Baptism And Our Jesus Identity - Baptism Sunday

Hello everyone, I'm Dr.

Steve Holt.

I want to welcome you to the Road Church Podcast.

Each week we go into God's Word.

We teach chapter by chapter and verse by verse.

We are here to build the Kingdom of God revolution through empowering people to change the world.

So we pray this will minister to you at your heart level and change your life.

So let me just say at the beginning that baptism is really, really special.

And many of you come out of infant baptism backgrounds.

That would be my story.

I was baptized at six weeks old in the Lutheran church in a gown.

And so I've seen the pictures of a little gown.

And it's it's not one that it that I have displayed in my library.

But anyway, I want to just say this that I would never be in any way incendiary about infant baptism.

I understand the covenant, I understand how that came about, and it probably was a part of the early church.

Even though we see believers' baptism, what I say believer, I mean you become a believer, so you're getting baptized as an adult, usually or as a child, you receive Christ, then you're baptized based on what we see in the New Testament.

But if you were to if you were to go back to the original covenant of circumcision, that's where infant baptism comes from.

So in my opinion, and some of you may disagree, that's not something I'm gonna go to battle over.

Okay?

So if you are infantly baptized, you're walking with Jesus today, and you've never even considered getting baptized as a believer, that's fine.

That's fine.

But if today, whether you've been baptized or not, God is convicting your heart to be baptized as a believer, we welcome you.

So even though you may not have signed up, you can just go for it, and we will be there for you with all of your wet clothes and everything, and you can get baptized.

So when I, at the end of my sermon, when I invite people to get baptized, you're all invited to get baptized.

And then our team will be up there, and I'll be over there too, and we'll be doing it during worship.

Does that make sense?

So, what we're gonna do, everybody on the kingdom ministry team, you guys are gonna all be up here, and as people get baptized, this is our tradition, we will uh lead that person to one of these rugs here, and there'll be a group that'll be around you.

So if you have family and friends here and you'd like them to pray over you, just have them come up, you know, and be ready.

They can be seated and come up when you get baptized afterwards so we can pray for you.

So here's what's interesting about baptism.

Number one, baptism is how Jesus started his ministry.

So as much as we talk about that, Jesus was about preaching the kingdom, he was about healing the sick, he was about casting out demons, he was about discipling twelve men, before he did any of that, he got baptized.

So in Mark 1, 9, it'll be up on the screen, you don't have to look there yet.

It came to pass in those days that Jesus came from Nazareth of Galilee and was baptized by John in the Jordan.

So he began, he started his public ministry with baptism.

That's significant that the creator of the universe, the Son of God, started everything with baptism.

So baptism is a starting point for us.

But then secondly, he concluded his kingdom ministry when he was handing that kingdom ministry to us as his disciples with telling us, first thing, get people baptized.

So in Matthew 28, he says, he spoke to them saying, All authority has been given to me on heaven and earth, go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

So he starts his ministry of baptism.

He concludes his earthly ministry with baptism, which we call the Great Commission, the Grand Commission of God to us.

So even though I was a part for over 10 years with Campus Crusade for Christ, which is now called Crew, both at the University of Georgia, University of Maryland, and then in Tokyo and Okinawa, we didn't baptize because we weren't a church, so we didn't baptize people.

But I think in God's proper order, as many, you know, thousands that I led to the Lord personally one-on-one, it was it was a remiss in me, now that I look back, that I didn't have people get baptized soon after they got saved.

But that just wasn't the tradition of that ministry that I was a part of.

And God understands that.

But why do we get baptized?

And I want to give you an idea, a thought that about our spiritual blood.

So it may be something you haven't heard before unless you heard me the last time I spoke on this, but that our spiritual blood is poisoned by a thing called sin.

Now, a lot of us don't like to talk about sin.

It's not, it's not even a tradition anymore in the church, hardly.

But sin's kind of important because if you understand that you're a sinner, then it helps you understand why Jesus died on the cross to forgive us of our sin.

So sin is important.

And I think of it like spiritual mitochondria.

Like the cells, I mean the spiritual cells of our body are tainted by sin.

And the best way I can describe it is it's kind of like bad blood or having cancer.

So you've seen people, I know we all have, who look great.

They're running every day, they're eating well, they're taking supplements, they're the picture of health, and then they go in and they get a diagnosis that they've got cancer, or that there's some problems with their blood, there's poison in their system, but they look fine.

Well, I think sin's like that.

That a lot for a lot of us, we look great and we know how to we know how to put on airs.

Most of you in this room are fairly honorable people, I guess.

I mean, you are to me, you are to each other, but there's something wrong with you, and you may not even know it.

