[0:00] Good morning. Good morning. It is good to be together.
[0:16] It's a beautiful day the Lord has given us to worship, but more than that, to have a special service where we baptize a number of our young people, five individuals, in fact.
[0:38] And that is always a very uplifting time and service. First of all, it's glorifying to God.
[0:49] That's of utmost importance. It's a bit nerve-wracking for sharing testimonies and doing the baptism, but we trust the Lord will give you strength.
[1:05] But it's also a blessing for the parents and the families. As you see, daughters follow through with this commandment by Jesus to be baptized.
[1:20] And to reflect what has happened in their heart. And so as parents, to see our children commit themselves to the Lord.
[1:33] That is huge. That is what we pray for. That is what life is all about. And so we rejoice with you this morning.
[1:48] We're going to start the service. I'm going to do a message. And then we're going to have the sharing of their testimonies. And then we have some questions that we ask them.
[2:01] And then they'll change into gowns and then we'll do the baptisms. And after they come back, change in dry clothes again, we're going to open it up for some sharing.
[2:14] So prepare yourself to maybe come up and share as the Lord leads you. Baptism. Publicly identifying with Christ.
[2:30] It's, you know, baptism has been taught in many different ways. And sometimes rightly and sometimes not so rightly.
[2:44] But water baptism is not where any change happens in the people getting baptized.
[2:57] That has already happened. And water baptism is a commandment of the Lord Jesus to publicly identify and say, I have decided to follow Jesus.
[3:11] And there is a strength that comes with that. As we publicly state that. And so that is what it is.
[3:24] There is not a special power or the Holy Spirit that comes upon you. For He is already in you. And just so we have that clear. So this morning I want to look at the passage that was read for us in 1 Peter.
[3:41] You may find that a bit of a strange passage to use. But let's look at that as it does teach baptism. And I've titled the message, The Waters of Baptism.
[3:57] And I believe this passage is foundational to teach the truth on baptism. And so starting in verse 18.
[4:09] In 1 Peter 3. He says, For Christ also suffered once for sins, the just for the unjust, that He might bring us to God.
[4:24] Okay? This is baptism. Jesus suffered. Jesus suffered the just for the unjust. Him being just, us being unjust.
[4:42] He suffered that He might bring us to God. His sole purpose of going to the cross was to bring us to God.
[4:55] That was why He suffered as the innocent Lamb of God. Because of Jesus being put to death in the flesh, but being made alive by the Spirit.
[5:10] They nailed Jesus to the cross. My sins were part of that package.
[5:22] Your sins were part of that package. As Jesus was nailed to the cross. But then, God made Him alive.
[5:36] Brought Him to life. And His body, His physical body, was resurrected from the grave. And we praise the Lord for that.
[5:47] So it was by the Spirit of God that Jesus did not stay in the grave. And it's the very focal point of our faith.
[5:58] His eternal life. It's that God conquered death. He conquered death once and for all.
[6:08] And He put Satan in His place. By that, verse 19, by whom also He went and preached to the spirits in prison.
[6:24] Now that's a controversial statement. Understood in a number of different ways. But it raises some questions.
[6:35] So Jesus, by that same Spirit, went and preached to the spirits in prison. And then it defines those spirits. In verse 20.
[6:46] And He says, who formerly were disobedient, when once the divine longsuffering waited in the days of Noah while the ark was being prepared, in which a few, that is eight souls, were saved through water.
[7:05] So now we have a reference to Noah, the flood, and the ark. And so we're going to just walk through that.
[7:22] So these were spirits that were formerly disobedient. And the fact that Jesus went to preach to them in prison.
[7:33] Now there's kind of two views on this. And one is that Jesus, when He died, He went to hell, to Hades, and He preached to the lost.
[7:50] The second view is, and I believe the correct one, is that it is a reference to Jesus being with Noah when He was building the ark and preaching to the people.
[8:09] And a little bit of backup on that. Luke tells us, as He talked to the thief or to the murderer beside Him, He says, Most assuredly, I say to you, tonight, you will be with Me in paradise.
[8:26] paradise. So Jesus did not go to Hades. He went to paradise. And so, on that basis alone, I rule out the first interpretation.
[8:44] If Jesus had gone to preach to lost souls who had died without Christ, what would be the purpose? what would be the purpose?
[8:57] For there is no second chance after death. Once we die, our life on earth is done.
[9:09] Our destiny for eternity has been set. And there is no second chance. And so, we rule out that interpretation of it.
