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Dr. Kenneth Wuest stated that “the Greek word for ‘baptism’ speaks of the introduction or placing of a person or thing into a new environment or into union with something else, so as to alter its condition or its relationship to its previous environment or condition.”
When we believed, the Holy Spirit baptized us into the Lord Jesus. “By one Spirit are we all baptized into one body.” “Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new” (though the “old man” yet indwells believers, they are new and separated from it - Ro 8:9; 1Co 12:13; 2Co 5:17—NC).
By this spiritual act of baptism, the Spirit places us in union with the Lord Jesus. We were taken out of our old environment and position in the first Adam, and positioned in the new environment of the Last Adam. By that means our position is changed from that of a lost sinner with a depraved nature to that of a righteous saint with the divine nature [not that this divine nature makes us divine, we are only “partakers” and not possessors: “not essentially, nor of the essence of God, this is impossible, for the nature, perfections, and glory of God are incommunicable to creatures - John Gill - 2Pe 1:4—NC). Our relationship to the Law is changed from that of a guilty sinner to that of a justified saint.
This spiritual baptism occurs once, at the new birth, and is forever (most important spiritual growth doctrine from which all growth doctrines derive—NC). The act of water baptism is meant to be our practical public testimony to, and illustrative of our spiritual baptism into the risen Lord Jesus Christ.
Positionally, judicially, each believer was positioned in, identified with the Lord Jesus on the Cross. From that point on, in that judicial oneness, what happened to Him happened to us. “I am crucified with Christ” (Gal 2:20). That crucifixion had to do with His and our death unto sin. “Or do you not know that as many of us as were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into His death?” (Rom 6:3)
As we are submerged in the waters of baptism we are testifying to the fact that the Spirit has baptized us into the Lord Jesus’ death unto sin. Our identification in His death includes a number of blessed factors:
a) In Christ we died to the penal consequences of sin. “For he who has died has been freed from sin” (Ro 6:7).
b) In Christ we died to the power and reign of sin. “Knowing this, that our old man was crucified with Him, that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves of sin” (Ro 6:6).
c) In Christ we died to the world. “But God forbid that I should boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world” (Gal 6:14). Here, by the “world” is meant God is left out.
Hence, we are to “love not the world neither the things that are in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world—the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life—is not of the Father but is of the world” (1Jn 2:15, 16).
d) In Christ we died to the self-centered life. “He died for all, that those who live should live no longer for themselves, but for Him who died for them and rose again” (2Co5:15).
e) In Christ the believer died to the claims of the Law, as well as the principle of law in general (the principle of law is “he that doeth wrong shall receive for the wrong which he hath done: and there is no respect of persons” - Col 3:25—NC). “Wherefore, my brethren, ye also are become dead to the Law by the Body of Christ.” Our death with the Lord Jesus, as symbolized in our water baptism, has satisfied the demand of the Law. “For Christ is the end of the Law for righteousness to everyone that believeth.” “For I through the Law am dead to the Law, that I might live unto God” (Ro 10:4; Gal 2:19).
f) In Christ we died to the dominion of Satan. “Inasmuch then as the children have partaken of flesh and blood, He Himself likewise shared in the same, that through death He might destroy him who had the power of death, that is, the devil, and release those who through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to bondage (Heb 2:14, 15).
I. Our water baptism pictures our burial with the Lord Jesus in His death unto sin. “Therefore we were buried with Him through baptism into death” (Rom 6:4). As we allow ourselves to be submerged beneath the surface of the baptismal waters, we are enables to appreciate what our Lord passed through in order to save us both from the penalty of our sins, and the power of our sin (“the power of sin is the Law” - 1Co 15:56—NC). We are henceforth better able to understand and comply with His statement to us, “Likewise you also, reckon yourselves to be dead indeed to sin” (saints are not dead to sin by reckoning, but reckon because they are dead to sin – Ro 6:11—NC).
Now we can know something more of His bitter anguish and cry on our behalf: “The waters are come in unto my soul. I sink in deep mire, where there is no standing: I am come into deep waters, where the floods overflow me. Reproach hath broken my heart; and I am full of heaviness: and I looked for some to take pity, but there was none; and for comforters, but I found none. They gave me also gall for my meat; and in my thirst they gave me vinegar to drink.” Again He cried out, “Thou hast laid me in the lowest pit, in darkness, in the deeps. Thy wrath lieth hard upon me, and Thou hast afflicted me with all Thy waves” (Psa 69:1, 2, 20, 21; 88:6, 7).
