What is Baptism?
If you’ve ever been to a wedding, odds are you’ve seen a couple exchange rings as a sign of the promises they made just a few moments beforehand. The rings, which represent their vows, mark them out publicly as a married couple from that moment on. And there’s more: “With this ring, I thee wed.” The rings are not just a sign—when a couple puts them on one another, they are “sealing the deal” on their marriage.
So, we can think of wedding rings as a sign and a seal of the covenant relationship of marriage, and their use reflects an ancient pattern seen in the Bible. When God entered into a special relationship with people (called a covenant), he often gave a visible sign of that new relationship. These signs were incredibly diverse, like a rainbow after a storm (Gen 9:13-15), a weekly day off (Ex 31:15-17), or even a minor surgery (Gen 17:9-11). In each case, just like a wedding ring, these signs represented and reminded God’s people about his promises to them. In some cases, these signs also “sealed the deal” of the covenant between God and people.
When we trust in Jesus, we enter into a covenant relationship with God, and baptism (which comes from a Greek work that means to “dip” or “immerse”) is both a sign and seal of this relationship.
As a sign, baptism points to the great realities of our salvation. The water retells a story: just as Noah was carried safely through the flood of judgement in the ark, and just like Israel passed through the Red Sea on dry land, so we too have been saved from judgement through Jesus, who took our judgement for us. When he went to the cross, he sacrificed himself as as payment for our sins. When we go under the waters of baptism, we reenact how Jesus went under the judgement of God for us, dying in our place. When we come up out of the water, we announce that we have begun to share in Jesus’ eternal resurrection life. Baptism proclaims that what Jesus did, he did for us (Rom 6:3-5).
The waters of baptism also point to the way that Jesus’ death cleans us, washing away our sins so that we might live in the new life he gives us (Acts 22:16, 1 Pet 3:20–21).
Beyond being a sign, baptism works to seal our covenant relationship with God. Baptism is how we respond to what Jesus has done for us. Baptism makes it public that we belong to Jesus, that we have come under his kingship, and that we belong to his body (the church). Baptism is like our citizenship ceremony in the kingdom of God, where we pledge our loyalty to heaven’s crown and are marked out as one of his disciples (Matt 28:18-19).
It’s not that baptism saves us; Jesus saves us by his grace, which we receive by faith. And yet, baptism—like a ring exchanged at a wedding—is how God has told us to receive and respond to his saving grace. “Repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins, and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit” (Acts 2:38).
The AMBER confession of faith summarizes all of this helpfully: “Baptism is a symbol and proclamation of the sinner’s death to sin and his resurrection in newness of life in Christ Jesus. Baptism is a mark of identity, not maturity, and by this initial, one-time act of obedience, the believer is ushered into the fellowship of the local body, admitting him to participate in the Lord’s Table. In baptism, the individual professes faith in Christ, but a local church also lends her affirmation by placing the name of the triune God upon the believer in recognition of his new status and incorporation into the people of God.”1http://baptistrenewal.ca/confession/
If you believe the gospel, knowing Jesus to be your Lord and saviour, then your next step is to be baptized. If you’re a part of our church community here at Emmanuel, you can visit this page to see what the process looks like for us. We’d love to help you take this important step!
