The One Part 6: Baptism!

“As a prisoner for the Lord, then, I urge you to live a life worthy of the calling you have received. Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love. Make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace. There is one body and one Spirit, just as you were called to one hope when you were called; one Lord, one faith, one baptism; one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all.” – Ephesians 4:1-6 NIV

Humans probably need to shower every day or two, to make themselves physically clean and get rid of their smell from sweat. For example, my daily routine is to shower every day and especially when I get wet from rain or sweat from exercising. Apart from teeth get rotten if we do not brush our teeth daily, I also need to brush my teeth every time I plan to go out because of my breath. According to my mum, it is because I rarely speak at home. But what about our spiritual junk? To be more specific, how do we get rid of our guilt and sins from the past?

The truth is that we cannot by ourselves. However, according to the Bible, water-baptism is the solution if we want to get spiritually renewed. Baptism symbolises the death and resurrection of Jesus (Romans 6:4). In Jonathan Edwards’ book, ‘Gospel-Centered Discipleship,’ He states, “Through faith in the gospel, Jesus’ death and resurrection becomes our death and resurrection.” This means that baptism allows us to die in our sinful nature and become resurrected in godly nature. Therefore, baptism technically is our spiritual birth (Romans 6:5-14). We also can see this in John 3:1-8. When Nicodemus, the teacher of Israel, heard whoever wants to belong to the Kingdom of God must be born again from Jesus, he thought Jesus was talking about physical birth. Jesus tried to let him understand this Kingdom mystery by explaining it to him in a clearer way; “Very truly I tell you, no one can enter the kingdom of God unless they are born of water and the Spirit. Flesh gives birth to flesh, but the Spirit gives birth to spirit.” (John 3:5-6) Jesus, even, was baptised, even though He originally came from God (Matthew 3:13-17).

As baptism is spiritual birth, believers in Jesus Christ only need to get water-baptised once. Although water-baptism does not signify that we are not going to sin anymore, it shows God and other believers our confession in Jesus as the Lord and Saviour. Although we are still sinners, God forgives us every time we repent because Jesus already died in our place (1 John 1:5-2:2). 2 Corinthians 5:21 proclaims, “God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.”