BAPTISM OF BELILEVERS AND UNION WITH CHRIST 4

Galatians 2:20; 1 Corinthians 1:13-17; Ephesians 2:4-6; 1 Corinthians 12:13; Romans 6:3,4
Mid-Week Lesson, 20230927

By GOD’s Grace and Wisdom, and His Holy Spirit’s guidance, we want to continue with our lesson on Baptism of Believers and Union with Christ.  Today, we are focusing on our union with Christ.

The Apostle Paul states that we go down under the water--a picture of burial--and then we come up again out of the water, which is a picture of resurrection.  This is a symbol, a picture, a representation in a dramatic manner of what is happening to us spiritually.

The Apostle Paul continues to emphasize that it is a very remarkable one, and a very appropriate one. First, you are buried, and then you rise; your baptism is a pictorial representation of union with our Lord in His burial and resurrection.

Now, let us examine this: The expression in verse 4, where we are told that we are “buried with Him by (or through) baptism,” seems to oppose very strongly this interpretation.  Paul does not say that it is a picture.

The Apostle Paul says that it is accomplished by or through baptism.  He does not say that this is a wonderful pictorial or symbolic representation of it.  He says that by or through our baptism this happened to us.

Let us bear in mind that the doctrine of our union with Christ says that we are united with Him in all that happened to Him; and the first thing that happened to Him in this context was that He was crucified!  The Apostle Paul introduces this same idea elsewhere, says, "I have been crucified with Christ” Galatians 2:20:

“I have been crucified with Christ [in Him I have shared His crucifixion]; it is no longer I who live, but Christ (the Messiah) lives in me; and the life I now live in the body I live by faith in (by adherence to and reliance on and complete trust in) the Son of God, Who loved me and gave Himself up for me.” (Amplified)

"I have been crucified with Christ.”  Where is that represented in this pictorial representation?  How does water baptism represent crucifixion?  It is simply not there.  And yet it is a vital part, perhaps the most vital of our union with our Lord Jesus Christ.

Therefore, there should be a doubt at once in our minds as to whether the Apostle uses baptism as a picture.

I would go further and suggest that to argue that the Apostle has water baptism in his mind in any shape or form here is to give a prominence to baptism that the Apostle Paul never gives to it.