Today on Summit Life with J.D. Greer. Welcome back to another day of teaching here on Summit Life with Pastor J.D. Greer.
As always, I'm your host, Molly Vitovich. You know, baptism is one of those subjects that tends to stir up some lively debate in Christian circles. Some people say you should be baptized as a baby, while others say you should wait for adulthood. Some like to sprinkle, others like to dunk. Some think you're not actually saved unless you've been baptized.
And then some just don't see what the big deal is either way. But what we should really care about is what the Bible says on the issue, and then in turn, why it matters. Pastor J.D.
Greer addresses those questions today on Summit Life as he continues our teaching series called The Whole Story. We're returning to the book of Matthew, so grab your Bible and a pen and let's get started. Matthew 3, verse one. In those days, John the Baptist came preaching in the wilderness of Judea and his message was pretty simple. Repent. Repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. For this is he who was spoken of by the prophet Isaiah when he said, the voice of one crying in the wilderness, prepare the way of the Lord and make his path straight.
Now, John wore a garment of camel's hair and a leather belt around his waist and his food was locusts and wild honey. Verse five. Then Jerusalem and all Judea and all the region about the Jordan were going out to him and they were baptized by him in the river Jordan, confessing their sins. First, I want you to note the simplicity of John's message.
You can summarize it really in one word. Repent. All repent really means is turn away from your sin. That was basically his whole sermon. And after a while, you'd be like, okay, John got point number one. Why don't you move on to point number two? And John would say, I don't really have a point number two.
All I really have is point one. You see, evidently, most of the people listening to John did not need to be told what to repent of. They already knew what they needed to repent of.
The vast majority of people today do not need to be told. They already know what area of your life right now is not under the full authority of God. Are you obeying him? Is he first in your finances? Is he first in your heart? Is he first in your relationships?
Is he first with your time? The problem is not that we need to learn a bunch of new things. The problem in every age is that we just need to repent and come to Jesus in the areas that we know are not under his control. Second, note the tone of John's message.
The simplicity was repent. The tone was what we call apocalyptic. Repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. Apocalyptic just means it concerns the end of the world. Jesus said for us to live ready, that there's always an apocalyptic kind of edge to the gospel, because there are two things that could happen at any moment that none of us know. One is that Jesus could return. He says he's going to come like a thief in the night. The other thing that could happen with you not knowing is death. And so you begin to live today in light of what you know is coming, and that is the end, and it got people's attention, and they thought about their lives in the present from a glimpse in the future. The tone was apocalyptic.
Number three, notice the response. Baptism. Verse seven. When he saw many of the Pharisees and the Sadducees coming to his baptism, all the religious people started to come, because that's what religious people do.
They find out what cool religious things are happening in the religious world, so they go do those religious things so they can add them to their religious resume. So he looks out there, and there's all these Sadducees and Pharisees, and John says to them, you brood of vipers who warned you to flee from the wrath to come. Verse eight, bear fruit therefore in keeping with repentance. Do not presume to say to yourselves, we got Abraham as our father, for I tell you, God is able from these stones to raise up children for Abraham. Even now the axe is laid to the root of the trees.
In other words, stop hiding behind religion. Religion is going to delude more people out of repentance and send them to hell than rebellion ever will, because it keeps you from understanding your need for grace and keeps you from dealing with the core of your heart. So now verse 11, John begins to show you the significance of his baptism. Now that he's prepared the way, now he's going to show you the significance of his baptism.
Verse 11, I baptize you with water for repentance, but there's one mighty coming after me that's mightier than I, whose sandals I'm not worthy to carry. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and with fire. John says that his baptism, in other words, is symbolic of something, a greater baptism. The real baptism happens not in water like John is baptizing with. The real baptism, he says, is going to happen in the Holy Spirit. So verse 13, enter Jesus. Then Jesus came from Galilee to the Jordan to John, and then in order to be baptized by him. And John recognizes him.
I mean, they're cousins after all. And John's like, whoa, you can't do that. Jesus, this is a baptism watch of repentance. So what does Jesus answer? Let it be so now for thus it is fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness.
