Water Baptism

Van said:

Perhaps you are referring to Christ baptizing with "spirit" and with "fire. Matthew 3:11, That word (G907) is NOT the subject. I agree, Christ baptizes believers with spirit and non-believers with fire.

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37818 said:

Luke 3:16-17, . . . and with fire: Whose fan is in his hand, and he will throughly purge his floor, and will gather the wheat into his garner; but the chaff he will burn with fire unquenchable.

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37818 said:

Parallel passage to Matthew 3:11-12, . . . and with fire: Whose fan is in his hand, and he will throughly purge his floor, and gather his wheat into the garner; but he will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire.

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Van said:

Stop posting vague claims. Do all 24 commentaries on 1 Perter 3:21 say water baptism is not emphatic of Christ's spiritual baptism.

“And I did not recognize Him, but He who sent me to baptize in water said to me, ‘He upon whom you see the Spirit descending and remaining upon Him, this is the One who baptizes in the Holy Spirit.’

“I baptized you]with water; but He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit.”

Unless you have been baptized into Christ's Spirit, such that you are in Christ and indwelt such that Christ is in you, you have not been saved. Full Stop

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Craigbythesea said:

All of the 24 commentaries on 1 Peter that I have here in my study interpret 1 Peter 3:21 to be speaking of water baptism rather than some sort of Spirit baptism. I have in my personal library only 37 books specifically on the Holy Spirit, but two of them are excellent:

Swete, Henry Barclay. The Holy Spirit in the New Testament. London: Macmillan and Company, 1910. (417 pages). In addition to the New Testament, Swete covers “SOME EARLY CHRISTIAN UNECONOMICAL GOSPELS, ACTS, AND APOCALYPSES.” He assumes that the readers of the book are fluent in Greek and Latin, but he provides a translation for Hebrew words. This book was the result of many years of intense scholarship and deserves a place in the personal library every English speaking Christian who seriously desires to know and understand what the New Testament says about the Holy Spirit.

Bruner, Frederick Dale. A Theology of the Holy Spirit. Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans/Publisher. 1970. (390 pages). This is another very well researched scholarly work with an extensive bibliography (34) pages. Foreign words are translated. Very much of the book is devoted to Pentecostalism and although Bruner is not Pentecostal he has an excellent understanding of it and treats it fairly and respectfully.

I need, however, to mention one more of the 37 books.

Torrey, R. A. The Person and Work of the Holy Spirit. First published in 1910. Torrey had an excellent education but he is not primarily known for his scholarship but for his success as an evangelist, educator, and writer. This book is much more brief than the other two, but it is packed full of spiritual insights making the reading of it to be highly recommended.

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Craigbythesea said:

I have here in my study ... 24 commentaries on 1 Peter, including very recent commentaries on the Greek text of these two books of the New Testament written by scholars who are very much abreast of current New Testament scholarship. None of them agree with what you have written. ... [snip]

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Martin Marprelate said:

I agree with your conclusion; I'm not quite clear how you got there.
Some thoughts from my blog Circumcision and Baptism .
It would be hard to imagine two operations more different than circumcision and baptism. They don’t sound alike, they don’t look alike and they certainly don’t feel alike. If someone were to be blindfolded and then had one or other ordinance performed on him, I guarantee that he would be able to tell which one it was! One was applied only to males in the Bible (Gen 17:10), whereas the other is given to both sexes (cf. Acts 8:12). One leaves a permanent mark upon the recipient; the other does not.

There are other important differences that need to be spelled out here with reference to infants:-
There is no command in the Bible for infants to receive water baptism.
There is no instance in the Bible of infants being baptized.
There is no reference in the Bible to infants being baptized.

Water baptism in the Bible is constantly tied in with repentance, faith and discipleship (eg Matt 3:6, 11; 28:19; Mark 16:16; John 4:1; Acts 2:41; 8:12, 13, 36-37; 16:14-15, 31-34; 1Cor 1:16: compare with 16:15f; Eph 4:5); circumcision is referenced to no one’s faith but Abraham’s- and that to the faith he had while still uncircumcised (Rom 4:8-11).
“Me and my seed” of the Old Testament is replaced by Christ and His seed of the New (Isaiah 53:10; Heb 2:13. cf. 1Cor 4:15). This point was not lost on the framers of the Westminster Confession of Faith:-

Larger Catechism of the W.C.F. Q.31. With whom was the covenant of grace made?
Ans. The covenant of grace was made with Christ as the second Adam, and in him with all the elect as his seed.

Col 2:11-12. ‘In [Christ] you were also circumcised with the circumcision made without hands, by putting off the body of the sins of the flesh, by the circumcision of Christ; buried with Him in baptism, in which you also were raised with him through faith in the working of God, who raised Him from the dead.’

Does this text say that baptism is the successor to circumcision? Not at all! I can do no better here than to quote A. W. Pink.

