What Is Baptism? The New Covenant Sign That Identifies Who Is United To Christ

this is the blood of my covenant in which there is forgiveness of sins.

So Passover is obsolete. Christ is the lamb that ended all sacrifices. Now we celebrate the new covenant Lord supper.

So circumcision was given to, uh, the physical descendants of Abraham to make it as a sign that the one son we've all been waiting. They were all waiting on would be born of that physical line. Jesus is that one offspring according to Galatians three 14. Now that he has fulfilled what that sign was pointing towards, a physical son of Abraham through Sarah would be born.

He has introduced the new sign that brings someone into the covenant, and that is baptism. What is significant there is they are related. Baptism doesn't fulfill circumcision. Jesus fulfills circumcision. It's a significant hermeneutical change. The other thing I sought to do was show I keep giving my verses, gotta make sure I'm showing my work.

You've gotta make sure you choose the right verses, you're trying to make sure they're understood together, and then the secondary verses, or the more confusing verses, they can be understood in light of them. This is a big picture issue because you have to also relate it to who are the people of God, from the old to the new. The old covenant people of God, without a doubt, were two types, physical descendants and the faith. The new covenant people of God are not physical descendants. Significant change.

Jeremiah 31, if you want to go back and you are here for that, you want to look at what this means. There are three things that are new about the new covenant that's already predicted and declared in the old. What are the three things from Jeremiah 31? Anybody? Uh, the law written on your heart, which I think is what Ezekiel is talking about in, in 36, the Holy Spirit is written in your heart.

So it's an internal, which is again, the old is explained to the new, uh, the, the, it contained this element. So the internal change, that's one. What else? All. And that's why we say it's a different kind of people. It's not born and those who know the Lord, it's all will know the Lord. It's a. Uh, people who are, uh, there by faith in salvation. And then what's the third?

Their sins are forgiven. Was Moses sin forgiven? Was it really forgiven? Did that lamb really take away the wrath of God from Moses? Yeah. It wasn't truly forgiven because it wasn't truly atoned for until the one lamb came to die. There's a significant difference in being covered by the Passover lamb and Jesus Christ having come and actually bringing that final full forgiveness. There is a difference in the forgiveness. Moses is fully forgiven. Be of good mind and heart. But it was a looking ahead forgiveness. We have a looking behind forgiveness.

Union with Christ

Tonight I want to teach in 20 minutes what I think is the most important aspect of baptism. We're going to be looking at what it is and what it does as it relates to who it's for. So there on your sheet you see the first thing is union with Christ. If you want to think about what the new covenant is, I would encourage you to do a deep dive in union with Christ. If you don't know anything about what it means to be saved today, it is union with Christ. It is the grand arching, great declaration that captures everything that we would call salvation.

Ephesians 1.3 would be with a simple place you could go.

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places.

That verse keeps going all the way through 14, so you could actually do a study tonight with your children or your roommates and mark off all the different union with Christ language over and over again, in Christ, with Christ, through Christ, redeemed, adopted, forgiven, made known. Here, this first kind of introductory statement, What blessings are yours in Christ? It's on the sheet, it's right there in the verse three.

You don't have to look at me. Huh? Every, all of them. All right, so there's a universal aspect. If there is a blessing of Christ, if there's a blessing of the new covenant, it's yours and all yours if you're in Christ. There's also an exclusivity. It's only yours in Christ. You're in Christ, you're in Adam, the only two places to be. In Christ, you have every spiritual blessing. Outside of Christ, you have sin, death, and judgment.

You see, there's two kind of theses that I want to clarify with the union of Christ. Baptism is the new covenant sign of being united with Christ in his death and resurrection. and being adopted as a son of God by the spirit. Baptism is only for believers because baptism is the sign that identifies who is united with Christ and who represents him. That first one we'll hopefully see throughout the three main passages that I hope to look at tonight.

The identify, the church does visibly identify who belongs because of the profession of faith and then we send those out as representatives Very much like a courageous young girl in Russia who might not want to have her czar represented on her shoulder. No, when she gets sent out, she is representing Jesus Christ. When you baptize somebody, you're putting the name of Christ on them to go out and represent them. So, good decision there.