So John consented. And when Jesus was baptized, immediately he went up from the water and behold, the heavens were open to him. And he saw the spirit of God descending like a dove and coming to rest on him. And behold, a voice from heaven said, this is my beloved son with whom I'm well pleased.
Did you see it? There's the whole gospel right there. Jesus doesn't need to repent. Yet he's being baptized in repentance and he's being baptized to fulfill righteousness, even though he doesn't need to repent and he doesn't need to become any more righteous.
Why is he doing those things? Because he is beginning, listen to this, his ministry of substitution. You see, Jesus is going to live the life that we are supposed to live and then die the death that we are condemned to die. It is true that Jesus did not need to repent, but we did. So Jesus does it perfectly in our place so that he can continue to live in our place so that when he dies, he's actually going to bear the condemnation that we bore.
He's going to live the life we're supposed to live and then die the death where we're condemned to die. You see, it's almost as if, if you think of it this way, imagine all these people standing around the shore of John's baptism and they all are wanting to repent and be baptized. So imagine they've all got a name tag on and the name tag says, hi, I'm JD. I'm a sinner. And everybody's got their own name and I'm a sinner below. And Jesus has a name tag on that says, hi, I'm Jesus.
I'm righteous. So Jesus from the back of the crowd begins to walk through, but as he does, he begins to take off people's name tag and he begins to put them all over his chest. And he walks down into the water and he gets baptized confessing not his sin, but theirs.
And then Jesus, you see, is going to go to a cross where Paul is going to say in second Corinthians, that God is going to make him who knew no sin to become sin for us. So Jesus is going to be beaten with a cat of nine tails that leaves his back flayed open. It lacerates his skin. He's going to be beaten to where you can't even recognize him. His beard ripped out. They're going to take a crown of thorns and shove it down on his face. So that is his face is so disfigured.
People can't even recognize him who know him. And when people are new to Christianity, they're like, that's disgusting. And what we say in response is that's the point. Your sin is disgusting. And Jesus actually became your sin on the cross. He became your sin. We say that Jesus did not merely die for us. He died instead of us. He took our place. So watch when Jesus gets out of the water and the father looks at him and says, this is my beloved son in whom I'm well pleased because Jesus repented and died for me.
I can actually take that accolade and apply it to me because we traded places. So now the father looks at me and says, this is JD. He is my beloved son in whom I'm well pleased. Not because I've lived in a way that deserves that, but because Jesus lived for me. He died for me and all that was mine became his and all that was his became mine. The gospel at its core is substitution.
Jesus in my place. This is what separates Christianity from every other religious message in the world. Every other religious message has a prophet that gives you a list of things to do. Do this, say this, rub this, touch that, don't touch that. And if you do these things, you need to do them often enough and well enough, God will accept you.
The list may differ, but the content is essentially the same. Jesus did not give us a list of things to do or rituals to go through. Jesus gave us a story about something he has done for us. He substituted for us and he gave himself for us so that in him, I could become the righteousness of God and I could hear I'm his beloved son in whom I'm well pleased.
He wore my name tag of sin so I could put on his name tag of righteousness. Substitution is the core of the gospel. It also is something that I just think so few people really get.
And the way that you know that you haven't gotten it is it's never offended you deeply. When you really get it, you're going to suddenly be very offended because I don't like to think of myself as needing a substitute. Substitute means you're helpless. I prefer to think of myself as God's like HGTV project. I'm a little fixer upper.
When you say I need a substitute, that means I can't even really get in the game. My wife and I will sometimes go to the same gym to work out. And one of the classes that we'll go to is they'll do these things called partner workouts. You know what a partner workout is? It's when you have certain reps of a certain exercise and then one person does it while the other one rests.
And then when they get tired, you switch off back and forth. Well, I've learned that there are certain exercises that my wife is just a lot better than me at. One of them is a burpee. You know what a burpee is? A burpee is something invented by the devil for the vexation of God's people. Well, she is a lot better at burpees than I am. So if we're doing one of these partner works out and we have to do like a hundred burpees, then what that means is that she does about 65 of them. And I ended up doing about 35, which is humiliating for me because I'm the man. And I want to be able not just to carry my weight.
