Many would agree that baptism is important, but do you have to be baptized to be saved? And does it matter how you're baptized? John MacArthur answers the questions and many more about baptism next on Today's Grace To You. While most Christian churches probably celebrate baptism, they don't all celebrate it in the same way. Some completely immerse the new believer, while others sprinkle with water. Some baptize infants, but others will wait until a person professes faith in Christ. So, how much do those differences matter, and what means of baptism is biblical? John MacArthur answers those questions today on Grace To You, in his message titled, Understanding Baptism. He'll show you how, if you're a Christian, baptism relates to your salvation and to your continued relationship with Jesus Christ. And now, with today's lesson, here's John MacArthur. Now to help us understand what we need to understand about baptism, I want to pose several questions and then endeavor to answer them from the Word of God, all right? Question number one, what is baptism? When we talk about baptism, what are we talking about? Let's assume we don't even know what we're talking about. Let's start at square one. What is baptism? Simply this, from a physical viewpoint, it is a ceremony by which a person is immersed, dunked or submerged into water. That's what it is. It is a ceremony by which a person is immersed, dunked, or submerged into water. That's what baptism is. That's the physical act of baptism. Now, water immersion is commanded of every believer. And it is very important, not only for its own sake, because it demonstrates one's obedient heart, but because of the picture that it presents. You see, baptism is a teaching aid. Baptism is an object lesson. Baptism is a physical analogy of a profound spiritual reality. Baptism is a physical picture of the death and burial of the new birth that occurs when one puts his faith in the Savior. It is an object lesson. It is a visual representation of a spiritual reality. That is the meaning of baptism. Now, let me talk a little bit about what has been the history of baptism. That's the second question. Where does it come from? How did we get it? Where did it start? Now, let's follow its history a little bit. This is fascinating to me. The last Old Testament prophet that comes into the world is John the Baptist. And his job as the forerunner of Christ is to come and make the people ready for the coming of Christ. How's he gonna do that? Well, he knows that the coming Christ will be holy. He knows that the coming Christ will demand righteousness. So he preaches repentance and holiness and righteousness. And he calls everyone to repent for the kingdom is near. Repent for the king is coming. Turn from your sin. And then he baptizes them as an illustration, as a visible symbol of that inward turning. Now, follow this. This is amazing. So here comes John the Baptist asking Jews to be immersed in water. This is a humbling thing. Because in the mind of a Jew, he's a child of the covenant. And the mind of the Jew, he doesn't need to be brought through some kind of proselytizing ceremony to be inducted into the people of God. But the fact of the matter is, the people were flooding out to John, according to Matthew And they were being baptized in large numbers willingly. Why? Because they were admitting that Jewish though they were racially, they had been disobedient, ungodly, sinful and apostate in terms of a right relationship to God and they too needed to be washed. They need to have something die and they need to be brought into a new relationship with God. So John preached repentance, he preached righteousness, he preached holiness, he called for people to turn from iniquity to holiness and he immersed them in the Jordan River as a visual symbol of what was going on in their repenting hearts. No better outward symbol could be found than immersion to testify to an inwardly transformed heart. That's a perfect illustration. There's also a cleansing, a washing symbolized. And so, John came with that wonderful baptism, that wonderful picture of a repenting people. And that's why Acts 19.4, Paul says, John baptized with the baptism of repentance, telling the people to believe on Him who was coming after him, that is in Jesus. So, he called the people to believe in Jesus and then to turn from sin and turn in faith to Christ and to symbolize that in a willingness to publicly affirm that they needed a washing, they needed a transforming, they needed to die as to the old and rise to live in new life, even though they were Jews. And when they did that, that is remarkable. It isn't particularly remarkable that a Gentile would do it. It is amazing that a Jew would do it and shows the true repentance of their hearts. So all who submitted to the baptism of the Jordan River by John were confessing their sinfulness and that they were worthy of death and they were worthy of burial and pleading to walk in a new life. And that death, burial and resurrection were symbolized in that baptism. It marked the turning point of a sinful Jew who wanted to be ready to face his Messiah and he wanted to be associated with the others being baptized as a penitent people, forgiven and ready to receive the Savior. And so there was John doing that. And on a very special day, in the midst of his wonderful ministry, a marvelous thing happened. Verse 13 of Matthew 3 says it. And then Jesus arrived from Galilee at the Jordan, coming to John to be baptized by him. Amazing! John is baptizing all these multitudes of repentant people who are acknowledging we should die