These three passages all contain the elements Baptism, union with Christ, to have faith. Here's the significant, hopefully, takeaway. To be baptized in Christ is only effective as a significant sign, or the real sign, if you're united with Christ, which also means you have the Holy Spirit inside of you, in dwelling, and you only have the Holy Spirit, and you're only united to Christ by faith. Those are the three kind of significant aspects of the equation. Let's jump in. We didn't get all the way through Galatians 3, so here we are. I've written some statements there that you can go back and do the study yourself more.

All sons of God through faith

Now, before faith came, we were held captive under the law in prison until the coming faith would be revealed. So then the law was our guardian until Christ came in order that we might be justified by faith. But now that faith has come, we are no longer under a guardian. For in Christ Jesus, you are all sons of God through faith. For as many as you were baptized into Christ Jesus have put on Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek. There is neither slave nor free. There is no male or female. For you are all one in Christ Jesus.

And if you are Christ, then you are Abraham's offspring, heirs according to promise.

" Significant, he's writing to Galatians. And the confusion there is there's folks who say, well, you also need to be circumcised to be fully Abraham. in the blessing. So Paul's making it very clear it's a before and after argument. There was a before administration of God's covenant and grace.

The present though, the new covenant, is a faith in Jesus Christ. So I want to make it clear, he's describing something that's new about the new covenant here. The most significant newness of the new covenant is stated in verse 26, for in Christ, union with Christ,

you are all sons of God through faith.

This is the doctrine of adoption. So if union with Christ is the grand kind of picture that everything falls under, if there's one that I think rises to the top as the most significant, it's adoption. Because this is the sonship. If you're looking for sonship in the new covenant, it's this. The only begotten of the father came down to become like you so that you could be adopted into the family of heaven. That's the heavenly blessing. The son of God came to share his inheritance. So the doctrine of adoption is the new sonship of the new covenant. And just to be really clear so that we don't have the salvation by works, you are only a son of God, how? What do you do? By grace through faith. You cannot be a son of God without faith. There is no blessing of Jesus Christ without faith.

So the most significant blessing, now that's me, and if you want to question if it's the most significant blessing, that's fine. that you're adopted into the forever family to experience a whole new love from God the Father. You're adopted, and in the ancient world, you couldn't lose and adopt a child. It was a forever declaration. You always know where your place is at the table. You know that you belong in that family, and it's the heavenly family.

Here, the significance is, in the new covenant, you have faith in Christ, so that you're a son of God through faith. Now, baptism is captured here,

for as many as you were baptized into Christ have put on Christ.

By submitting to baptism, that is how you've actually put on that sonship, practically. That's how you received what that sonship is. Put on is union with Christ's language as well. But notice the grounding.

You are sons through faith, for you have been baptized into Christ. You see, there's plenty of people who get wet in church. It's only baptism if you're united with Christ and the sign of the name of Christ is put upon you. Baptism is only significant as a sign if the person receiving the name of Christ is already united with Christ.

The covenant of sonship and the covenant of Christ is so tied to Baptism, they do go hand in hand. There's a way in which you see someone who's baptized is adopted. There's a way in which you're putting on that adoption. Significant here, it is the sonship. Now, here's one of the wonderful benefits and privileges that you think about as being baptized as a child.

You can look at Galatians 4, 4-7 later that tells you the Holy Spirit allows you to cry out to Abba Father because you get to now call God Father, which is new in the New Covenant. We take that for granted, right? We looked at the Lord's Prayer a while back in Matthew. That is a new way to talk about God, because Jesus, his only son, has shared with you his inheritance.

The fourth thing there,

for as many as you were baptized in Christ and put on Christ, there was neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female,

Whatever distinction, especially the Jew-Gentile, that two kinds of God's people of Jews, that doesn't exist anymore. Your physical lineage does not exist anymore. It doesn't matter. There's only one kind of covenant person.

It's those who are in Christ. And even significant, verse 29, to be a child of Abraham is to be a child of God, which means you're an heir along with Christ. If you go back further in Galatians in chapter 3, you can look and see how The only true children of Abraham are children of faith in a way that makes that clear.

His burial and resurrection

I don't have time for this, but I'm going to ask for one question of clarity. Seeing no hands, I'm not lingering in the awkwardness. Austin, you just walked up. You cannot ask a question. Colossians 2, we looked at this last week. In him, in him, with him. If I just teach you tonight to read that phrase and rejoice every time you see it, great.

