Our Baptism, Christ’s Death And Resurrection And Our Lives In Him

EOur Baptism, Christ’s Death And Resurrection And Our Lives In Him

Romans 6.1-7

I love how the LORD has us here in this passage, as we journey through the Bible, a week after we celebrated Jesus’ Resurrection. As we have journeyed through His Word for decades now He has been faithful to have us where we are in our journey. It is a testimony to the faithfulness of God. His Word speaks into our lives, our hearts and souls and minds.

The more I study the Word of God the more I see how connected it is, how it is a masterpiece. In these  verses events in Christ’s life and our journey come together and are related. The Bible is in harmony with living the Life of following Jesus. That is why when we read it, we find ourselves saying, “yes.” That is why it hated by those who are enemies of the cross of Christ.

II Corinthians 1.20 For all the promises of God in Him are Yes, and in Him Amen, to the glory of God through us.
Philippians 3.18 For, as I have often told you before and now tell you again even with tears, many live as enemies of the cross of Christ.

So this morning we look at the connections between Our Baptism, Christ’s Death And Resurrection And Our Lives In Him.


1. Our Baptism was an act of being totally identified with Him in His Death. v.3
Under the water, synonymous with Christ being buried.

We were immersed with the water. We were immersed into His death. The old life was drowned out. Water symbolized the grave.
v.2 we died to sin

Water also symbolizes cleansing.
I Corinthians 6.11 But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.

Now, when you are born again, that which is born of the flesh is flesh. If you are born again by the Spirit of God, the new life that you now have is spirit, soul, and body. So now the spirit is the dominant feature and the new life is spiritual life, the old life was a fleshly life. The new life is a spiritual life. A spirit in union with God's Spirit. So a spirit in union with God's Spirit, my thoughts, my consciousness now is upon God and the things of God and how I might please Him by walking in the spirit. These are the things that dominate my conscious state. God's love for me, God's grace for me, God's goodness for me, these things dominate my conscious state. No longer dominated by my fleshly desires or fleshly needs.

Ephesians 5.25 Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave Himself up for her26 to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the Word, 27 and to present her to Himself as a radiant church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless. 28 In this same way, husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. 29 After all, no one ever hated their own body, but they feed and care for their body, just as Christ does the church— 30 for we are members of His body. 31 “For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh.” 32 This is a profound mystery—but I am talking about Christ and the church.

We need to be in the Word of God regularly. We need it to change us. We need to hear it and read it and study it.
Christ washes us His Church through His Word.

His Word is an agent in our being born again.
Faith in it.
Living and Active.
Given by His Spirit
I Peter 1.22 Now that you have purified yourselves by obeying the truth so that you have sincere love for each other, love one another deeply, from the heart. 23 For you have been born again,not of perishable seed, but of imperishable, through the living and enduring word of God.

We all need to come to the place where God’s Word is supreme in our lives.
We need to grow in the knowledge of it
We need to hide it in our heart to keep from sinning.
Truly allowing the Word of God to dwell in us puts His Love in our hearts.
Colossians 3. 16 Let the word of Christ dwell among you richly as you teach and admonish one another with all wisdom through psalms, hymns, and songs from the Spirit, singing to God with gratitude in your hearts. 17 And whatever you do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through Him.


Proverbs 3.1 My son, do not forget my teaching,
    but keep my commands in your heart,
2
for they will prolong your life many years
    and bring you peace and prosperity.
3
Let love and faithfulness never leave you;
    bind them around your neck,
    write them on the tablet of your heart.
4
Then you will win favor and a good name
    in the sight of God and man.

We are in such a battle today. One of the battles we face is the Word of God being challenged as not being unique. Other religions are put on the same level as Christ’s teaching, there is a combining of teachings known as syncretism. This is relatively new. Someone I know very well named Confucios, Buddah, Mohammed and Jesus. I could not help myself. I said, “Only one of their graves are empty.” Then I grabbed the picture taken of the kids in Haiti in the school and said that it is the followers of Jesus who give to these kids so they have hope. In fact go anywhere in the world and you will find hospitals and schools and the Church of Jesus Christ, with all her faults and shortcomings giving freely, helping villages and whole nations.
The Word of God stands. Jesus is building His church.

This ancient rite that the church has practiced since its inception continues to be practiced today. Our Baptism is like His death.



2. Our Coming Out of The Water was like His Resurrection. v.4
Newness of life now!

As I come up out of the water, it's like being resurrected--like Jesus resurrected coming out of the grave. That new resurrected life of Christ.

Lazarus was raised from the dead... in Bethany.
Jesus was Resurrected in Jerusalem. Lazarus died again. He will rise again at the Resurrection.
Jesus is alive forever. He is the Resurrection and the Life. Death has been defeated by Him and in us!
As we come out of the water we are symbolizing Jesus’ Resurrection.

3. The Resurrection of Jesus is Ours in the Future as well as now. v.5-7

The same spirit that raised Jesus from the dead
Romans 8.11
And if the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead is living in you, he who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies because of his Spirit who lives in you.

He will come again.
The dead in Christ will rise first. Resurrection
Then we who are alive... Translation.

v.6 powerless= put out of business

As Christians our biggest problem is with our flesh. For our flesh is still seeking to make its demands on us. Our flesh will still bring us under its control and power. As a Christian there is a warfare that is going on in me, for the flesh is warring against my spirit and my spirit is warring against my flesh and these two are contrary to each other.
There is this battle going on for the control of my mind, the control of my life. My flesh still wants to sit on the throne of my life and the spirit wants to sit on the throne of my life and there is a battle waging raging, actually, over the control of my life itself, the flesh and the spirit. I don't always do the things that I would as we sang this morning. Then I shall be what I would be, and I shall be what I should be, things that are now nor could be soon shall be our own. The battle will be over one of these days and my spirit leaves this old body of flesh. I am still living in the body, that is my big problem. If I weren't living in this body any longer then I would have no problems. But I am still living in the body, and as long as I am living in this body it is going to struggle for supremacy, and thus, I must keep my body under. You remember Paul the apostle said, "I beat myself to keep my body under."
It is a struggle. It is a fight. My body wants control again. It wants to sit on the throne. I have to keep my body under. The way to do that is to reckon that old self to be dead. It is a reckoning process. "Lord, that is a part of the old life dominated by my flesh. I reckon that to be dead. That flare up, Lord, that belongs to the old life, that bitterness that belongs to the old life, that anger that belongs to the old life, that is dead." Thank God that it is dead. I don't have to live under that domination anymore. That was crucified with Christ and I am now living a new life in the resurrected Lord. So the old man was crucified with Him. But the body of sin might be put out of business, that I shouldn't serve sin any longer.


Resurrections happen in our lives as we serve Jesus.
Take Joseph... His life was over. He was sold as a slave by his brothers, lied to his father, then put in prison in another country.
Then God raised him up and out and placed him in a position of power to serve.


Baptism, Jesus’ Death and Resurrection and our lives in Him.