II. Our Lord Jesus was not only delivered for our transgressions, but He was “raised again for our justification” (Rom 4:25). When we were brought up out of the waters of baptism we illustrated our resurrection from the dead, in Him. “That like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life. For if we have been planted together in the likeness of His death, we shall be also in the likeness of his resurrection” (Ro 6:4, 5).
III. Hence our baptism not only consists of immersion in water, submersion under water, but emergence from the water to complete the picture of our spiritual baptism in union with the Lord Jesus. As He arose from the dead, to live in the power of an endless life, so we are to reckon ourselves “alive unto God in Christ Jesus our Lord” (again, reckoning doesn’t establish what has already been established, but depends on it (Ro 6:11).
In this new position of life from the dead, the Word says to us, “Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, that ye should obey it in the lusts thereof. Neither yield ye your members as instruments of unrighteousness unto sin: but yield yourselves unto God, as those that are alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness unto God. For sin shall not have dominion over you” (Ro 6:12, 13, 14)
—Miles J Stanford (1914-1999)
MJS daily devotion for July 28
“No true believer expects the Law to give life, yet many expect it to govern life. Too few realize that their death on the Cross separated them from the entire principle of law, and that their resurrection united them to the Lord Jesus,” “full of grace and truth” (John 1:14). —MJS
“All of the Lord’s commands to me are according to the new nature I already have. He is my life, and all His words are the expression of that life. Therefore when His words are given to me, they only give me the authority to do what my new nature likes to do. ‘A new commandment I write unto you, which thing is true in Him and in you” (1 John 2:8). –John Nelson Darby (1800-1882)
“Does our Father mock us by bidding us do what He knows we are unable to do? No! He gives commands we cannot perform in our strength that we may know what we ought to request from Him.”
“Legalism is an effort to shape oneself to given laws or rules. Seeking to urge oneself into conformity to law, the old man is before the eye, and satisfaction is felt according as there is conformity to a given standard.
“The moment legality is sanctioned, it must be with reference to that which needs to be made subject. This is not Christian, because as believers we are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, against which there is no law.” —MJS
When we believed, the Holy Spirit baptized us into the Lord Jesus. “By one Spirit are we all baptized into one body.” “Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new” (though the “old man” yet indwells believers, they are new and separated from it - Ro 8:9; 1Co 12:13; 2Co 5:17—NC).
By this spiritual act of baptism, the Spirit places us in union with the Lord Jesus. We were taken out of our old environment and position in the first Adam, and positioned in the new environment of the Last Adam. By that means our position is changed from that of a lost sinner with a depraved nature to that of a righteous saint with the divine nature [not that this divine nature makes us divine, we are only “partakers” and not possessors: “not essentially, nor of the essence of God, this is impossible, for the nature, perfections, and glory of God are incommunicable to creatures - John Gill - 2Pe 1:4—NC). Our relationship to the Law is changed from that of a guilty sinner to that of a justified saint.
This spiritual baptism occurs once, at the new birth, and is forever (most important spiritual growth doctrine from which all growth doctrines derive—NC). The act of water baptism is meant to be our practical public testimony to, and illustrative of our spiritual baptism into the risen Lord Jesus Christ.
Positionally, judicially, each believer was positioned in, identified with the Lord Jesus on the Cross. From that point on, in that judicial oneness, what happened to Him happened to us. “I am crucified with Christ” (Gal 2:20). That crucifixion had to do with His and our death unto sin. “Or do you not know that as many of us as were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into His death?” (Rom 6:3)
As we are submerged in the waters of baptism we are testifying to the fact that the Spirit has baptized us into the Lord Jesus’ death unto sin. Our identification in His death includes a number of blessed factors:
a) In Christ we died to the penal consequences of sin. “For he who has died has been freed from sin” (Ro 6:7).
b) In Christ we died to the power and reign of sin. “Knowing this, that our old man was crucified with Him, that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves of sin” (Ro 6:6).
c) In Christ we died to the world. “But God forbid that I should boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world” (Gal 6:14). Here, by the “world” is meant God is left out.
