Baptism IS Salvific

JOHN THE BAPTIST’S MINISTRY AND BAPTISM OF JESUS

The primacy of Christian baptism can first be seen in Jesus’ chosen forerunner, John the Baptist. He was the herald of the Messiah who exercised his role through his baptism of repentance. This baptism is distinct from Christian sacrament baptism but points to the crucial significance of baptism in the Gospels. John baptized to prepare the way for the Lord. He was from the priestly tribe of Levi and was a prophet in the manner of Elijah.

In Matthew 21:25 (and Luke 20:4f) Jesus says that John the Baptist’s baptism was “from Heaven” in speaking to the Pharisees. Jesus Himself was baptized by John the Baptist in the Jordan River. The Jordan is the natural boundary between Israel and Jordan. Historically, the prophets Elijah and Elisha parted the Jordan River, as did Joshua when he led the Israelites into the Promised Land for the first time.

In Matthew 3, Jesus’ baptism was “fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness” (v. 15). When he came up from the waters, there was the Holy Spirit in the form of a dove and the voice of God the Father: “This is my Beloved Son, with whom I am well please.” Spirit/Dove symbolizes creation: in Genesis 1 the “spirit of God hovered over the waters”; in Genesis 9 the dove was sent over the waters and came back with a fig leaf in its mouth.

Christian baptism is described by John in powerful words: “I baptize you with water for repentance, but he who is coming after me is mightier than I, whose sandals I am not worthy to carry; he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and with fire.” Some might hold that this is talking about two different things, and I would agree. It is talking about the symbolic nature of Jewish baptismal rituals and the use John made of those rituals in the baptism of repentance with the nature of Christian baptism. Christian baptism is not a removal of dirt from the body, nor tied to Temple purity codes, but actually unites the person to Christ by the power of the Holy Spirit. That is, John’s baptism was a sign or type of Christian baptism, which is why those baptized by John were re-baptized into Christ when the Apostles found them.

In Matthew 4, after Jesus was baptized by John, he goes into the wilderness “led up by the Spirit.” This connects baptism with His anointing by the Spirit and His mission. The Messiah was anointed by the Spirit in His own baptism by John, now the Messiah (literally Anointed One) goes forth to the wilderness to wage war against Satan and the reign of sin and death.

John 1 echoes Matthew 3, that John’s baptism is a symbol of a repentant heart to prepare the way of the Messiah, whose sandal he is not worthy to untie. John is baptizing to call Israel to repentance of their sins. When he sees Jesus (v. 29) he calls Jesus “the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!” And relates the same story of the dove’s descent upon Christ (v. 32). God revealed to John that this sign means “this is He who baptizes with the Holy Spirit” (v 33) and this leads John to confess Christ’s true identity: “I have seen and have borne witness that this is the Son of God.”

OTHER GOSPEL COMMENTS ON BAPTISM

Mark 10:38 and following describes “baptism” as the type of suffering Jesus will endure. “Are you able to drink the cup that I drink, or to be baptized with the baptism with which I am baptized?”

Luke 12:49 and following is similar to Mark 10, “I came to cast fire upon the earth, and would that it were already kindled! I have a baptism to be baptized with; and how I am constrained until it is accomplished!” Thus, his suffering and death is described by Jesus as a kind of baptism.

Mark 16:16 ends with the declarative: “He who believes and is baptized will be saved; but he who does not believe will be condemned.” We see again and again the intrinsic link between belief/faith and baptism, just as we will see the intrinsic link between the Spirit and baptism.

An Excursion into John 3 as Theology of Baptism

John 2:22-25 ends the chapter with an endnote on belief. “Many believed in his name when they saw the signs which he did; but Jesus did not trust himself to them, because he knew all men and needed no one to bear witness of man; for he himself knew what was in man.” This sets up the famous conversation between Jesus and Nicodemus, “Now there was a man of the Pharisees…” Within this conversation, we get the phrase “born anew” or “born again” or “born from above”. Jesus describes what it means to be born anew/again/from above:

(Vv. 5-8) “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Do not marvel that I said to you, ‘You must be born anew.’ The wind blows where it wills, and you hear the sound of it, but you do not know whence it comes or whither it goes; so it is with every one who is born of the Spirit.” 

In John 3: 5-8 Christ describes what it is for a man to be born anew/from above. It is through water and the Spirit. What is born of flesh is flesh, but in Christ we are reborn in the Spirit. This is what baptism communicates. John continues this theology of salvation by connecting it to belief/faith.

