Water Baptism - Part 2

Today on Fellowship in the Word, Pastor Bill Gebhardt challenges you to become a fully functioning follower of Jesus Christ. Now, as Paul's saying, I'm glad that I didn't meet any of you to Christ.

Does that sound like Paul at all? He said, but I'm glad I didn't baptize any of you. There's a distinction between being baptized in the water and being saved.

OK, there's no question there's a distinction. So it's what is water baptism? It's clearly a ceremony where persons immersed in water. Are there other baptisms in the scripture?

Yes. Fire, the Holy Spirit putting ourselves into the body of Christ. What's the history? It comes out of Judaism for proselytes. And the real question comes down to why do we baptize? Thank you for joining us today on this edition of Fellowship in the Word with Pastor Bill Gebhardt. Fellowship in the Word is the radio ministry of Fellowship Bible Church located in Metairie, Louisiana. Let's join Pastor Bill Gebhardt now as once again he shows us how God's word meets our world. When you and I put our faith in Christ, we are immersed in Christ, we identify with Christ, and that means you see this through scripture. The immersion is so complete that where I am, Christ is.

Remember the scriptures say Christ in you, the hope of glory. So I'm here and so is Christ. You're here and so is Christ because he's in us. But where he is, so am I. Paul says to the Ephesians and Ephesians two were seated in the heavenlies. Now you say, well, no, I'm seated here. Yes, but in Christ are seated in the heavenlies because he's seated in the heavenlies.

But it goes bigger than that. Once you're immersed in Christ, it's not only that he is where I am and I am where he is. But I also am where he was. That's the identity. And when he was on the cross, guess who was on the cross?

Me. You see, when he was crucified, I was crucified and you were crucified. When he was buried, I was buried and you were buried. And when he was raised from the dead, so was I. I have a new life. I am a new creature in Christ. So Paul says, why then would I want to sin? I'm dead to sin.

I paid for sin. That's what happens spiritually when a person comes to a saving knowledge of Christ. Water baptism is just a picture. A symbol of that dying, buried, rising again. I'll say it after the 10 o'clock service, we're baptizing two people. I'll say when I put them under buried with Christ in his death, raised to the newness of life. That's the symbol that didn't do it.

It's already been done. It's just the symbol. People have always been exactly saved the same way. Somehow, it isn't as interesting that Jesus gave the church only two ordinances. The Lord's table do this in remembrance of me and water baptism. What did the church do? We made them both sacraments.

Just the opposite. No, this is the only way you can go to heaven. You have to do these sacraments in order to get to heaven.

No, they're ordinances. He said these are things that picture something else. And we said, no, no, no, we have to earn this.

We have to do it ourselves. So we took the Lord's table and baptism and we made them essential to salvation. And of which they're clearly not at all in scripture. Turn with me to 1 Peter chapter 3. 1 Peter chapter 3. Verse 21. I want you to see what Peter wrote.

It's important. Peter says in verse 21, corresponding to that, baptism now saves you. Immersion in Christ now saves you. But he realizes just how dense we are and what we'll do with something like that. And so he continues. He said, corresponding to that, baptism now saves you, not the removal of dirt from the flesh.

What's he mean? Not water, not talking about water. You see, that's important to understand. We're not talking about water. He said not not the removal of dirt from the flesh, but an appeal to God for a good conscience through the resurrection of Jesus Christ. That's what saves you.

Peter is as clear as it could be. Water baptism doesn't save anybody. He's never said it did. In fact, he says here, it clearly doesn't save anybody. Philippian jail or Paul and Silas are in the jail.

There's an earthquake. They could have escaped. They didn't. He would have lost his life.

He didn't have to worry about that. So he said that what must I do to be saved? And what they say, you got to find a water. And if you don't get baptized, you're going to go to hell.

They didn't say that. He said, believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and you will be saved. That's the gospel of Jesus Christ. Now. That's the spiritual reality that I'm talking about here.

There's the baptism, the true baptism of the Spirit of God, which occurs when we put our faith in Christ. Maybe the best way to point it out would be this. I have this is a wedding ring. OK, that's my wedding ring. So if you have a wedding ring, it means you're married, right?