Here, baptism is likened to the circumcision of the heart. It is not the circumcision of Abraham, but it's the internal is likened to the external. And notice there, in Galatians, it was adoption that was emphasized that is tied directly to baptism, which is a real new covenant reality. Here, verse 12, your baptism is tied directly to his burial and resurrection. There is no way to be tied to Jesus' burial and resurrection without being saved by his death, burial, and resurrection. It, by definition, is tied to your salvation. And notice here, it makes faith again explicit,

having been buried with him in baptism, in which you were also raised with him,

how?

Through faith. Again, the internal change that the Old Testament contained is now fully realized for all the people of God, everyone who is circumcised of Christ, which is another way of saying united with Him. The other thing I wanted to point out here is verse 13 and 14. We see this in a few places. We could go to Romans 5 too.

The only birth covenant mentioned in the New Testament is you're born in Adam. We're not individuals. You're born into Adam and his sin and his death. The only birth covenant mentioned in the New Covenant is you're born in Adam or you're born again in Christ. You're physically born in Adam and you have his original sin and you'll die or you're born again by faith adopted into the new family of Jesus Christ.

Walk in newness

I'm sick of time, I've got to continue on, sorry. More to say, but Romans 6. Probably, if you're allowed to have five favorite passages, this is one of mine.

What shall we say then, are we to continue in sin that grace may abound?

Now that's a crazy question, why would Paul ask that question? In Romans 5, he said,

we're sin abounds, grace abounds.

You should memorize that verse. That's a good one.

We're sin abounds, grace abounds.

Well, should we then keep sinning so the grace may abound? Are you nuts, is what Paul says. Do you not know who you are? The answer to his question is by no means. In Greek, they have double negatives. In English, we're not supposed to. But they knew grammar better than we do.

How can we who died to sins still live in it? Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death?

Categorically, how could you keep sinning if you've been baptized into Christ Jesus? Because if you've been baptized into Christ Jesus, you were baptized into his death.

Verse four,

we are buried therefore with him.

Union with Christ. Baptism is tied to the union of Christ because when you're baptized into his death, you are buried therefore with him. The relationship is as if baptism and the new life are a simultaneous reality. It's not a hope for, maybe, could be, it is a reality. No, you are baptized. When you're faced with sin, it's out of bounds. You have, Christ died for you.

And in order just as we were raised from the dead for the glory of God, we too might walk in newness.

Verse five,

for if we have been united with him in a death like his, we shall certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his.

So again, we see that union with Christ with adoption and son. Now, twice has been united with him in his death and his resurrection. And this one is very important for us all.

When we're tempted, Paul says, no, you're baptized. Faith is not as clearly present in the same way the other two were, but you're supposed to know you were baptized, know that your baptism was the mark and the sign and points to the absolute reality, you're united with him. Therefore, you no longer have to obey sin as your master. You're dead to the power of sin. You now get to walk in the newness of the resurrected life of Jesus Christ. You must know you were baptized united with him in the baptism so that you're dead to sin and alive to Christ.

And if you want to go further, you can look at verse 11. You can now consider yourself dead. There's a different step there. That's like when you look in your mirror and you're talking to yourself. You're recalculating. I know longer because I know who I am in Christ. I know that I was buried with him. I know I was risen again. Baptism is that event, that That is a regular reminder as I remember it and as I see others baptized and what that means. I know I'm dead to sin. I know I'm alive to Christ. I will consider myself dead. I will consider myself alive. And then the word that's not in here is present. I now will present myself as an instrument of righteousness because Christ died for me and I'm united with him.

Rejoice in the moment of baptism

When someone is baptized in the name of the Son, and I've only focused on the name of the Son because it's union with Christ. We do baptize in the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, but the operative here is you're united with Christ in baptism. We're celebrating a life that already is. That sign is significant because of the life that is already there, the reality that's already taken place. So let me try to practically give some pointers here. This is one of the reasons we, I don't want to say we delay baptism.