(Vv. 16-18) For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. For God sent the Son into the world, not to condemn the world, but that the world might be saved through him. He who believes in him is not condemned; he who does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God.

If you doubt that belief, being born anew, and being born of the Spirit are not the same thing as Christian baptism, John makes it more plain. Jesus leaves Nicodemus and starts baptizing people! “After this Jesus and his disciples went into the land of Judea; there he remained with them and baptized.” Then a conflict arises: “Rabbi, he who was with you beyond the Jordan, to whom you bore witness, here he is, baptizing, and all are going to him.” And John responds with the famous “He must increase, but I must decrease” because he knows he is “the friend of the bridegroom” and not the bridegroom himself. “He who has the bride is the bridegroom”.

John 3 ends with an endnote on the Son’s identity as being From Above: “He who comes from above is above all…” and he “bears witness to what he has seen and heard, yet no one receives his testimony; he who receives his testimony sets his seal to this, that God is true.” John connects being “from above” here at the end with being born from above (which is the other translation of the Greek) in v. 3. It would make sense that John is ending where he started. Jesus is the One from Above who is Above all. Nicodemus is “he who is of the earth belongs to the earth, and of the earth he speaks” (v. 31) and Jesus is “he who comes from heaven is above all”. Jesus says to Nicodemus “we bear witness to what we have seen” (v. 11) and John ends with “He bears witness to what he has seen and heard” (v. 32).

The connection to baptism means that John is telling us you must be born from above. Nicodemus interprets it in an earthly sense since that is all he knows and sees. This is “born again” reentering my mother’s womb, which is nonsense. Jesus, the One from Above, gives us the formula for being born from above: water and the Holy Spirit, receiving his testimony, having his seal to this testimony, and the gift of the Spirit, which gives eternal life to those who believe and obey the Son.

Baptism in the Apostolic Era

In Acts 1:22 and following one of the criteria to be Judas’ replacement was to have been a disciple of Jesus Christ from the Baptism of John in the Jordan to the Resurrection. Obviously, the baptism of Christ was the beginning of His public ministry, so to be one of the Twelve you had to be present for the whole public life of the Messiah.

Acts 2 is the story of Pentecost, when the Spirit changes baptism from an outward sign of the believer’s interior repentant heart, to a sacrament: an outward sign that imparts grace because it effects what it signifies. The first Kerygmatic Sermon is preached by the Apostle Peter, the power and gifts of the Holy Spirit are made manifest in tongues. Their response to “this Jesus whom you crucified” is to be “cut to the heart” (v. 37) and ask, “What shall we do?” Peter commands: “Repent, and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins; and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. For the promise is to you and to your children…” And in response “So those who received his word were baptized, and there were added that day about three thousand souls” (v. 41). Added to what? To the Church, the body of Christ.

In Acts 8 we have the famous story of the Apostle Philip and the Ethiopian eunuch. The eunuch is reading Isaiah 53 and asked who it was about. Philip “beginning with the scripture told him the good news of Jesus” (v. 35). This leads v. 36: “And as they went along the road they came to some water, and the eunuch said, ‘See, here is water! What is to prevent my being baptized?’” The kerygma is shared and the immediate response of faith is baptism.

In Acts 9: 17-19 we have the conversion of Saul. Ananias said: “And laying his hands on him he said, “Brother Saul, the Lord Jesus who appeared to you on the road by which you came, has sent me that you may regain your sight and be filled with the Holy Spirit.” And immediately something like scales fell from his eyes and he regained his sight. Then he rose and was baptized”.

In Acts 22, Paul recounts this with Ananias’ words: “And he said, ‘The God of our fathers appointed you to know his will, to see the Just One and to hear a voice from his mouth; for you will be a witness for him to all men of what you have seen and heard. And now why do you wait? Rise and be baptized, and wash away your sins, calling on his name.’

In Acts 10:34-48, Saint Peter preaches the kerygmatic sermon that starts with “the word which was proclaimed through all Judea, beginning from Galilee after the baptism which John preached…” to describe Jesus’ ministry. But Peter continues in v. 38 with “how God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and with power”. This connects the overshadowing of the dove in the Jordan with the “anointing” of Jesus as the Christ, the Messiah, confirming his messianic mission.