[9:24] But rather, we look at our passage and it says that these spirits in prison were formerly disobedient.
[9:38] So these people during the time of Noah. Now, Noah in Scripture is known as, in the New Testament, as a preacher of righteousness.
[9:54] And how long did the ark? 120 years? That's kind of the figure that's usually used.
[10:10] Most of 120 years at least where he was building the ark. and so, while he was building, God was speaking through the life of Noah to the people of the world at that time.
[10:29] And, and they refused to believe. Our passage in verse 20 says that of these spirits in prison who were formerly disobedient, it says when once the divine long-suffering awaited in the days of Noah.
[10:50] 120 years God's patience with the world endured. 120 years they were listening to Noah.
[11:04] They were asking perhaps questions, why are you building a boat? It has nothing here on earth. and, and to no avail.
[11:17] Noah and his sons and their wives, eight people were saved. And everyone else rejected the message of God.
[11:30] And, and, and hence they died without God, without the coming Messiah, and are now spirits in prison awaiting the resurrection.
[11:45] Awaiting the resurrection of the dead where they will face God and judgment. And so this is the message that we have here regarding baptism.
[12:00] And, and so Noah, a preacher of righteousness was an instrument of God. he was being used by God to warn these people. Has our world changed today?
[12:30] There are more than eight believers. Praise the Lord. Lord, we have a building full of them, full of you. There are many believers in the world today.
[12:44] According to statistics out there, there's more believers today than ever before. As, as the world is being evangelized, and yet, having said that, a very small minority very sad, but very true.
[13:08] And it is to many, the message of God, of repentance, is falling on deaf ears. Rejection, rejection, rejection.
[13:22] And so, we need to be faithful, as God's people, to continue to preach the word, to share the word, to lead people to God.
[13:35] To lead them to a point where they have a decision to make. And this is God's will. Going on in our passage, there's also an antitype now, which now saves us, baptism.
[13:55] not the removal of the filth of the flesh, but the answer of a good conscience towards God, through the resurrection of Jesus Christ.
[14:07] So, it's speaking here of an antitype, a type in the Old Testament that it's speaking for today, and he says that is baptism, and that saves us.
[14:22] And when you isolate this verse, then we look at this tank of water, and getting dipped in there will save you. But that is the danger of isolating Scripture.
[14:37] And we know from other Scriptures, it cannot mean this. And so now it's talking about that saves us. A few thoughts pointed out here, not the removal of the filth of the flesh.
[14:56] So when we bathe, what part of us gets washed? In the physical bathing.
[15:10] It is our body. We get cleansed. Right? Any one of you ever tried to wash your heart? to cleanse your heart?
[15:26] Yeah, we have tried by physical means to obey God and so on, but we fail, right? We cannot clean our heart.
[15:39] And Peter here is very adamant. He says, this baptism is not the removal of the filth of the flesh. flesh. The Old Testament law had many ceremonial cleanings.
[15:55] Washing. The priests had to wash in water before they served. Many aspects cleansing by water. And all it could do was clean them up on the outside so they didn't smell.
[16:12] But God had a purpose. it pointed to the need for purity. For cleanliness of the soul.
[16:27] And it all was designed to point to that. And it was fulfilled in the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. So all the ceremonial washings were that.
[16:41] And he says, the removal of the flesh is not sufficient. The physical washing. So we know that dipping in this tub will not help in cleaning us up.
[16:55] But rather, what is the answer? The answer of a good conscience toward God through the resurrection of Jesus Christ. You know, when our conscience is cleaned up, meaning freed, that there's no more guilt, the removal of guilt, there is only one way that can happen, and that means we have been forgiven.
[17:28] Till your sins are forgiven, there is guilt that remains. No exceptions.
[17:38] And I appreciated the song, Amazing Grace. It brought it out very well. The removal of sin, forgiveness, removes guilt.
[17:55] And when guilt is removed, what happens to your conscience? It is cleansed. We are free. free. And this is what Jesus came to do.
[18:09] And it says, through the resurrection of Jesus Christ, this happens. And so this is the true baptism, is the cleaning up of the conscience by the forgiveness of sins.
[18:28] as we look at Noah, the flood and the ark, what part did the water play in the flood?
[18:48] Death. The flood brought about death, not salvation. salvation. And in our text in verse 20, the last words there says, that is, eight souls were saved through water.
[19:07] Not by water, but through the flood. God saved them. And what did He use to save them? A boat. It's called the ark.