I want to be able to take care of my girl, right? But it's humiliating because she's just a lot better than me. What essentially the gospel is, is not Jesus saying, you do what you can, then I'll do the rest. He's basically saying, you can't even get off the floor. I'm going to have to do all 100 because you are dead in your sin and you can't go anywhere. So I'm going to do them all. And then I'm just going to credit you with them because I'm going to be your substitute. And when you feel that it suddenly becomes at the same time, really humiliating and totally blessed because your salvation no longer depends on you. It's Jesus who did it in your place. Your place, it is the sweetest and most difficult gospel truth. You're listening to Summit Life and a teaching series in which we've been taking a few months to survey the entire Bible. We'll rejoin Pastor JD in just a moment, but I wanted to remind you about why this ministry exists. At Summit Life, our mission is to take people deeper into their understanding of the gospel message and then in turn take that knowledge and advance the gospel wider into the world. We believe that everyone should have access to the life changing truth of Jesus Christ. Through broadcasts, podcasts, devotionals, and other resources, we work tirelessly to make the gospel accessible.
In fact, we want anyone within the sound of our voice to have access to the trusted biblical teaching free of charge. This vital mission is made possible by friends like you. Will you join with us with your support? Your prayers and financial gifts help us bring hope-filled teaching to homes, cars, and workplaces. Together, we can make an eternal difference. Consider becoming one of more than 500 gospel partners who help sustain this ministry.
Visit jdgrier.com to start your monthly donation today. Now let's return to today's teaching. Once again, here's Pastor JD. So let me end today by talking about baptism for us, for you and me, what it means for us today because Jesus, you see, catch this, is going to take this thing from John, his cousin, and he's going to make the centerpiece of the Great Commission. So the Great Commission says, go make disciples, baptize them.
It's going to be the centerpiece of the message because it was a symbol of us, whether we're Gentiles or Jews, and almost everybody here is a Gentile, it's going to be symbol of us crossing over from the wilderness of sin where we're in charge to the land, the promised land of faith and obedience where Jesus is in charge. Paul is going to say in the same way, it's a symbol of us going from the death of sin to new life with Christ. Therefore, Romans 6, 3, we are buried with him by baptism into death, that just like Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also now should walk in the newness of life. So let me point out four quick things that we learn about baptism from John that still apply to us. Number one, from John we see that baptism publicly declares your repentance. Baptism was a public symbol that symbolized I'm leaving the wilderness of sin and entering this promised land of obedience, passing from death to life. There are many people, especially in the south, who get baptized but never repent. And that's revealed by the fact that they're not really living in the land of faith and obedience, they're still essentially in the wilderness of sin. Because somebody convinced you, somebody convinced you wrongly that you could accept Jesus as Savior and not surrender to him as Lord as if Jesus was a salad bar that you could take the parts you want and leave the parts you didn't.
But what it means to come to Jesus is to cross through that river, metaphorically speaking, where you say I'm leaving behind the wilderness where I'm in charge and I'm going into the place where God's in charge and that will be revealed by the fact that my life is surrendered to him. There is a large number of people in the south that have gone through baptism but not actually repentance. If your life did not radically change when you got baptized, it was not a baptism of repentance, you just got wet in front of a bunch of people. It's a baptism that publicly depairs your repentance.
That's the first thing we learn. Number two, baptism is by immersion. Baptism is by immersion. Now I'm not trying to theologically quibble, and there's a lot of things that we would consider more important in Christianity than this, but I want to explain to you why we do it the way we do it. We submerge people when we baptize them for two reasons.
Number one, because that's how they did it in the Bible. John wasn't standing on the shore throwing water out on top of their heads, he brought them into the river. Baptized back then, if you go back and look at literature, what it meant was to soak or to plunge. They used it when somebody drowned.
Not as a joke, but like for real. Like someone so drowned they were baptized. When a ship sank, that meant someone was baptized. We even have a recipe that was written down in the first century by a Greek poet and physician named Niconder on how to make pickles. He says the first thing you do when you're making a pickle is you bapto the cucumber in water, which meant dip.
