The Power of Baptism

For years, I have been trying to get some clarity about the significance of baptism. Not the church "ordinance" of baptism, but the spiritual ramifications of being baptized, and it can be a little confusing if you look at it through religious reasoning. SO I WON'T!! I received Jesus by faith when I was 11 years old, and I was baptized three weeks later. When I went into the baptistry, I did not "feel" some strange heightened awareness of the water and the people out there in the sanctuary. I was following through with what the Word of God told me I should do, and it was a natural order of events to get baptized. Is there power in baptism? Yes.

Jesus was baptized, and here is the account of what happened. Matthew 3:¹³ Then Jesus went from Galilee to the Jordan River to be baptized by John. ¹⁴ But John tried to talk him out of it. “I am the one who needs to be baptized by you,” he said, “so why are you coming to me?” ¹⁵ But Jesus said, “It should be done, for we must carry out all that God requires. ”So John agreed to baptize him. ¹⁶ After his baptism, as Jesus came up out of the water, the heavens were opened and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and settling on him. ¹⁷ And a voice from heaven said, “This is my dearly loved Son, who brings me great joy.”

When you are born again, there is a spiritual transformation that takes place, and as Paul wrote in 2 Corinthians 5:¹⁶ So we have stopped evaluating others from a human point of view. At one time we thought of Christ merely from a human point of view. How differently we know him now! ¹⁷ This means that anyone who belongs to Christ has become a new person. The old life is gone; a new life has begun! There is a human point of view and a spiritual point of view for all of us to look at and understand. The human point of view will be that baptism is one of our first acts of obedience, and I see some wisdom in this thinking. But what if it is much more than an act of obedience? In other words, it is the first time we follow the leading of the Holy Spirit to do something, and when Jesus said He was sending the Holy Spirit to guide us and help us understand all things, that was evidence of the Holy Spirit leading us.

If you have a purely religious mindset, you will come to a conclusion that baptism is our chance to "join a church." Southern Baptists even give you a letter and put you on the roll when you are baptized, and you can take that to any other Southern Baptist church as proof of you being baptized, and they will accept you as a "voting" member of their church. Sounds a little political to me, but that is how Southern Baptists do it. Our baptism is so much more, and part of the more is the Holy Spirit leading you to follow the Word of God on the subject and carrying out all God requires, as Jesus said in the above verses. Usually, new converts are willing to be baptized because they want to follow the Bible, regardless of what it does for them in church membership. Why? A church is not a "club" that you can join to satisfy its membership requirements. And baptism is not the "password" to get in. We are baptized to follow the Word of God's teachings and all of the requirements, which deepens our walk with God.

Obedience to God is not a man-made act. It is a Holy Spirit-driven result of our changed life that is prompted by God and done out of love for our God. This love of following God completely doesn't stop in the baptismal pool, but is seen through every part of our faith, including giving, sacrifice, and calling. John's baptism was not a spiritual event, but a change of direction event. Without the leadership of the Holy Spirit and the love of God, we have nothing to give, so trust and love God. If our roots are good and deep, then our convictions will be pure and solid. Paul spoke to this spiritual transformation in Romans 12: 1And so, dear brothers and sisters, I plead with you to give your bodies to God because of all he has done for you. Let them be a living and holy sacrifice—the kind he will find acceptable. This is truly the way to worship him. Don’t copy the behavior and customs of this world, but let God transform you into a new person by changing the way you think. Then you will learn to know God’s will for you, which is good and pleasing and perfect. Because of the privilege and authority God has given me, I give each of you this warning: Don’t think you are better than you really are. Be honest in your evaluation of yourselves, measuring yourselves by the faith God has given us. ...

Love does not let us give for personal gain, because the manipulation of man is an affront to the true Word of God and what we learn. A pure heart is what God is looking for, and the transformation causes us to be real and genuine in our faith walk. That is our spiritual act of true worship. From the heart and not from a worldly perspective. Thus, the power of baptism is seen in the way a person's faith walk comes to life. REAL LIFE!!

The Pilgrimage Continues,

David Warren