Hence, we are to “love not the world neither the things that are in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world—the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life—is not of the Father but is of the world” (1Jn 2:15, 16).
d) In Christ we died to the self-centered life. “He died for all, that those who live should live no longer for themselves, but for Him who died for them and rose again” (2Co5:15).
e) In Christ the believer died to the claims of the Law, as well as the principle of law in general (the principle of law is “he that doeth wrong shall receive for the wrong which he hath done: and there is no respect of persons” - Col 3:25—NC). “Wherefore, my brethren, ye also are become dead to the Law by the Body of Christ.” Our death with the Lord Jesus, as symbolized in our water baptism, has satisfied the demand of the Law. “For Christ is the end of the Law for righteousness to everyone that believeth.” “For I through the Law am dead to the Law, that I might live unto God” (Ro 10:4; Gal 2:19).
f) In Christ we died to the dominion of Satan. “Inasmuch then as the children have partaken of flesh and blood, He Himself likewise shared in the same, that through death He might destroy him who had the power of death, that is, the devil, and release those who through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to bondage (Heb 2:14, 15).
I. Our water baptism pictures our burial with the Lord Jesus in His death unto sin. “Therefore we were buried with Him through baptism into death” (Rom 6:4). As we allow ourselves to be submerged beneath the surface of the baptismal waters, we are enables to appreciate what our Lord passed through in order to save us both from the penalty of our sins, and the power of our sin (“the power of sin is the Law” - 1Co 15:56—NC). We are henceforth better able to understand and comply with His statement to us, “Likewise you also, reckon yourselves to be dead indeed to sin” (saints are not dead to sin by reckoning, but reckon because they are dead to sin – Ro 6:11—NC).
Now we can know something more of His bitter anguish and cry on our behalf: “The waters are come in unto my soul. I sink in deep mire, where there is no standing: I am come into deep waters, where the floods overflow me. Reproach hath broken my heart; and I am full of heaviness: and I looked for some to take pity, but there was none; and for comforters, but I found none. They gave me also gall for my meat; and in my thirst they gave me vinegar to drink.” Again He cried out, “Thou hast laid me in the lowest pit, in darkness, in the deeps. Thy wrath lieth hard upon me, and Thou hast afflicted me with all Thy waves” (Psa 69:1, 2, 20, 21; 88:6, 7).
II. Our Lord Jesus was not only delivered for our transgressions, but He was “raised again for our justification” (Rom 4:25). When we were brought up out of the waters of baptism we illustrated our resurrection from the dead, in Him. “That like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life. For if we have been planted together in the likeness of His death, we shall be also in the likeness of his resurrection” (Ro 6:4, 5).
III. Hence our baptism not only consists of immersion in water, submersion under water, but emergence from the water to complete the picture of our spiritual baptism in union with the Lord Jesus. As He arose from the dead, to live in the power of an endless life, so we are to reckon ourselves “alive unto God in Christ Jesus our Lord” (again, reckoning doesn’t establish what has already been established, but depends on it (Ro 6:11).
In this new position of life from the dead, the Word says to us, “Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, that ye should obey it in the lusts thereof. Neither yield ye your members as instruments of unrighteousness unto sin: but yield yourselves unto God, as those that are alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness unto God. For sin shall not have dominion over you” (Ro 6:12, 13, 14)
—Miles J Stanford (1914-1999)
MJS daily devotion for July 28
“No true believer expects the Law to give life, yet many expect it to govern life. Too few realize that their death on the Cross separated them from the entire principle of law, and that their resurrection united them to the Lord Jesus,” “full of grace and truth” (John 1:14). —MJS
“All of the Lord’s commands to me are according to the new nature I already have. He is my life, and all His words are the expression of that life. Therefore when His words are given to me, they only give me the authority to do what my new nature likes to do. ‘A new commandment I write unto you, which thing is true in Him and in you” (1 John 2:8). –John Nelson Darby (1800-1882)
“Does our Father mock us by bidding us do what He knows we are unable to do? No! He gives commands we cannot perform in our strength that we may know what we ought to request from Him.”
“Legalism is an effort to shape oneself to given laws or rules. Seeking to urge oneself into conformity to law, the old man is before the eye, and satisfaction is felt according as there is conformity to a given standard.
“The moment legality is sanctioned, it must be with reference to that which needs to be made subject. This is not Christian, because as believers we are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, against which there is no law.” —MJS