Bapto means dip quickly. He goes after that you baptizo the pickle in vinegar, which means you don't dip it quickly, you put it in vinegar and hold it down until the vinegar soaks all the way in and it changes the constitution of the cucumber to make it a pickle. He says then when you pull it up, it will come out filled with the Spirit and speaking in tongues. No, no, no, he didn't say that.
I made that part up. But what it shows us is there's a way that they thought of baptism. And so what we do when we baptize you is we put you under the water until you can quote the entire Nicene Creed. And then we pull you, no, I'm kidding. But there's a sense in which it's not unclear what the word means.
It is not unclear at all. It means put somebody under, in which the second thing is what it symbolizes. It symbolizes death. When you bury, I'm not trying to be cute, but when you bury somebody, you don't sprinkle dirt in their head.
You put them into the ground. So we are being buried with him by baptism into death. That's why we do it by immersion. Number three, we see from this story here with John that baptism is not a condition of, it's an evidence of salvation. The repentance came first. Nowhere in the Bible is baptism made a condition of salvation. But I still meet people who are like, yeah, you got to get baptized if we want to go to heaven.
I told them I can prove that's not true in one story. One story, you got Jesus and a thief on the cross right next to it. And the thief on the cross, after a lifetime of sin, realizes that Jesus is the Messiah. He repents. And he says, Lord, remember me when you come into your kingdom. And what does Jesus say? Go get a hose quick and get you a bucket.
No. And he says, today, this very afternoon, you're going to be with me in paradise. The apostle Paul said that if you will confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and you'll believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, that Jesus was your substitute, then you will be saved. Because with the heart you believe unto righteousness. With the mouth you make confession unto salvation. Whosoever calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved. There ain't nothing about baptism anywhere in that.
So baptism is not a condition of salvation, but it's an evidence of salvation. I often describe it to my kids, and I've said this to you before, too, that it's like this wedding ring that I wear. This wedding ring, I tell my kids, symbolizes that I'm married to your mom. If I take it off, I didn't suddenly become unmarried to your mom.
If somebody else puts this ring on, it doesn't make them married to your mom. But this ring just shows everybody that I have a covenant with your mom. In the same way, baptism is this public declaration that we have repented and that we have been saved by Jesus, which is why we teach people you ought to do it after becoming a believer. Because if it's an evidence of your repentance, if you do it before you repent, then it can't be an evidence of repentance you haven't done. And if you do it when you're an infant, that's not an evidence of your repentance. It's an evidence of your parents' repentance and your parents' faith.
And by the way, thank God for your parents' faith. Thank God for what they wanted for you when they baptized you. And what we say is you should be baptized the way they are in the New Testament, which is as an evidence of your salvation and not a hope for your salvation. So everybody we see in Acts gets baptized after they believe. Acts 2 41, 3,000 people believe and are baptized. Acts 8, Ethiopian eunuch believes and is baptized. Acts 9, Paul believes and is baptized. Acts 10, the Holy Spirit falls on all who believe the word and are baptized. Then they're baptized. Acts 16, 15, Lydia's heart opened by God to hear what Paul says. Then she's baptized.
Acts 16, 30, Philippian jailer. What must I do to be saved? Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ. You and all your household, they all believe. They get baptized. Acts 18, 8, many Corinthians listen to Paul's preaching. They believe and are baptized.
Now let me read the verses and explain the verses where the people in the book of Acts get baptized before they repent or when they get baptized as infants. And now I'm completed with that list. Okay. There are none, not a single one. So what we say is, yes, I'm not trying to make a mountain out of a molehill, but we're just saying it's an evidence of your salvation.
Why not? If you got baptized when you were an infant, thank God for the faith that your parents showed in that moment. You get the joyous privilege of calling them and saying, mom and dad, what you hoped for me 19 years ago, 35 years ago, what you hope for me has come true. And now I have repented and I belong to Jesus. And I've entered the promised land of faith and obedience. I ratified. I ratified what you hope for me by joining my baptism to what you did for me. So that now I've publicly declared that I belong to him.
