Therefore, it all comes down to two simple steps that are described in Verse 11. His life becomes our life. The apostle uses two marvelous visual aids that God likes to employ to help us to understand truth. In water baptism the person who goes under the water is the same one who comes up out of the water. The command is: “Go . Water baptism teaches us, by symbol, the meaning of this baptism of the Spirit. Now, I don't understand that. A woman came up to him and asked him to baptize her nine-year-old daughter. 14For sin shall not be your master, because you are not under law, but under grace. It has been set free of sin in order that we may begin to exercise control over the body of sin, so that it may be rendered inactive and we no longer need to be slaves to sin. Can he live as an alcoholic, or a swindler, or an adulterer, or a homosexual, or a slanderer? It would be the epitome of irresponsible exegesis to assert that this baptism is something different from the immersion that transitions one “into Christ,” as the case is in both Romans 6:3-4 and Galatians 3:26-27. With our tongues, designed to be that by which we bless God, we curse him instead. In Christ your spirit is freed: It has been united with Jesus; It has risen with him, and It is free from sin. Even your soul, which is produced by the union of the body and the spirit, is not wholly you. For we have each other, and the sharing and fellowship and caring are God's ingredients to healing -- long-lasting healing -- that will impart strength beyond endurance, as God does it in His time and in His way. Beginning at Verse 1: What shall we say, then? Yet this baptism is very essential to becoming a Christian. When I was a boy in Montana, I had a horse that could smell water from farther away than any animal I ever saw. The word united means "to graft a branch into another." Verses 8-10: Now if we died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him. We participate in those events. The body requires rest from time to time. Baptism is the symbol of what has already occurred in the heart and life of one who has trusted Christ as Savior (Romans 6:3-5; Galatians 3:27; Colossians 2:12). Scripture is very careful to help us see that in Jesus there was no sin. By being born into this human race, we became part of what Adam did. They hurl exegetical caution to the wind and adopt absurd views that are wholly without substance. Something always went wrong and you ended by fouling up in some way. John 3:23). He knows that there will be a struggle and there will be failures. The apostle is saying that what was true in Adam has now been ended and now we are in Christ, by faith in Jesus Christ. This is one of the most important concepts to understand. . ( Romans 6:4) Water baptism is a way to visually preach the gospel. Every funeral throughout the ages has testified to the reality of that fact. Which baptism, therefore, is now obsolete? But the promise remains: "Sin shall not have dominion over you. Does the Grace in Ephesians 2:8-9 Exclude Baptism? His body became possessed and controlled by sin. ", Looking back across these more than thirty years since that night, I can see that God has broken the grip of the things that mastered me then. You are under grace, and God understands your struggle. (Romans 6:2c NIV). Furthermore, the verse clearly says that we are baptized into Christ, not the river Jordan, or into any other water. But Paul says that is not true. Let's see what the apostle says about baptism in Verses 3-4. We are no longer in Adam, in any sense. Finally, a vast host of scholars—even those who do not view baptism as a condition of salvation—admit that the passages surveyed above relate to water baptism. There's something wrong here. I walked in a cloud of glory, rejoicing in this great promise: "Sin shall not have dominion over you, for you are not under law, but under grace. 1] to bring a great many instances of their sayings: where all that mention that text from Justin Martyr down to St. Austin do so apply it: and many more might be brought. We are all tempted this way because sin, as a principle, is still in control of the functions of the body. There will be a struggle; it is not always easy, but we have the strength to do it and we have the right to do it. by Matt SlickRomans 6:3-5 is often used as a proof text for the claim that baptism is essential for salvation. It cannot be water baptism, for that baptism (as administered by a human teacher) was to continue to the end of the Christian age (Matthew 28:20). Baptism is an important step of obedience that every Christian should take. . Can he go on in a lifestyle that is basically wrong and sinful? There is this sin within us that wants to take a natural function of the body and push it beyond what it ought to -- and thus it becomes sin. Ron was reluctant to do so without finding out whether the girl really understood what was happening, so he began to question her and to teach her about the reality behind the water baptism. That requires something far more potent than water. When our spirit has died in Christ, then the body of sin will be rendered powerless. your mind, your stomach, your hands, your feet, your sex organs -- offer them to God] as instruments of righteousness. Every evidence of history demonstrates it to be true. Here Paul is dealing with what is probably the most remarkable and certainly the most magnificent truth recorded in the pages of Scripture. What is it? It is clear from a consideration of the language in Romans 6:3-4 that the baptism into which one is immersed is also that from which he emerges (i.e., is raised). His body was rendered powerless with regard to sin. You will search in vain to find any mention of water even in the entire book of Romans! Jesus was alive; then he died, was buried, and then he arose from the dead. 10The death he died, he died to sin once for all; but the life he lives, he lives to God. You see, sin, in the believer, is located in the body. Now, how would they know it? That is why Jesus was buried -- to prove that the sin in his body was ended. "Do Romans 6:3-4 and Galatians 3:26-27 Refer to Spirit Baptism?" We want to give up. Water baptism is a beautiful picture of what our Lord has done for us. Verses 6 and 7: For we know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body of sin might be rendered powerless, that we should no longer be slaves to sin -- because anyone who has died has been freed from sin. But somehow there is in us a principle that wants to overindulge, and we become lazy, slothful, apathetic. A similar argument is made concerning the Galatian passage (Walvoord and Zuck 1983, 461, 600). ... Romans 6:21-23 Bearing Sanctified Fruit. The position is false. Notice some things that Paul says about the baptism of the Spirit in this passage: First, he says that we are expected to know about it. In order that we might understand it, Paul now gives us both sides to this parallel -- death and resurrection. "Don't you know that we were all baptized into Christ, into his death?" The Mandate for Christian Unity – A Study of Ephesians 4:1-6. This is how, Paul explains: The Spirit took us and identified us with all that Jesus did. 5If we have been united with him like this in his death, we will certainly also be united with him in his resurrection. We are now in Christ, and he is our life from now on. The mind, that amazing instrument of the body, functions in such a way as to reason and to logically deduce and to produce an amazing variety of inventions and technological advances. I remember walking the floor, my heart just boiling over with praise and thanksgiving to God. Even our loves become twisted. Verses 5-10 introduce a new figure for us and reveal a deeper revelation of what has happened to us. It is not something that is felt; it is not something you can know through your senses when it takes place; it is something the Spirit does to our human spirit. In Verse 11 we are asked to do something. I tell you, you really have to love Christ to be baptized in the frigid waters of the Pacific! Standing in the water symbolizes a Jesus dying on the cross, immersing in the water symbolizes Jesus being buried in the tomb and being raised from the water symbolizes Jesus rising from the dead. Paul says that is what happens to us. The same point is made in Colossians 2:12. He pointed to the shadow on the sand and said, "When you go down in the water and are raised up again, that is a picture of what has already happened." You are not a Christian if that isn't true of you. And when you came to Jesus, when you believed in Jesus, that was the real baptism. Paul is referring to the essential you, the spirit within you. That union with Christ is the truth from which everything else in Scripture flows. If both are still in effect, the apostle’s math was in error. In Verses 3-14 (of Romans 6) we want to see how the apostle begins to unfold this conclusion so that we might understand in detail what that change means in our lives. It is impossible, Paul says, because, as he puts it in these four little words, "We died to sin," (Romans 6:2b NIV).