[19:21] ark. And so the ark represents Jesus Christ taking us through the waters of death.
[19:34] And as we trust in Jesus, we are saved from death. And so hence, as we look at the water in the tank, it does not save us.
[19:48] But it represents us going down, dying, being buried, and rising in newness of life.
[20:03] And we're going to look at a couple verses to that. And so just remember Noah was saved through the water, not by the water.
[20:16] Luke 12, I'm going to turn there, Luke 12 verse 50, Luke 12 verse 50, But I have a baptism to be baptized with, and how distressed I am till it is accomplished.
[20:34] What baptism is Jesus talking about here? His death. His coming impending death as He went to Jerusalem and where they would put Him on the cross.
[20:47] and He says, I have a baptism to be baptized with. A baptism unto death. And then turning to Romans 6.
[21:02] Romans 6. verses 3 and 4.
[21:15] I'll back up to get the context. Verse 1. Romans 6, verse 1. What shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound?
[21:26] Certainly not. How shall we who died to sin live any longer in it? Or do you not know that as many of us as were baptized into Christ Jesus, listen to these words, were baptized into His death?
[21:46] Therefore we were buried with Him through baptism into death, that just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so also we should walk in the newness of life.
[22:02] For if we have been united together in the likeness of His death, certainly we also shall be in the likeness of His resurrection. The baptism into death, and that is for us, that is the moment we surrender to Christ Christ, and come before Him in brokenness, and invite Him to take over our life.
[22:39] That is the baptism of death. To the old man that was under the control of Satan, the old man that all of us were born with, that had a sinful nature that kept on sinning.
[23:01] And as we surrendered through brokenness, we were buried, or we died with Christ, we were baptized to His death, we were buried, that old man is dead.
[23:18] that old man that was under bondage to sin has died. And as we then come up in newness of life, receiving the Holy Spirit, we now have the power, the ability to rise above sin for the first time.
[23:46] Our life as a believer is often a struggle, but always we have the ability to rise above.
[24:01] No longer am I a captive to Satan, a slave to him. And so buried to death, or baptized into death and burial and then raised in newness of life.
[24:18] And so that is why the water baptism portrays that very accurately, that what has happened inside of us as we surrendered, as we died to self, became broken before Christ, were buried, came up in newness of life.
[24:38] And so Jesus pictured that for us, and as we choose to follow Him, then we experience that as well. I'm going to close with this part of the service, just realizing that water baptism then is a public testimony to the world of God's life-changing power.
[25:08] And as we listen to the testimonies of these five individuals, focus on what God has done in their life.
[25:21] Testimonies are not about sinfulness, putting the emphasis on all that's behind us, the ugliness.
[25:32] We all have that. But it's upon, the focus is upon God, upon our Lord and Savior, who brought us out of that. So let us not give glory to sin, but rather to God as we listen to these testimonies.
[25:51] With that, we're going to, I'm going to close in prayer, and then we're going to go over to the testimonies. Let's bow. Father, as we celebrate baptism, we're going to take baptism, we're going to be taken back to the root of baptism, Lord, which is our spiritual death, recognizing that, and giving the dominion to Christ.
[26:27] And so, Lord, as we do water baptism, we know that it's only symbolic of what you've done spiritually, that you've brought life. As these five individuals share, Lord, may you give them boldness, strength, courage, to share clearly what you've done in their life.
[26:50] To your honor, and to your glory, we pray this in Jesus' name. Amen. To know the scriptures, to look into it, and learn a lot more about it, and I am so glad that all these have taken that step of faith, and you know that the angels will celebrate right now.
[27:21] It says there that they will, they celebrate every time when there's a sinner coming to Christ, and I'm so glad to see that. So, anyway, I encourage you to look forward and study the scriptures and go with that, and he will always encourage you.
[27:45] Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Okay, I think we're going to close our morning service as the clock of the afternoon.
[28:00] We're not going to have a closing song, but rather we'll have a receiving line, and that way we can spend a few moments in greeting and congratulating and so on.
[28:17] The benediction in Jude, the last two verses, now to him who is able to keep you from stumbling and to present you faultless before the presence of his glory with exceeding joy, to God, our Savior, who alone is wise, be glory and majesty, dominion and power, both now and forever.
[28:40] So, as we've known, to God be the glory. with that, I'm going to dismiss you guys to the back, and then parents and siblings and family can follow, and now Thank you.