Continuing in Acts 10:34-48, Peter ends the sermon with “To him all the prophets bear witness that every one who believes in him receives forgiveness of sins through his name.” One would be tempted to think “belief” and not “baptism” saves, but the very next passage confirms this link between faith and baptism as congruent: “the Holy Spirit fell on all who hear the word…the gift of the Holy Spirit had been poured out even on the Gentiles…” Then, as a direct consequence of this manifestation of the Holy Spirit, Peter “declared, ‘Can any one forbid water for baptizing these people who have receive the Holy Spirit just as we have?’ And he commanded them to be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ.”

The Evangelist Luke connects Faith, the Spirit, Forgiveness, and Baptism. In this case, the manifestations of the Spirit come first before baptism. This unique situation is to confirm to Jewish Christians that Gentiles have equal access to the Spirit through faith in Christ. But then why baptize if they already have Faith and the Spirit? Because baptism matters and communicates the merits of the death and resurrection of Christ to the individual.

Acts 11: 1-18 Peter recounts in Jerusalem to “the apostles and the brethren” that the Gentiles had “received the word of God.” Criticized by the circumcision party, Peter recounts how the Spirit fell on the Gentiles, which recalls John the Baptist’s testimony that Jesus baptizes with the Holy Spirit. “If then God gave the same gift to them as he gave to us when we believed in the Lord Jesus Christ, who was I that I could withstand God?” The circumcision party, and the apostles and the brethren, respond: “When they heard this they were silenced. And they glorified God, saying, ‘Then to the Gentiles also God has granted repentance unto life.’”

In Acts 15, Peter’s address to the apostles and the elders of Jerusalem about what God has done among the Gentiles: “And God who knows the heart bore witness to them, giving them the Holy Spirit just as he did to us; and he made no distinction between us and them, but cleansed their hearts by faith” (vv. 8-9). Baptism is seen so many times as connected to the giving of the Spirit and to the response of faith, we also see it as the cleansing of the soul from sin.

Acts 13 shows again the importance of John’s Baptismal ministry as crucial for the preparation of the Messiah in verses 23-26. Important to note this is another Kerygmatic sermon in Acts.

Acts 16 has the famous conversion of Lydia and the imprisonment of Paul and Silas. Both stories revolve around the preaching of the Gospel and the response of baptism. For Lydia, “who was a worshiper of God. The Lord opened her heart to give heed to what was said by Paul. And when she was baptized, with her household,” (vv 14-15). For the jailer who was about to kill himself thinking Paul and Silas had escaped, “And he called for lights and rushed in, and trembling with fear he fell down before Paul and Silas, and brought them out and said, “Men, what must I do to be saved?” And they said, “Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved, you and your household.” Again, it sounds like all you need is belief/faith alone and salvation is yours, except when you keep reading the story, what is the immediate response of the jailer and his household? “And they spoke the word of the Lord to him and to all that were in his house. And he took them the same hour of the night, and washed their wounds, and he was baptized at once, with all his family” (vv. 32-33).  

In Acts 18:5-11 we have the conversion of Titus and a ruler of the synagogue, Crispus (whom Paul personally baptized- Cf. 1 Cor. 1:14). What is their response to the preaching of Paul in Corinth? “Titius Justus, a worshiper of God; his house was next door to the synagogue. Crispus, the ruler of the synagogue, believed in the Lord, together with all his household; and many of the Corinthians hearing Paul believed and were baptized.”

Acts 18:24-19:10 talks of the Jew Apollos who preached Jesus but knew only of John’s baptism. Priscilla and Aquila heard him, “they took him and expounded to him the way of God more accurately.” Paul expounded to them both the Holy Spirit and Jesus’ baptism, which is more than a baptism of repentance, but of belief in Jesus. They were baptized, hands were laid upon them, and then they received the Holy Spirit. (19:3-7).

Paul’s Teaching on Baptism to Corinth

1 Corinthians 6:10-12 Paul explains how Christians who return to their pagan sins are “unrighteous” and will “not inherit the kingdom of God” (v. 9). He lists sins: immorality, idolatry, adultery… drunkards, revilers, “nor robbers will inherit the kingdom of God. And such were some of you.” Then Paul explains the Christian difference: “But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and in the Spirit of our God.” “Washing” is the cleansing power of baptism, which sanctifies the believers and justifies them in the Name of Jesus in the Spirit.