and we need a new life. And all that is going on and all of a sudden Jesus comes. John knew who He was because on a prior occasion John had said of Him, Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. He knew He was the Messiah. He knew He was the Lamb of God, the Savior, the Coming One, though later in His ministry He had doubts planted in His mind. At this point He has already affirmed Christ as the Lamb of God. He knows He's not a sinner. He knows He doesn't need to repent. So why in the world does He want to be baptized? So when Jesus comes and wants to be baptized, verse 14 says, John tried to prevent Him. And he said, I have need to be baptized by you, and do you come to me? How can I, a sinner, baptize a sinless one? You should baptize me. It was absolutely unthinkable to John the Baptist. He knew Jesus. He knew His divine identity. He knew He was the Lord's anointed. He knew He was the spotless, sinless Lamb. And he could not understand how Christ could possibly confess sin when He was already the perfect sinless Son of God. So he tried to stop Him. But Jesus in verse 15 answered him. And He said, permitted at this time, for in this way it is fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness. Then He permitted it. What did He mean by that? What a statement. To fulfill all righteousness? He says it's necessary, John, and it's necessary in fulfilling all righteousness. Let me ask you a question. How did Jesus fulfill the righteousness of God? Well, you could say He lived a perfect life. That didn't fulfill it. How did He fulfill the requirement of the righteousness of God? How? By dying on a cross. So whatever Jesus' baptism means, it is somehow connected to His fulfilling all righteousness. And therefore, it is somehow connected to the act in which He did that when in righteous wrath, God poured out vengeance on the Lord Jesus Christ and in His perfect sacrifice and sin-bearing death, all righteousness was then fulfilled and a righteous God was satisfied and able to impute righteousness to believing people. All righteousness has to be fulfilled at the cross. Therefore, the baptism of Jesus Christ is somehow connected to the cross. I think so. I believe that's right. And I believe that baptism was a symbol of His death and resurrection. The proselyte baptism, the proselyte was saying, I'm worthy of death for my sin. I want a new life under the true God. The baptism of John the Baptist, a Jew saying, I am worthy only of death for my sin. and for my apostasy and for my failure. I deserve to die. I want to rise in a new life and be ready for the Messiah. The symbol of death and resurrection fits perfectly the fulfilling of all righteousness which Jesus desires to do, and thus I believe His is a prefiguring of His own death and resurrection. Therefore, it has the same symbolic meaning as our baptism on this side of the cross, for it pictures His own coming, death and resurrection, as our baptism pictures His death and resurrection past. Proselyte baptism, baptism of John the Baptist, baptism of Jesus, baptism by Jesus, and then Jesus commands, you go and you baptize. That's the first step in making disciples. And the early church comes along, 3,000 believed, 3,000 were baptized. Absolute continuity. And always baptism, the beautiful picture of the death of the old, the resurrection of new, it finds its ultimate fulfillment in the death, burial and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Question number three. What is the theological significance of Christian baptism? And I've already alluded to this, I had to in the points previous, but let me crystallize it. What is the theological significance of Christian baptism? What is the spiritual significance of Christian baptism? What is it really depicting? Is it just the death, burial, resurrection of Christ? No. Listen carefully to what I say. When you as a believer are baptized by immersion into water, You are demonstrating not just the death, burial and resurrection of Christ, but you are demonstrating your union with Christ in that death, burial and resurrection. Do you see that? For whom did Christ die? For you. Whose sins did He bear? Yours. For whom did He rise? You. You...Paul says, I am crucified with Christ, right? I died in Him, I was buried in Him, I rose in Him to walk in newness of life." That's the spiritual significance. A person being baptized is giving a spiritual truth physical form, or making it into an object lesson. The moment you put your faith in Christ, you become a Christian. By a supernatural, sovereign, divine, spiritual miracle, God puts you in Christ. And you die at the cross and you rise to walk in newness of life. You're just instantly in Christ in His death, resurrection, and you become new in Him. That's the message. That's the point here. Even in 1 Corinthians 10 where it says all Israel was baptized into Moses, all it means is they were immersed into solidarity with Moses. He was their leader and as God poured out direction to him, they being under his leadership were immersed into the blessing and the working of that direction. It means solidarity with something. You have been immersed into Christ. This is such a beautiful theme in the New Testament with the epistles, Galatians 3, 27, for all of you who are baptized, that doesn't mean water, but all of you who are immersed into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ and it's symbolized in water. In Colossians chapter 2 verse 12, having been buried with Him in baptism, it doesn't mean water there, it means you were literally immersed into His death and you were raised