And so part of the part of the job description of the local church, and each of us, when we share our faith with someone, is to start off with, and I love the four spiritual laws.

It's saying that God loves you and offers a wonderful plan for your life.

And then we quote John 3.16, for God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son that whoever believes in him should not perish but everlasting life.

But it was John 10.10 that had the greatest impact on me as a freshman at the University of Georgia, where it says, the enemy or Satan comes to steal, kill, and destroy.

But this is Jesus speaking, but I came that you might have life and might have it more abundantly.

And I was like, wow.

I don't remember in my Lutheran heritage ever seeing that verse that there was this, there was this clear dichotomy between the kingdom of darkness and the kingdom of the light.

And so it just resonated with me, and it was the perfect timing of God for things that were happening in my life.

But we talked about the fact that I was a sinner.

And I knew that term, but I didn't understand the concept.

And so, church, all of us are sinners.

And all that means, and I mean this, is that you are imperfect.

And the word sin is a Greek word which comes from the idea of missing the mark.

It was used in archery contests, so when the archer would pull back and fire his arrow, I don't know how close the judge was to the target, but he would shout out back to the archer, sin one, sin two, sin three, determined by how far off from the bullseye they were.

So that's what sin is.

Sin is missing the mark.

Sin is a cancer that's within all of us that comes from the first Adam.

That's important.

Adam and Eve in the garden, the first Adam, we are sinners.

Now, here's the problem we all struggle with is we grade each other on a curve.

So what we do is we go, man, I'm I'm not as bad as Joe, or I'm not as bad as Susan, or I'm not as bad as Hitler.

I mean, whatever it is you compare yourself to, we have this comparison thing, and then we skate past the fact that you've got a cancer.

You do have a cancer, all of us do.

And the the issue is how long will we let the cancer grow, develop, and be built up and multiply itself in the mitochondria of our spiritual bloodstream such that it starts to create death in our life.

So turn in your Bibles to Romans chapter 6, verse 3, and I want you to just go through a few verses with me, and then we're actually gonna look at what I think are four key principles of baptism that we see in the actual baptism of Jesus.

Romans 6:3

So in verse 3 we read, Do you not know that as many of us as were baptized into Christ Jesus?

Now I underline that.

Baptized into Christ Jesus, were baptized into his death.

So write this down if you're a note taker.

Jesus died a death we could not die.

Jesus died a death we could not die to give us a life we cannot live.

It's really important.

This is kind of the theme of what I'm saying this morning.

Jesus died a death we could not die to give us a life we cannot live.

So baptism is not about going into the waters by yourself.

You're going into the waters identifying with the death of Christ.

That's what the passage is saying.

We're baptized into Christ Jesus.

Into.

We are baptized into his death.

So there is an identity, right?

This is important.

There is an identity that leads to an intimacy when you do baptism this way.

I can't say that about infant baptism because you don't even remember it.

So, but but you know what, you understand what that was about?

That's about the fact that God, by his grace, has chosen you and you have nothing to do with it.

And I I come from a little bit of a different persuasion and believing that, for by grace you've been saved through faith, not of yourself, but the gift of God.

So faith is a proactive, intentional part that happens as a believer where we identify with the death of Christ, dying a death you could not die.

You could not die for your sin.

No human person can die for your sin.

You are identifying with Christ, but you're also identifying with his death.

He died as a perfect man.

He died a death you cannot die.

So you can be the best person in Colorado Springs.

You can be the most philanthropic person in Colorado Springs.

You can be the best father, the best mother, the best uh philanthropist, the whatever.

You're still not saved if you haven't identified with the intimacy that you can have through Jesus Christ.

So baptism changes Christianity from a religion into a with Christ, which is intimacy.

So at this church, at the road, we're not interested in promoting Christianity as a religion.

We're about intimacy through a personal, vital, dynamic, growing relationship with Christ.

Does that make sense?

That's what Paul's saying here in Romans is this identity we have.

So you ask yourself, why are people brokenhearted?

Why are people addicted?

Why are people so mean?

Why do I look back in my life and I see so much betrayal?

Because Romans 6.23, jot down Romans 6.23, the wages of sin is death.

The wages of sin is death.

The wages of sin is death.

The wage, the payment, as it were, of sin, which leads to being brokenhearted, which leads to depression, which leads to addiction, that's headed toward death.

And so what we need is a blood transfusion, not a dialysis.

So a dialysis is taking your blood and then cleaning it out through a machine and putting your blood back into you.

You don't need a dialysis, you need a blood transfusion.