Does it? No. Could I have a wedding ring and not be married? Right. I could have a wedding ring and not be married because does this marry you?

No, there's no. This is a symbol. You see, what marries me is the covenant relationship I have with my wife. I said I do.

She said she does. And we were married. We made a covenant with each other, just like when you came to Christ. And the ring is the symbol behind that covenant. That's exactly what water baptism is. Water baptism is the symbol of your covenant relationship with God through your faith in the finished work of Jesus Christ on the cross. What is water baptism? It's just simply a ceremony in which a person is immersed in water. Are there baptisms without water?

Yes. Fire judgment from God, the Holy Spirit and being in Christ are all spiritual baptisms. The third question is, what is the history of baptisms?

Why did they ever occur? The history is strictly from the Old Testament, from the Jews. The Jews came up with a system by which when a Gentile wanted to be a follower of God and become Jewish, that the Jews would put them through a three step process as Gentile proselytes to be able to become Jewish. The first step was called the milah.

Didn't affect women, but did affect men immensely. The milah is circumcision. So if you're a Gentile and you want to become Jewish, the first step for the man is he has to be circumcised. That's the first step. That's the sign behind Abraham.

So that was the first step you did. The second is called the tabula, and the tabula means you're baptized. They were immersed in water. They are baptized. And the third step that they had to do was called the korban, and that is an animal sacrifice has to occur. Now, when all those occurred, a Gentile who was not part of the covenant community of Abraham could become Jewish. Then John the Baptist showed up and John decided, I'm going to do something very different.

I'm going to make I'm going to ask Jews to be baptized. And it's like, turn with me to Matthew Chapter three and let's get a picture of that. Matthew Chapter three. In verse one of Matthew three, it says, Now in those days, John the Baptist came preaching in the wilderness of Judea, and he was saying, and here's his message, repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. He said, For this is the one referred to by Isaiah the prophet when he said, The voice of one crying in the wilderness, make ready for the way of the Lord. Make his past straight. John is an unusual man.

Notice the next verse. Now, John himself had a garment of camel's hair and a leather belt around his waist, and his food were locusts and honey. He was a Nazarite. He didn't cut his hair.

He is sort of a wild man of the wilderness. But he's asking something here of the Jews that they would have did not understand, especially the leaders. You don't baptize Jews.

John said, You're going to have to do it now. Messiah is coming. And notice what John's messages repent. You see, repentance has nothing to do with being baptized. Baptism is the symbol that you did repent. Repentance occurs in the human heart, just like faith does for us. Repentance occurs in the human heart. Now, everyone went out to John and they said, We repent and we were baptized by you. And it says, Then Jerusalem was going out to him, all Judea and all the district around the Jordan, and they were being baptized by him in the Jordan River. And they confessed their sins. We want the Messiah to come. We repent of our sins. But when so many when he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees coming for baptism, he said to them, You brood of vipers who warned you to flee from the wrath of come?

See, they just want to be part popular with the people. And they said, We're out here. We go through this. John said, You can't go through this, you brood of vipers, unless you repent. You can't do this just to come out here and think you can go through a symbol and it's going to make big things. OK, he said, Therefore, you better bear the fruit of keeping with repentance in verse eight. What I'm doing here is not about water.

What I'm doing here is about your heart. And he says, And do not suppose that you can say to yourselves, Well, we're still OK because we have Abraham as our father. For I say to you that from these stones, God is able to raise up the children of Abraham. Being a being a blood Jew doesn't mean much God can take stones and turn them into sons of Abraham, that has nothing to do with it. That's what he says to them.

Notice then, he says, The axe is already laid at the root of the tree. Therefore, every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and he's thrown in the fire. He said, But for me, he said, As for me, I baptize you with water for repentance.

But he was coming after me as mightier and I am not fit to remove his sandals. He'll baptize you with the Holy Spirit if you're a believer or with fire if you're not. He will immerse everybody. You see, Christ will make sure everybody identifies with him.