up, it says. You have been made alive together with Him, having forgiven us all our transgressions." It's the immersion into Christ's death, the immersion spiritually into His burial, the immersion into His resurrection so that we die and He lives in us. And Paul says, I am crucified with Christ, nevertheless I live, yet it's not I but Christ lives in me. I die in Him, I rise in Him. The most explicit passage of all, Romans 6, do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ, that's not water baptism there, that's immersed into Christ, have been immersed into His death? Therefore we have been buried with Him through baptism into death in order that as Christ was raised from the dead to the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life. We are dying with Him, we are buried with Him and we rise with Him, immersed into Him. And though those passages are not referring to water, it is water baptism that symbolizes that spiritual reality. And when Peter says in 1 Peter 3, 21, these words, he makes that distinction. He says, baptism now saves you. What baptism? Not the removal of dirt from the flesh, not the water baptism. It is the spiritual union that saves you. That is the washing of regeneration, Titus 3.5. That is the washing away of your sins, Acts 22.16. But baptism is the symbol of it, water baptism. Now that takes us to question number four and then one other one. And question number four is this, what is the relation of immersion to salvation? Some people say you have to be baptized to be a Christian. If you're not baptized, you're not saved. What is the relationship? Let me put it to you as simply as I can. The relationship of water baptism to salvation is the relationship of obedience to salvation. Having been saved, we enter into obedience. Baptism was the immediate and inseparable indicator of salvation. Why? Because salvation It basically produces obedience. And so, believers were obedient to be baptized. Day of Pentecost, three thousand believed, three thousand were baptized, three thousand continued in the Apostles' doctrine, prayer, fellowship and the breaking of bread. No loss, three thousand believed, three thousand baptized, three thousand continued. Everybody was baptized, everybody was baptized immediately. That's God's standard. That's God's command. The Apostles insisted on it. Now listen carefully, it was not easy. You're talking on the day of Pentecost about three thousand people in the city of Jerusalem where a few weeks before Jesus Christ had been crucified as a charlatan and a fraud and one who posed a threat both to Jewish religion and Roman authority, He was mocked and spit on and crucified as a false religious leader. And basically, it was a matter of putting your life on the line to identify with Christ. So any Jew that was baptized on the day of Pentecost in the name of Jesus Christ was taking a bold step. Alienation from the culture, alienation from the synagogue, alienation from family, alienation from everything. The price was high. And it was very simple. Nobody who was a half-hearted convert was going to be baptized. So the people that were baptized were the real Christians because they were willing to pay the price. That's why you have 3,000 believers, 3,000 baptized, 3,000 continued. Typically today, you hear a guy say, we had a great evangelistic rally, 3,000 were saved, 42 were baptized, and 10 continued. Different. The cost of baptism then was very high and people who weren't serious in their commitment to Christ weren't going to pay it. There was no way they were going to be alienated from their entire culture and perhaps lose their life. It was therefore the inseparable token of salvation. So very often in the New Testament, as you read, it uses the word baptism instead of saved because the way you knew someone was saved was because they were what? If a convert was not willing to be baptized, there was little confidence in his repentance. If he was willing to be baptized, he paid a high price, revealed his true heart of repentance. So when Jesus says, go unto all the world, make disciples baptizing, what does He mean? He means bringing them to salvation, which is demonstrated in a willingness to be baptized and to pay the price of identification with Jesus Christ publicly. That's exactly what Romans 10 means when it says, if you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you'll be saved. People say, do you have to be baptized to get into heaven? Do you have to be baptized to get into heaven? The thief on the cross didn't. There may become exigencies which preclude baptism, but I'll tell you this, if you are reluctant to be baptized, there is question about your willingness to be obedient and an unwilling heart in the matter of obedience may well reveal an unregenerate person because Jesus said, if you love Me, you will...what?...keep My commandments. And He said, how can you say, Lord, Lord, to Me and not do the things I say? And it starts with this simple command...simple command. One who refused baptism would be one who wouldn't confess Jesus publicly, therefore one whom Jesus wouldn't confess. Every treatment of salvation in the Bible makes clear that it's by grace through faith plus or minus nothing, no works, grace through faith. Baptism is simply the demonstrator of real faith and real transformation which issues an obedience and the first act of obedience was baptism. Baptism does not make you holy. Baptism does not save you. Baptism does not secure you. Baptism does not provide some ongoing power. All baptism does is demonstrate your obedience and give you the joy