You need pure blood being poured into your sinful bloodstream, and that pure blood is Jesus.

That's his hands being broken with those nails, with the feet.

No bones were broken, but I mean being pierced.

Being pierced by those nails.

That blood cleanses us of sin.

And why is that important?

Because you can't hit the rewind button.

So if you're over 50, you know what a rewind button is.

If you're under 50, it means that you can touch on your phone that little that little arrow that's going the other way, and you push that and you can listen to the podcast again.

So I always go over all my sermons with Liz.

So this morning we up and we're going through it, and she's she's mentioned the rewind button, and I said, honey, they don't know what that is.

They don't think about it.

There's nothing in their life that has a rewind button.

They've got a rewind touch or something.

So whatever you call it, you can't go back.

And so here's the deal: some of us in this room are feeling guilty because you're haunted, especially at night, by night terrors.

And the reason I'm saying it that way is because that's my story.

So I'm identifying with you that have this struggle with mistakes you've made in the past.

Folks, everybody look at me.

You can't change the past.

Say it together.

You can't change the past.

Listen up, but you can change the future.

And you change the future by repentance in the present, and that's part of what baptism does.

So what you're doing in baptism, and this is God's idea, not mine.

God's idea was to give us the, I would call it the ritual, the ritual of baptism, is that it's a restart.

You can't rewind the past and change anything, but you can break the power of guilt.

And you can come and say, God, I repent.

I I blew it.

I'm so sorry.

Now as you resurrect me into new life in Christ.

Now you don't have to get baptized every time you sin.

You have to repent and confess your sins.

1 John 1.9, that means you agree with God about your sins and you're restored into that relationship.

But baptism has that element to it.

So Romans 5.8, this is so important.

Romans 5.8 to me is one of the greatest passages in Scripture about the new life.

But God demonstrates his own love toward us in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.

Much more than having now been justified by his what?

Blood, that the blood transfusion, a spiritual blood transfusion by God, we shall be saved from wrath through him.

For if when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God through the death of his son, much more having been reconciled, we shall be saved by his life.

So the uncontaminated blood of Jesus, somehow, in a mysterious spiritual way, is transferred into you and you believe in Christ, and it's sealed when you get baptized.

So don't hear me saying baptism saves you.

I'm not saying baptism saves you like some denominations do.

I do believe, though, that the proper order is that we give our lives to Christ, we repent, then we get baptized.

You see it all through the New Testament, quickly getting baptized.

Why?

Because I do believe in like a blood transfusion.

There's like a blood transfusion that we experience, and then through that, the best way I can describe it is implicit memories.

I'm gonna call it implicit memories.

How many of you heard of the counselor Adam Young?

Anybody heard of Adam Young?

Okay, not many of you, but few.

Nobody really.

But I listen to Adam Young all the time, and I just love this guy.

Anyway, he talks about implicit memories.

Here's what implicit memories are: implicit memories are different than explicit memories.

So explicit memories are related to something you did that you can remember.

Implicit memories are the way in which you respond to pressure, the way in which you respond to a difficult situation that you don't have an explicit memory of, but it was something, usually from childhood, that's built in you.

That's the way sin works.

That's the way sin works.

You're just born that way.

And yet each one of us have implicit memories that become a almost like a torture in a spousal relationship.

Right?

Okay, so an implicit memory begins to be, begins, it's not the end of the story, it begins to be washed by the blood of the Lamb.

Because here's what's happening: you're forgiven.

You are absolutely forgiven by the identification with Christ through baptism.

So here's what you're doing: you're identifying with the death of Christ, but you're also identifying with being buried with Christ.

That's what the water thing is, I guess.

Again, this is God's idea.

I'm just trying to explain it the best I understand.

Is that by going under, it's identifying with the death or the burial of Christ.

So look at the rest of verse 4.

So it reads this way: Therefore, we are buried with him through baptism into death.

Therefore, we are buried with him through baptism into death.

Wow.

So listen, everybody, write this down.

This is really important.

I think it's a good point.

I'm taking notes on myself.

Old identity, I'm dead in sin.

Old identity, I'm dead in sin.

But the new identity is that I'm dead to sin.

So I was dead in sin, which creates guilt, creates frustration, creates, in my case, the struggle that I have is self-condemnation.

So I struggle with self-condemnation.

Anybody struggle with self-condemnation?

Okay.

So what self-condemnation is, is you're looking back at a memory of something and you just feel terrible about it.

And you just and you say things like, I'm a jerk, I'm a loser, I'll never change.

That's the battle.

So the new identity that we're working toward is I'm dead to that sin.

I'm not dead in that sin.

I'm dead to that sin.