You will either get my spirit or you'll get my judgment. That's why Paul said to the Philippians, Remember, every knee will bow. Every tongue will confess Jesus Christ is Lord. Everyone is going to have to identify with Jesus Christ. Everyone is going to be baptized by Jesus Christ, either by the spirit of God or by the judgment of God.

That's what he says. He said his winnowing fork is in his hand. He'll thoroughly clean the threshing floor.

He will gather his wheat into the barn and he'll burn up the chap with unquenchable fire. He's directing that to the scribes and Pharisees. Then Jesus arrived from Galilee at the Jordan and coming to John to be baptized by him. And John tried to prevent him and said, Wait, wait, wait. I have need to be baptized by you.

Why would why? He said, Would you come to me? You see, he was baptizing sinners who had to repent to get ready for the Messiah. The Messiah comes the son of God and John says, I can't baptize you. You should baptize me. You're the son of God. I can't ask you to repent.

You have nothing to repent of. Why would I baptize you? You see, that's what John says. And Jesus said, permitted at this time for in this way, it is fitting to fulfill our righteousness.

And then he permitted him. You see, what Jesus was saying was this, John, you're the voice of God. And all people are understanding that righteousness comes through the repentance and they have the symbol of it through water baptism. And what I want to identify with that I want to identify what I am.

You see, I am fall. I am following in baptism here to show that I am part of the righteousness of God. It also allows Jesus to identify with sinners. The baptism of Jesus is not like any of these other people. And Jesus baptism is not like any of ours. I hear often people say we need to follow Jesus in baptism. Our baptism is not like Jesus. We baptize because we are sinners saved by grace. They baptize because they had faith and repentance of their sin and they had water. Jesus had neither of those. Jesus's baptism was to identify himself with the righteousness that God was bringing to the nation Israel at the time. That's what happened. And so that's what he did. Now, what's interesting about this is that Jesus then becomes the standard of righteousness.

And again, it's always the reality of the heart. It really never having to do with salvation. In First Corinthians, 114, listen to what Paul said. He said, I'm glad that I baptized none of you. Now, as Paul's saying, I'm glad that I didn't meet any of you to Christ.

Does that sound like Paul at all? He said, but I'm glad I didn't baptize any of you. There's a distinction between being baptized in water and being saved.

OK, there's no question there's a distinction. So it's what is water baptism? It's clearly a ceremony where persons immersed in water. Are there other baptisms in the scripture? Yes. Fire, the Holy Spirit putting ourselves into the body of Christ.

What's the history? It comes out of Judaism for proselytes. And the real question comes down to why do we baptize? Go with me to Matthew Chapter 28. Matthew Chapter 28. The last words of Matthew.

This section is called the Great Commission. I've said this many times in the past. It's why we exist. Every single thing that we do as a church, we will do infinitely better in heaven. Everything.

You'll sing better. Thank the Lord for that. You know, but I mean, our worship, our fellowship, everything will be much better in heaven, except one thing.

We can't win the loss there. You see, that's the why it's the one. That's why it's called the Great Commission. It's the one essential of the church. We are now God's plan to evangelize the world. And Jesus says this in verse 18. Jesus came up and spoke to them and said, all authority has been given to me in heaven on earth.

There is no other. He said, go, therefore make disciples of all the people groups, of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe that all that I commanded you. And he said, and lo, I'm with you always, even to the end of the age. That's the Great Commission. The imperative mood in those verses in the Greek is make disciples. That's the commandment. And he said, you do that by these participles. You do it by going. You do it by baptizing and you do it by teaching.

It's clear. Jesus Christ said, I want you to go and make disciples. And part of the commission, part of the Great Commission is clear. Baptizing them in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, identifying them in that way. When we get to the book of Acts, the church begins in Acts chapter two. And in Acts chapter two, guess what they do?

He says you need to believe and then you need to be baptized. Peter took it seriously in Acts eight, 12. Same thing. Acts 10, 44. Same thing. Acts 10, 46 to 48. Same thing. Acts 16, 30 through 34.

Same thing. Acts 18 in verse eight. Never once in the book of Acts is someone baptized and then they believe.