1 Corinthians 10:2: describing ancient Israel, he says that “all were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea”. Looking with the eyes of Christ, Paul sees the cloud and the sea as types of Christian Baptism. What is the effect of baptism? You are in Christ. You have put on Christ. This is typified by the cloud and the sea, which baptized Israel into Moses, their covenant representative. 



In 1 Corinthians 12:13, Paul explains that Jews and Gentiles are all one body in the Church because of our Baptism. Following Catholic sacramental theology, Paul says it is “by the Spirit” that the baptism we received was efficacious: “For by one Spirit we were all baptized into one body—Jews or Greeks, slaves or free—and all were made to drink of one Spirit.”



In 1 Corinthians 15:29, Paul states the very obvious truth that only those baptized into Christ will be raised from the dead. Thus the local practice, not universal, of being baptized on behalf of others (which raises an interesting Catholic point of godparents with infant baptism): “Otherwise, what do people mean by being baptized on behalf of the dead? If the dead are not raised at all, why are people baptized on their behalf?”

Theology of Baptism as Putting on Christ in Galatians.


In Galatians 3:27, we have Paul declaring this: “For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ.” This statement is the culmination of his entire argument. Faith saves, not the works of the law. Christ redeemed Jew and Gentile from the law and from the reign of sin. Like Romans and Colossians (below), Paul’s theology of Baptism, Faith, Forgiveness, and the Spirit are all united and overlapping: “Now before faith came, we were confined under the law, kept under restraint until faith should be revealed.  So that the law was our custodian until Christ came, that we might be justified by faith. But now that faith has come, we are no longer under a custodian; for in Christ Jesus you are all sons of God, through faith.  For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ.  There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus. And if you are Christ’s, then you are Abraham’s offspring, heirs according to promise.”

Theology of Baptismal Destruction and Regeneration: Romans 5-6

In Romans 5:12 and following Saint Paul is making the argument that Christ is a type of Adam. Adam was a failure as the “type of the one who was to come”, but he still was a type. Typology relates old things to new things as shadow to reality (Heb. 10). All humanity was in Adam and Adam failed, so humanity failed with our covenant representative. Now, through faith, all of humanity has access to the new Adam, the second Adam, Jesus Christ. Jesus’s obedience unto death offers us the “free gift” of salvation, reversing the death that the first Adam’s disobedience brought into the world.

Romans 6:3-5 clearly connects the typology of Jesus as the New Adam whose obedience unto death is the source of new life, but only through faith and baptism. “Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, so that as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life.  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.”

Theology of Christian Unity: Ephesians 4-5

In Ephesians 4:1 and following Saint Paul lays out seven things that are the foundation of Christian unity, and it is amazing what is on that list. He starts the theology by recalling Christian dignity and vocation: “I … beg you to lead a life worthy of the calling to which you have been called…” Then connects it to the oneness all Christians should have in the Holy Spirit: “eager to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.”

Then Saint Paul lists the 7 “Ones”: “There is one body and one Spirit, just as you were called to the one hope that belongs to your call, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of us all, who is above all and through all and in all. But grace was given to each of us according to the measure of Christ’s gift.” 

Theology of Fullness of Life in Christ: Colossians 2

In Colossians 2 Saint Paul is commending the firm faith of the Colossians, “As therefore you received Christ Jesus the Lord, so live in him…” Paul talks about people preying on Christians with philosophy and empty deceit, human traditions, elemental spirits of the universe. In Christ, however, the “whole fullness of deity dwells bodily, and you have come to fullness of life in him, who is the head of all rule and authority.” The Christian life is living in Christ, who is fully God dwelling bodily with us.

Paul connects the OT covenant entrance rite, circumcision with baptism, which is the NT covenant entrance rite. “In him also you were circumcised with a circumcision made without hands, by putting off the body of flesh in the circumcision of Christ…” How do Christians put off the body of flesh? “and you were buried with him in baptism, in which you were also raised with him through faith in the working of God, who raised him from the dead.” Saint Paul has no problem connecting faith with baptism and vice versa, as they are congruent as a single continuous act. My faith in the saving work of Jesus Christ, my realization in the powerlessness I have over my own sins and trespasses, leads me to repent and place my hope in the Lord. That hope and faith and repentance is all made effective to my soul by baptism.