I'm gonna place that, listen, under the blood of Jesus.

I need his blood transfusion to change my neuropathways.

Because my neuropathways go towards self-condemnation.

The new neuropathways, which I'm always working on, I hope you're working on, is that I am resurrected with Christ.

That I am a new creation in Christ.

So the new identity is I'm buried with Christ and I'm not alone.

I've been crucified with Christ.

It's no Longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me.

And that that life that I live in the flesh, I live by faith in the Son of God who was delivered up for me.

That's the new identity, is that I'm crucified with Christ.

That's identification and intimacy, remember?

Identification and intimacy with Christ.

We continue.

Paul says that just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life.

Verse 5.

For if we have been united together in the likeness of his death, certainly we also shall be in the likeness of his resurrection.

So hear what I said.

We're identifying with going under, being buried with Christ in his death.

But then you're, you know, you know, we're not going to hold you down there.

We're going to let you up.

And so as you come up, you're now identifying and having intimacy with the resurrection of Christ.

So you're coming out of the grave, you're coming forth a new person, and I can't tell you, after 40 years of ministry, how many times people have gotten delivered of the demonic coming up out of the water.

I had one guy nearly drowned on me in a hot tub in Yorbelinda, California years ago.

And he had come out of a cult.

And I didn't know him.

I just was, I was just the receiver of people as they came through the line.

And when he came up, he just was shaking.

He was experiencing something I'd never seen before.

He went back under the water.

We grabbed him.

We pulled him up.

He went down again.

We pulled him up.

He got baptized like three or four times.

And he was set free.

And he wanted to testify that he felt a spirit over him that was lifted.

So you may experience that today.

We're okay with that.

We're not only okay with that, we think it's pretty exciting.

Because you're getting set free.

And that's the point.

So we don't care if it's a little bit weird because it.

Have you read this book?

If you think things are weird, you need to spend more time in God's Word because this is one weird book.

This is a lot of weird stuff.

And of course, there's theologians out there that will do anything to actually say, oh, those things don't happen anymore because they haven't had the experience.

Listen, men and women, preach the word, not your experience.

Okay, so so you know, I hear everybody say that.

I've always heard that.

Preach the word, not your experience.

But we always mean it like what I just said would be a no-no.

You don't expect that was an experience.

No, that was biblical experience.

And so what happens is that because we haven't had the experience, we say we're preaching the word, but we could say it this way: don't just preach the word or your non-experience.

Because this book is full of weird experiences.

And so that's the guide we have.

We always judge it by the word.

Does that make sense?

We judge it by the word.

That's when you get into trouble when you don't do that.

So this is a blood transfusion of Christ, this resurrection that we have in him.

Knowing this, verse 6, that our old man was crucified with him, that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves of sin, for he who has died has been freed from sin.

You say, well, if our new identity is I'm resurrected with Christ, and this passage says I'm no longer a slave to sin, it does not say, listen, it does not say you don't sin.

It just says that the power of sin has been broken.

We say, well, what's the difference?

The difference is how you proactively deal with the temptations of sin.

You now have resurrection power to say no to things before you had no power to say no to.

That's why I said it's the death we could not die to live a life we cannot live.

You cannot live the Christian life.

Everybody say that.

I cannot live the Christian life.

But Christ can.

Christ can live the Christian life in you.

As you let yourself identify with the crucifixion of Christ, the life, death, and resurrection of Christ, you begin to have power over the power of sin.

It's very, very exciting.

It's the clearest example, the greatest example to the world that Jesus is alive is not theology.

The greatest witness that Jesus is alive today is not doctrine.

As important as all that is, I've got a degree in it.

The greatest testimony of the life, death, and resurrection of Christ is you.

It's you living it.

It's someone saying, Man, that guy was, you remember that guy?

What a bozo.

He's changed.

He's been transformed.

And he says it's Jesus.

And if someone is even remotely open to spiritual things, they go, well, maybe I should investigate that.

Maybe I should check that out.

And so the greatest testimony of the power of God is our changed lives.

But listen, the greatest testimony that hurts the Christian faith is us not living the Christian life.

And I can't tell you how many times people have just about cut me off, came that close to just nipping the front of my car when I'm driving down the road, and there's a fish on the back of their back windshield.

And I just want to wring their neck.

They better not be going to the road.

So turning your Bibles to Mark chapter 1.

Mark 1 · chapter mention

And I just want to make a few comments before we go into worship.

And I'm going to say that the baptism of Jesus is prophetic for us today.

Look at Mark 1, verse 9.

Mark 1:9

So I referenced it at the very beginning.