It is a mistake to suppose that baptism has come in the place of circumcision. As that which supplanted the Old Testament sacrifices was the one offering of the Saviour, as that which superseded the Aaronic priesthood was the high priesthood of Christ, so that which has succeeded circumcision is the spiritual circumcision which believers have in and by Christ: “In whom also ye are circumcised with the circumcision made without hands, in putting off the body of the sins of the flesh, by the circumcision of Christ.” (Col 2:11)- how simple! How satisfying! “Buried with him in baptism, wherein also ye are risen with him” (v12) is something additional: it is only wresting Scripture to say these two verses mean “Being buried with him in baptism, ye are circumcised.” No, no: verse 11 declares the Christian circumcision is “made without hands,” and baptism is administered by hands! The circumcision “made without hands in putting off [judicially, before God] the body of the sins of the flesh” has taken the place of the circumcision made with hands. The circumcision of Christ has come in the place of the circumcision of the law. Never once in the New Testament is baptism spoken of as the seal of the new covenant; rather is the Holy Spirit the seal: see Ephesians 1:13; 4:30.’

Exactly so. The main argument of Colossians is that believers are complete in Christ (2:10). The O.T. contains several exhortations to the Israelites to circumcise their hearts (eg. Deut 10:16; Lev 26:41-2; Jer 4:4. cf. 9:25-6; Rom 2:28-9), but Christians are never urged to baptize themselves in the Spirit. This is because circumcision was applied to infants who were ‘brought forth in iniquity and conceived in sin’ (Psalm 51:5) and was therefore of no effect unless a changed heart came later. Baptism, by contrast was given to those whose heart had already been changed, enabling them to repent and trust in Christ (Mark 16:16; Acts 2:41; 8:12; 16:14), so that they needed nothing more.

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Craigbythesea said:

I have here in my study 31 commentaries on Ephesians and 24 commentaries on 1 Peter, including very recent commentaries on the Greek text of these two books of the New Testament written by scholars who are very much abreast of current New Testament scholarship. None of them agree with what you have written. In post 23, Martin did an excellent job of showing that the Greek word βαπτίζω expresses the concept of immersion in water. Tertullian (c. 150–225 AD) wrote extensively about water baptism and his writings show very clearly what the early fathers of the church believed about water baptism and its efficacy for salvation. His views on the issue were the virtually unanimous view of the church until some renegade Roman Catholics freaked out over the issue of salvation by works and radically misunderstood what Paul wrote about works not realizing that he was, as he said himself over and over again, writing about “works of the law.” The absurd concept that water Baptism is a “work” was given birth during this very dark period of church history. However, by the grace of God and common sense, that absurd notion took hold in only a relatively small part of the church and today the very large portion of the church stands firm on Peter’s words in 1 Peter 3:20-21,

20 ἀπειθήσασίν ποτε ὅτε ἀπεξεδέχετο ἡ τοῦ θεοῦ μακροθυμία ἐν ἡμέραις Νῶε κατασκευαζομένης κιβωτοῦ εἰς ἣν ⸀ὀλίγοι, τοῦτʼ ἔστιν ὀκτὼ ψυχαί, διεσώθησαν διʼ ὕδατος. 21 ὃ ⸂καὶ ὑμᾶς ἀντίτυπον νῦν⸃ σῴζει βάπτισμα, οὐ σαρκὸς ἀπόθεσις ῥύπου ἀλλὰ συνειδήσεως ἀγαθῆς ἐπερώτημα εἰς θεόν, διʼ ἀναστάσεως Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ,

Peter’s syntax is absolutely clear, and however we may interpret his teaching, our interpretation must agree completely with his syntax. In verse 20, he says that eight persons were saved through water (διεσώθησαν δι᾿ ὕδατος). He does not say that eight persons were saved through baptism in the Spirit. In verse 20, he says that this salvation through water prefigured baptism. A word –for-word translation here is “Which antitype also now saves you.” Syntactically, baptism is here the antitype of “salvation through water.” Therefore, there is absolutely no question but what Peter is saying that water baptism now saves, and he elaborates by expressing the fact that it is “not the removal of dirt from the flesh” during water baptism that saves us, but it is the appeal to God through water baptism for a good conscious that saves, and that this is made possible through the resurrection of Jesus Christ.

Please see especially the following commentaries on the Greek text of 1 Peter:

Bigg, Charles - I.C.C. (1 Peter, 2 Peter, Jude) exe., xv, 353 (198 on 1 Peter) pages, 1902, Second Edition
Davids, Peter H. - N.I.C. exe., xxii, 266 pages, 1990
Donelson, Lewis R. N.T.L. (1 and 2 Peter) exe., xxiii, 301 (157 on 1 Peter) pages, 2010
Elliott, John - H. A.B. exe., xxiii, 956 pages, 2000
Kelly, J. N. D. - H.N.T.C. (1 Peter, 2 Peter, Jude) exe., x, 387 (221 on 1 Peter) pages, 1969
Michaels, J. Ramsey - W.B.C. exe., lxxv, 337 pages, 1988
Reicke, Bo Ivar - A.B. (James, 1 & 2 Peter, Jude) exe., xxxviii, 221 (73 on 1 Peter) pages, 1964
Selwyn, Edward Gordon exe., xvi, 517 pages, 1947, Second Edition

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