Not once. It's always a believer who is baptized because it's the symbol of what happened in your heart. So when do you baptize somebody then? It's simple when they believe. And what does that mean?

A variety. I was baptized in my 20s because I came to Christ in my 20s. I can still remember when I was a student at Dallas Seminary on a very cold, I think it was November, very cold. I baptized two people and I did it in a Jacuzzi at the swimming pool because the Jacuzzi was heated. And I can still remember the steam coming off my body.

You know, it's kind of cool in a way, but it was freezing cold. One of them was a man who was a college student. The other one who I remember my whole life, his name's Homer Charles, he was four. And I met with both of them beforehand. And I wanted to make sure I wanted to make sure they were believers. My interview with Homer Charles was much better than my interview with a college student. He had it down. He had every single aspect of this down. You know, I talked to him about his sin. He got all that right. I talked to him about the Lord. He got I mean, it was amazing. He was four years old. And by the way, was it an empty thing?

No. The last I knew he he loved the Lord his whole life. He did mission trips in his teens. He still walks with the Lord.

He came to the Lord of four. You see, he articulated his faith. So when you believe. You see, inwardly, when that happens to you, identify and you're baptized by the Spirit of God, it's time to show the symbol. That's how that can happen.

It can happen any time. The last question is, does water baptism then really matter? Because I think that's the question a lot of evangelicals are having. Well, one thing I can say this, you can't obey the Great Commission and ignore it. You can't you can't be obedient to the Great Commission and say, yeah, I believe. I believe I believe two thirds of that or three fourths that I believe that. But I don't believe in the other. You can't ignore it. Jesus is as clear as you can be about this. Secondly, baptism is the outward confession of the inward reality.

It's extremely important. You see, it's the outward confession of what happened to me inwardly. It's just like my ring. You see, I don't wear the ring because I have to. I don't wear the ring because my wife makes me. I wear the ring because I want to. You see, I want to do that. I want a symbol of what happened to me.

I want that symbol. You see, that's the whole point of water baptism. And remember, in their culture, whenever you were baptized, they didn't take you to a church or swimming pool. In the early church, you're baptized in public. You see, you saw people being baptized. Everybody saw them. Believers, unbelievers, everybody. You know this if you heard me say it before, but when I first became pastor of the church, I called Jefferson Parish and I asked them if I could do all of our baptisms at La Foniere Park.

And of course, they said, absolutely not. OK. Why did I want to do that? Because it's public. You see, because it's public, I'm going to stake my stand and say who I am in public. Now we've turned it into extremely private. You know, and some people don't even like to be baptized in front of the church. They just want to be baptized privately.

And that's OK. But you realize how private you're trying to make this, because it's an outward expression to everyone who wants to know. It's a stand in which we take. And lastly, simply this, baptism is an act of obedience to every Christian. It's just an act of obedience. It's important to Jesus Christ. He wouldn't have said it if it wasn't important. The thing is bothering me now within our culture is it's not as important to us. We've turned it into something like an elective, something like it's just it's just an elective. You can do it if you want. If you don't, it's fine.

So that article said that there were four reasons. Why Christians are not being baptized in our country. And you may be indifferent.

You may be profitable or you may be defiant about it. But after this morning, you're no longer ignorant. You see, you know what the word of God says. Baptism.

Wonderful picture. Of a great spiritual reality. Let's pray. Father, I don't know why the Church of Jesus Christ here in the United States has changed so much in these last 30, 40 years. And we've made water baptism to almost be nondescript in a very sort of indifferent elective act. It's clear in the word of God that that was never the case. I just pray, Father, that all of us who are your children understand that.

We understand what the Bible says about it. We understand of what it means to you. And, Father, what it should mean to us. I pray, Father, that your spirit works in each of our hearts for our good and for your glory in Christ's sake.

Amen. You've been listening to Pastor Bill Gebhardt on the Radio Ministry of Fellowship in the Word. If you ever miss one of our broadcasts, or maybe you would just like to listen to the message one more time, remember that you can go to a great website called oneplace.com. That's oneplace.com, and you can listen to Fellowship in the Word online.

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