Our goal is that for anyone baptized, they have the opportunity to wait, learn, and greatly rejoice in the moment of baptism to know more fully what baptism is as they're going into the water and coming out. They're able to rejoice in the many ways in which I'm being united with his death, being united with his life. I'm being united with him as a son. I say that because I have to have numerous conversations about not only was I a believer when I was baptized, but I don't even know if I knew what I was doing when I was baptized. So we, I guess we could say we use the word delay, but we're really want to make sure when somebody's baptized, we've had the opportunity to disciple them, teach them, help them fully understand what baptism is signifying, because it is a significant sign for those who were truly united with him. That's one way in which we think about baptism. Another one here is, I believe, as Romans 6 tells us, it is supposed to be that regular reminder.

You know you've been baptized. You were cognizant. You were aware. You were present by faith, rejoicing in Christ. And every time someone else is baptized, you're reminded of that. You've died to that old man. You're no longer the power of sin. You're risen again in Christ. If you are not baptized, but you believe in Christ, or maybe you think you believe in Christ, or maybe you want to believe in Christ, my invitation, talk to your parents, talk to an elder, talk to a church member.

The goal of when we talk about delaying isn't that we make sure you've like become righteous enough. We want to make sure you understand what it is. Because you are going to go out and represent Christ. A burden I've carried for some time is, you know, there's a lot of, you know, we want to not baptize, you know, a six or seven year old because we want to make sure they fully understand and rejoice in that union with Christ. We're not looking for somebody to prove they're a Christian. We want to make sure that they have believed and they're rejoicing and they can fully celebrate.

My fear is that in talking about that delay, it makes baptism scary for maybe our teenagers. We long for you to be baptized. We long for you to say, I believe in Jesus Christ. I want to be identified with him. I do not want that delay and that desire for you to understand to be some kind of confused obstacle that you should not come or that you need to be ready enough or jump through some kind of labyrinth. I fear that that's what that has created. We long for you to come and proclaim Christ.

The whole idea is we want to make sure that you truly appreciate what is happening at some level. And the rest of your life, you'll get to continue to learn how to appreciate it more. One last thing. All right, there's some kind of spectrum that when we do the baptism of the Lord's Supper, it's just like a mere physical act. It's just kind of intellectually like enticing us or informing us.

Then there's these things actually like save you, right? So there's some who believe that baptizing a baby washes away the original sin, which actually makes sense to me if that's what you think because you're the born in Adam and you need that original sin washed away. It's wrong. But in terms of the reasons for infant baptism, that's the one that actually makes the most sense to me.

Christ is present

So you have that spectrum. I am fully convinced that whenever God's people gather to do what God commands, and they do so in order to be faithful, the Holy Spirit is blessing it. Christ is present. He tells us he's present.

We're two or three gathered, I'm there with you.

The prayer that was read earlier, Christ resides in our hearts by the Holy Spirit.

We know from 1 Peter and other passages, the Holy Spirit will bless you in what you're proclaiming. The Holy Spirit will bless you in what you're hearing. Oh, the Holy Spirit is present and blessing in the Lord's Supper when we take it together. The Holy Spirit is blessing and providing encouragement in baptism.

There's no way anything we're doing is of value if the Holy Spirit isn't actually here with us and connecting with us and encouraging us in the gospel truths. I'm also convinced we have to leave that as a mystery, because everybody I know that tries to explain it has to get it wrong.

When you go beyond what Christ says, Christ is present with us. When we gather, Christ is present with us. When we're reading his word, teaching his word, when we're praying, when we're singing together, Christ is present with us. Christ is present with us in the ordinances and blessing us as we're obedient. But we need to be careful of going beyond what scripture says in that mystery. Am I allowed to do questions at seven something? Matt said yes. Did you say yes? No? All right. A pressing clarifying question. A pressing clarifying question. Well, I pray it was that clear. Let's pray.

Father, we thank you that because you sent your son to not only die for us and give us eternal life, he has come to share his inheritance, his love from you and his love towards you with us. We thank you that we get to be adopted into a new family. in the new covenant that Christ secured by his own blood. We thank you, Lord, that your Holy Spirit has come to wash us, renew us. Your Holy Spirit communicates to us that we are children of God, and your Holy Spirit allows us to call you Father. Lord, we thank you for baptism in the Lord's Supper. We thank you for baptism and that it is that moment of someone putting on Christ being identified with his death and resurrection. We thank you that we get to celebrate that as a church. We pray that we would celebrate that with everyone here, because they come to you by faith. In Jesus' name we pray, amen.