I put on that ring, which leads me lastly to number four. John shows us a baptism is important. The soul story shows us a baptism is important. People often are like, well, I just don't get what the big deal is. It was just like a ritual. Why do you have to go through it?
It didn't seem to change anything. Notice what happens to Jesus when he's baptized. He hears the affirmation of God.
This is my beloved son. And he gets filled with the spirit. He's about to go into the wilderness to be tempted. Matthew four, if you read ahead, he's about to go into the wilderness to be tempted by Satan for 40 days. And this affirmation from the father is going to become the core of his strength and resisting Satan, because he's going to say, the father has declared over me his love and that love and that assurance is going to give me the strength to withstand Satan to his face. Your baptism is important because it's a marker that you put in the ground where you say, I have left the jurisdiction of Satan. You got no more authority here because I now have crossed over this Jordan River. And I'm now in the promised land of obedience where God rules. So you shut up Satan. That's essentially what, what, why it's so important.
It becomes this marker. I have struggled with whether I should do this next part, because for some of you, this is the only thing you're going to remember from the whole sermon. And I definitely lost the vote when I asked the other pastors, but you know what?
I got the mic. So here we go. Martin Luther, who's one of my favorite theologians, 16th century, Martin Luther said that the devil every single night would come to dispute with him. What he meant by that was he would tempt him. He would whisper discouragement in his heart, lie to him. He said, I felt like I was wrestling with Satan in my soul every night. He said, I learned that there are two things that could drive away the devil.
Way, the presence of Satan. Number one, he says, is I say out loud to him, Satan, I am baptized. And I declared to him that I have left his wilderness of sin where he is jurisdiction. And I've entered into the promised land of Jesus where Jesus rules and that he can not talk to me because I am not under his rule anymore. And that drove the devil away.
That was number one. He said, the second thing that I do is he says, I pass strong gas. He said, because Satan's core sin is pride. And there's nothing that shows greater disrespect for somebody than passing gas in their face. He says, so Satan can't handle it when I mock him that way. And so I humiliate him by passing gas and that drives his presence away. You got to admit the logic is pretty sound, correct? Now, there are two ways that Luther has given you for you to wage battle against Satan.
The first is more effective and more pleasant for the people around you than is the second. But it is important that you have this confession that you harken back to, that you say, that is this symbol that I made to God, that I made to people, that I made to my family, that I made to Satan himself. I said, I'm leaving the wilderness of sin and I'm not going back.
I'm crossing over this river. And this is the land of repentance and obedience that I'm in. And here's the question, have you repented? Have you taken that step of receiving Jesus as your savior? If not, we'd love to walk with you through that process.
Get in touch and learn more about becoming a follower of Christ when you visit jdgrier.com. If you're a regular listener, you know that every month we pick out a resource to go along with our study. This time we've paired the whole story with something pretty unique. It's actually a Summit Life Kids Activity Book. Pastor JD, what makes our new Summit Life Kids Activity Book unique compared to other resources like it? Yeah, I think what makes this resource stand out is it's its flexibility and its focus. I mean, first it's digital, so you don't have to wait for shipping.
You can print as many times as you need it. But more than that, each activity in there from the word searches to the coloring pages, it's designed to draw kids into the truth of God's word. Molly, it's amazing to me how many times verses that I memorized as a child still come to me in moments when I need them most. I'm so thankful for a mom and dad that centered our home and our family discussions on the Word of God. Your generosity matters very deeply to us. It's an important part of how this ministry works.
It enables us to be on the air and to be able to go into new places where we can teach the Word of God, hopefully with Holy Spirit power and clarity as you pray for us and your donations enable us to be able to do that. So thank you. Thank you for partnering with us. Thank you for this ministry is as much yours as it is ours.
And we're working together to see the Word of God saturate our nation and places around the world. Thanks, JD. We would love to send you this brand new digital activity book. Call 866-335-5220. That's 866-335-5220 or give online at jdgrier.com. And we'll send you this new resource immediately. It will be linked right in your donation receipt for immediate download today. I'm Molly Vitovich. Be sure to listen Wednesday when we're looking at the subject of temptation on Summit Life with JD Greer. Today's program was produced and sponsored by JD Greer Ministries.
