptize Me," Jesus was again saying, "I want you to place Me in these waters, which will represent My
identification with My mission." What's your mission, Jesus? "My mission is to be the Messiah Savior, and to be the King of the Jews, and to set
up the earthly kingdom promised to Abraham, and then expanded to King David and the Palestinian Covenant of the land, and the covenant of a new
heart (the New Covenant)."
So, John took Jesus and baptized Him for this purpose. When Jesus entered the water of His baptism, He was signifying that He had come to die for
the sins of the world. When Jesus came up out of the water, He was signifying that he had come to rule as King of the Jews in a resurrected
humanity.
So, you and I don't follow Jesus in baptism, because His baptism was unique. Once more, the baptism of Jesus identified Him with His earthly
mission of Savior of the world, and king of the Jews.
Christian Water Baptism
Finally, we come to the Christian church-age baptism that we're all well-acquainted with. This church-age baptism is a ritual baptism. It's the
baptism of believers in the church age, and they are identified with Jesus Christ. What I have told you previously about the baptism of the
Holy Spirit is illustrated by the water baptism of the church-age. When a believer is placed into the waters of baptism today, those waters
represent retroactive positional truth. Those waters represent the believer being associated with the death of Christ on the cross. When the
believer is placed into those waters, he's representing being buried with Christ, having paid for the sins of the world. When the believer is
brought back up out of the waters, he is representing current positional truth. He is now in the position of the one who has eternal life
credited to his account (who has absolute righteousness credited to his account). He now stands as one who is absolutely perfect before God,
and that is portrayed by water baptism. But it is accomplished by Holy Spirit baptism.
A great deception that Satan has pulled upon humanity today is that he has taken the baptism of the Holy Spirit, which Romans 6:3 is talking about,
and he has twisted the thinking of people around so that they attribute to the man-performed rituals what only God Himself can accomplish through
the baptism of the Holy Spirit. The believer is simply portraying what the Spirit of God has already done for him.
Christian church-age water baptism identifies a believer with Jesus Christ in His death; His burial; and, His resurrection. And that's all it is.
It's a picture. The placing into the water does not accomplish any divine accomplishment. Only God accomplishes that.
Now, in order to demonstrate indeed that Romans 6:3 is referring to that specific baptism of God the Holy Spirit, and that it is that baptism that
identifies you with the death of Christ, next time, we will look a little more in detail at this particular baptism. There are in the Bible three
kinds of uses of this word "baptism." Sometimes it's used in terms of a mechanical usage; sometimes it's used in terms of a ceremonial usage; and,
sometimes it's used in terms of a metaphoric or symbolic usage. And the devil today has vast groups of people that have twisted the mechanical and
the ceremonial around. And if you get particularly the mechanical and the ceremonial twisted around, you're dead for all eternity. If you twist the
ceremonial water baptism of the church-age, and you get it mixed up with the mechanical baptism of the Holy Spirit, where God is actually putting
you into Christ and out of Adam, and you look to that water baptism to accomplish that mechanical change, you will pay for it with your soul
forever, because you are trusting to a water-performed human work to identify you with the death of Christ. And it never will do it. The baptism
of Romans 6:3 is the baptism of God the Holy Spirit. The results are monumental and fantastic, as we shall look at next time.
Dr. John E. Danish, 1977
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