of obedience and the blessing of obedience. It could go like this. Here's a possible way you could see it. A person comes into the water and says this. I hereby confess in my willing submission to this divinely appointed ordinance, my glad obedience to the command of my Lord and Savior. In this symbolic way, I show my identification with the one who bore my sins, took my place, died in my stead, was buried and rose again for my justification. as Christ went through the reality of suffering and death to secure my salvation. So by my immersion in water and coming out, I thus publicly declare my identification with my Lord in His death, burial and resurrection on my behalf with the intention to walk with Him in newness of life." Now that's a sample baptismal confession. No more beautiful, simple picture could be given than that. Do I need to sum it up? Our Lord recognized baptism had a heavenly purpose. He understood that it was a God-ordained thing. In fact, is it Matthew 21...25? Yes, Jesus says, the baptism of John, what source was it from? Heaven or from men? And Jesus is affirming, hey, the baptism of John was from heaven. He's even affirming the heavenly source of John's immersing baptism. Baptism is still the purpose of God. To refuse is to refuse the purpose of God. So if you haven't been baptized, you can't claim ignorance, not anymore. You're left with pride, you just don't want to humble yourself, you don't want to have people think you've been disobedient, indifference, it's not that important to you, or defiance, you're cultivating sin in your life and you're just not about to be a worse hypocrite, or you're not a Christian at all. Would you examine your heart? Beloved, I am convinced that much of the problem in the church today stems right from this root of disobedience that is manifest in the simple matter of baptism. And I am convinced that Satan has tried to confuse this issue for centuries to make believers divert themselves from the simple, straightforward patterns of obedience which God has ordained. We must be obedient, and so be blessed. You're listening to Grace to You with the Bible teaching of John MacArthur. Along with ministering daily on the broadcast, John serves as president of the Masters College and Seminary, both in the Los Angeles area. John calls today's message, Understanding Baptism. John, now that you've covered the fundamentals of baptism, what it is and what it's not, talk a little bit about baptism in today's church. Would you say that churches are more prone to overemphasize baptism, make it almost necessary for salvation, or downplay this ordinance? No, I think there are those churches and those denominations that overemphasize baptism because they make it a saving ritual or a saving rite. There are denominations that believe if you haven't been water baptized, you're not saved. They make it a work, so therefore you get a salvation by work's result. But that's the rare situation. Far more common is to downplay the role of baptism. Churches are just full of people, full of crowds of people, sitting there singing songs in the contemporary worship environment and praising Jesus and going through all of the motions that that kind of music elicits from people. And they've never even thought about being baptized. That is an act of obedience that is required of a believer at the very beginning of one's Christian experience. There's far too little concern with baptism. Yes, you have still the reality of infant baptism, which the Bible never ever advocates or promotes or even explains or defines. So you have those people ignoring believers' baptism. And then you have the kind of contemporary church that ignores believers' baptism because it really doesn't fit into the program. It doesn't fit into what they're trying to accomplish in a dark room with a lot of loud music. So, they often would even relegate it to some event at somebody's pool or a beach somewhere instead of putting it in the forefront of life in the church. In our church, every Sunday night, people are baptized, and that is an act of obedience. It's a blessed act. It's an act that brings great blessing to the one who is faithful. Let me tell you about a CD called Baptism, a Matter of Obedience. I'll send it to anybody who requests, okay? Baptism, a Matter of Obedience to anybody who requests it free of charge. Free of charge. Friend, if you or someone you know is considering whether to be baptized, let me encourage you to get a copy of this CD. It'll answer questions you and your loved ones may have, and it's a great resource to share with a new believer or perhaps someone you're discipling. To get your copy of the message titled, Baptism, a Matter of Obedience, contact us here today. To request your copy of the free CD, email your name and address to Grace to You, Post Office Box 4000, Panorama City, California, 91412. Or send that name and address to letters at gty.org. You can also let us know that you'd like a copy of John's message on baptism, a matter of obedience, when you call us at 1-800-55-GRACE. Or request it when you visit our website, gty.org. And while you're online at gty.org, make sure you take advantage of the thousands of free resources available. You can read our latest blog, for example. It's a series titled, Christian Clichés and How to Avoid Them. Also, watch video of John's various television and conference appearances. And you can download John's entire sermon archive, that's more than 3,000 sermons, free of charge, in the MP3 or transcript format. Website again, gty.org. 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