What I asked was "Who are those textbook scholars who deny that baptism in Romans 6 refers to the believer's experience of salvation, the believer dying to sin and made alive to God in Christ, to explain why we turn from sin?" So yes this is deplorable, I agree. It is in fact utterly stupid. I already confirmed that baptism was an ordinance (and that Paul was dealing with “water baptism”). I issued no challenge but simply asked for examples of those scholars of which you spoke. This was not an unreasonable request. When you asked the same of me, I didn’t act the fool. I even went the extra mile in getting those references to you.
When I said Paul uses “water baptism” as a sort of “shorthand”, I clarified that he uses the symbol for what it symbolizes. I also clarified that this includes water baptism as an ordinance and its significance as such. In other words, baptism represents the ordinance as an act of submission, as entrance into church membership, as identifying with Christ, etc. But it also represents the believer’s death, burial, and resurrection in Christ. What you are objecting to is not that I diminish baptism, but that I do not diminish baptism. I believe that baptism can represent both itself as an ordinance and what it symbolizes. You deny that it can be both an ordinance and remain symbolic of what it represents (i.e., a type of “shorthand”, or “representation” of all that is ordinance and all that it symbolizes). You seem blind to half of its significance. And I NEVER stated that baptism was ONLY shorthand for salvation. In fact, I included baptism as an ordinance as a part of that “shorthand” or meaning. This is plain foolishness…childlike rubbish. You went to seminary. You have an education. And you know that in defending a position one references support and provides that source so that others can evaluate the accurateness of the quote. You don’t provide entire chapters, but the highlights to support your view. Stop acting like a child. We have had good discussions and I know that you are better than this.
I provided the quote from Gill as well as a link to the fuller commentary (for the entire chapter). And I do not disagree with Gill at all. Baptism is indeed an ordinance. And, as Gill points out very strongly, Baptism is also a token or a symbol which represents something beyond the ordinance itself. It represents the believer’s death, burial and resurrection in Christ – and Paul says that since we are dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus that we should not sin in our bodies.
And it is not Gill with whom you contend. It is Paul.
And we have not even touched on the biggest difference between you and I. In fact, you never addressed the issue. I will respond with it in another post for clarity. I don’t think that there is anything else to add here.