But let's just break it down a little because this is such a great set of verses.

It came to pass in those days that Jesus came from Nazareth of Galilee and was baptized by John and Jordan.

Look at verse 10.

And immediately coming up from the water, he saw the heavens parting.

Here's the first thing that happens in baptism: God's going to give you a new vision.

God is going to give you a new vision.

Remember the story of Philip where he's translated from one spot to another, one of those mysterious, that's like I told you this Bible's like full of weird stuff.

So in Acts, Philip just suddenly is there.

And here's an Ethiopian eunuch going back to Ethiopia in Africa, but he's reading Isaiah 53.

He's reading it and he doesn't understand it, and then there's Philip.

Just boom, just appears.

And he goes, What are you reading?

You know?

And so they have this conversation.

The guy believes, and then he's baptized.

And he suddenly, I know this from tradition too, that he had a vision now of the evangelization of Ethiopia.

And tradition tells us, legend tells us, based in history, he went back and evangelized Ethiopia.

He turned Ethiopia upside down for Christ.

Because Philip just happened to show up through a translation made by the Holy Spirit where somehow he was transported supernaturally to be right in front of this eunuch.

So listen, you guys that are getting baptized, expect in the next few days, you're going to get a new vision.

You're getting a new vision, or you're going to get a confirmation of your present vision.

But God's going to show you something new that he has for your life.

It's going to be a new vision.

Read on.

Number two, Holy Spirit filling.

Holy Spirit filling.

Or like a dove, Holy Spirit came upon Jesus.

Well, we asked the question well, was the Holy Spirit with Jesus before that?

I don't know.

Weird stuff in this book.

Did he literally see a dove come down?

I don't know.

It says like a dove, so it might not have been, but something happened that Mark felt like he needed to write down.

It was like a dove.

This is like a really weird story.

But one time when we were going through a really hard time in our family because of a death of someone.

That we opened the door of our house one day, all the kids were there, we're all kind of little, and there was a dove.

A white dove.

White dove.

I don't know if there's albino doves or what, but it wasn't the gray like a morning dove has.

It was white.

Never seen it again, but saw it that day.

And it came walking in our house.

And we're like, whoa, look at this.

And I think all the kids would remember that.

This dove just walks in, it goes into the living room.

And then it walks out.

It came in.

I guess he wanted to make a statement of some sort.

Maybe it was sent by the Holy Spirit.

And then it left.

And it did like three days in a row.

It did that.

And then it was gone.

And I think Liz would say, because of the what was happening in her life, it was healing to her.

It was healing to her.

So I don't know what it is about doves, but we've never forgotten that story.

But the Holy Spirit is like a dove, you guys.

And if you had a dove sitting on your shoulder, what would frighten it the most?

It'd be quick movement, right?

If you make a quick movement, the dove's gonna fly off.

So something about the Spirit of God and the filling of the Holy Spirit is to walk gently.

Walk gently in your relationship with Him.

So some of you are gonna get baptized and you're gonna get filled with the Holy Spirit when you come out of the waters.

And it's going to be a mighty, mighty, powerful work of God.

Number three, verse 11.

Then a voice came from heaven.

Number three, hearing from God.

You're now gonna have a new clarity of hearing from God through your identification and your intimacy with Christ in baptism.

So expect that in the next week or so you're gonna hear from God like you never have before.

And then lastly, and probably the most important point is verse 11b.

A voice came from heaven and said, You are my beloved son in whom I am well pleased.

So, church, nobody else may call you beloved.

Your mom and dad might not call you beloved.

You may have never been called beloved.

You may have never experienced God's love, even from a person.

But God calls you beloved.

You're adopted into his family.

And as a matter of fact, this is the capstone.

This is the most important part of breaking the power of self-condemnation is to say to yourself, I am beloved.

She doesn't like me, he doesn't like me.

I've made a lot of mistakes, Lord.

I have a lot of regrets.

But I'm beloved.

And so help settle in me the fact that your unconditional love and your blood transfusion covers all my mistakes and all my sins.

Whether those sins be passive or intentional, it's covered by the blood of Jesus.

That's what baptism is about.

Baptism is about a new vision.

Baptism is about hearing God's voice.

Baptism is about being filled with the Holy Spirit.

Baptism is also about knowing that you're a beloved saint.

Every one of you in this room that have put your faith in Christ, you are a saint.

You may not feel very saintly, but don't listen to your feelings.

By faith, you're a saint.

Thank you for listening to the Road Church Podcast.

We pray today's message has empowered you to make a difference in your world.

For more information about the Road Church and to find more content like this, go to theroad.org.

That's therode.org.