The Gentiles were outsiders made insiders through the work of Christ, faith, and baptism into His death: “And you, who were dead in trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made alive together with him, having forgiven us all our trespasses”. God made uncircumcision circumcision through baptism, which makes us “in Him.” Saint Paul finishes this thought with “If with Christ you died to the elemental spirits of the universe, why do you live as if you still belonged to the world?”

Theology of Baptism as the Flood of Noah and the Church as the Ark: 1 Peter 3

Saint Peter is arguing through a typological argument that is it better to suffer for doing right than to suffer for doing wrong. This suffering can cause one to reject the lordship of Jesus out of fear, but Peter cautions against this, for “those who revile your good behavior in Christ may. Be put to shame.” In this context, Saint Peter connects the death of Jesus Christ as one who suffers for righteousness, with the waters of Baptism.

“For Christ also died (or suffered) for sins once for all, the righteous for the unrighteous, that he might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh but made alive in the spirit; in which he went and preached to the spirits in prison, who formerly did not obey, when God’s patience waited in the days of Noah, during the building of the ark, in which a few, that is, eight persons, were saved through water. 

Like Paul, Peter presents the waters of baptism FIRST as a sign of destruction, death, judgment of sinful man, of the flesh, of the old Adam and the old creation. The floodwaters of Noah were the same waters of “the Deep” that covered the earth in Genesis 1:2, over which the Spirit of God hovered. Peter describes the Household of Noah (Noah, his wife, their 3 sons, and their wives = “8 persons”) as being “saved through water.” Note that he does not say, “saved from the water” but “through”, as the water destroying wicked humanity saves the family of Noah from wickedness.

Baptism, which corresponds to this, now saves you, not as a removal of dirt from the body but as an appeal to God for a clear conscience, through the resurrection of Jesus Christ, who has gone into heaven and is at the right hand of God, with angels, authorities, and powers subject to him.”

Saint Peter concludes chapter 3 with this typology. The Floodwaters of Noah are a type of baptism, which is what the Greek “corresponds to this” means. Just as those on the Ark were saved through water, so those in the Church are saved through water. Baptism, not the Floodwaters, “now saves you”. But get the symbolism right! “Not as a removal of dirt from the body” as if the symbol was a physical washing, but that baptism saves because it is “an appeal to God for a clear conscience”. A clear conscience is a cleared Earth after the Flood receded.

But what powers the sacrament of baptism? Is it magical, as some suppose the Catholic Church of teaching as if there’s “something in the water” that makes a person new? Peter explains baptism saves us “through the resurrection of Jesus Christ who has gone into Heaven and is at the right hand of God”. Again, like Paul, Peter connects baptism FIRST with death, destruction of the sinful, old self, “the flesh”, and THEN SECOND with new life, life “in Christ”, because it is resurrection. This echoes Romans 6- baptism into a death like his is a baptism into a resurrection like his.

Towards the theme of “washing” and “regeneration”, we have Titus 3:4-6: “but when the goodness and loving kindness of God our Savior appeared, he saved us, not because of deeds done by us in righteousness, but in virtue of his own mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewal in the Holy Spirit, which he poured out upon us richly through Jesus Christ our Savior…”

Theology of Baptism as Sprinkling and Washing

Hebrews 10: “Therefore, brethren, since we have confidence to enter the sanctuary by the blood of Jesus, by the new and living way which he opened for us through the curtain, that is, through his flesh, and since we have a great priest over the house of God,  let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, with our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water. Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for he who promised is faithful…”

2 Peter 1:5-10: For this very reason make every effort to supplement your faith with virtue, and virtue with knowledge, and knowledge with self-control, and self-control with steadfastness, and steadfastness with godliness, and godliness with brotherly affection, and brotherly affection with love. For if these things are yours and abound, they keep you from being ineffective or unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. For whoever lacks these things is blind and shortsighted and has forgotten that he was cleansed from his old sins. Therefore, brethren, be the more zealous to confirm your call and election, for if you do this you will never fall…

2 Peter 2:21-22: For it would have been better for them never to have known the way of righteousness than after knowing it to turn back from the holy commandment delivered to them. It has happened to them according to the true proverb, The dog turns back to his own vomit, and the sow is washed only to wallow in the mire.

Revelation 7:14: And he said to me, “These are they who have come out of the great tribulation; they have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb.

Revelation 22:14: Blessed are those who wash their robes, that they may have the right to the tree of life and that they may enter the city by the gates.