Clothed With Christ (3)
“For as many of you as have been baptized into Christ have put on Christ,” declares Galatians 3:27. Roman Catholicism, Eastern Orthodoxy, Lutheranism, high Anglicanism and other groups claim this text refers to the ritual or ceremony of baptism: Everyone baptized with water has personally and truly “put on Christ.” According to this view, Galatians 3:27 teaches the baptismal regeneration of all who receive the first sacrament: “For as many of you as have been baptized [with water] into Christ have put on Christ.”
The biblical doctrines of grace are radically opposed to baptismal regeneration. This soul-destroying dogma does not fit with the eternal, unconditional election of some in Christ and the sovereign reprobation of others in the way of their sins (Rom. 9:22-24; I Thess. 5:9). Dying only for His elect sheep and church (John 10:11, 15, 26; Eph. 5:25), the Lord Jesus gives His abundant life to them alone. The new birth is infallibly granted only to those whom the Holy Spirit desires to save (John 3:8). All those who are born again (I Pet. 1:3) are kept by the divine omnipotence (5) and so they assuredly receive their eternal inheritance (4). As Romans 8:30 declares, “Moreover whom he did predestinate, them he also called: and whom he called, them he also justified: and whom he justified, them he also glorified.” Contrary to Romish baptismal regeneration, those to whom the Saviour gives “eternal life” will “never perish” (John 10:28).
Over against the heresy of baptismal regeneration, the truth is that Galatians 3:27, like many other passages (e.g., Rom. 6:3-4; I Cor. 12:13; Eph. 4:5; Col. 2:12; I Pet. 3:21), refers to the spiritual, inner baptism of God’s elect and redeemed people (which is signified and sealed by water baptism). Let us marvel at this: The Holy Spirit has baptized us into Christ Himself! This is what water baptism points to and symbolizes.
Many Baptists appeal to Galatians 3:27 in order to make a different point from that made by the advocates of baptismal regeneration. These Baptists believe that baptism equals (total) immersion (followed by rapid emersion). They claim that this text provides support for the mode that they use in the ceremony of water baptism. Galatians 3:27’s reference to our putting on or being clothed with Christ, they say, is an allusion to someone being enveloped in a robe after he or she has been (totally) immersed (and then swiftly emersed) in the ritual of baptism.
According to the immersionist theory, Jesus is pictured in not just one but two ways in the ceremony of baptism! First, Christ is represented by the sinner, for his going under the water portrays Jesus’ burial (though His body was laid in a cave tomb and not put underground) and his coming up of the water the Redeemer’s resurrection (though He did not arise out of soil). Second, Christ is represented by the robe with which the baptized sinner is clothed.
But what is the element in the sacrament of baptism? It is not the baptized sinner, nor any garment that he or she may put on after the ceremony. The cleansing water is the sacramental element and sign! The water symbolizes and seals the washing away of our sins by the blood and Spirit of Jesus Christ (cf. Acts 22:16; Titus 3:5).
In many sports, like football or snooker or golf or tennis or rugby, it is a big mistake to take one’s eyes off the ball. In the sacraments, one’s spiritual focus is to be on the elements, whether water in baptism or bread and wine in the Lord’s Supper. The elements point to and signify Christ’s cleansing us by His blood and Spirit (baptism), and feeding us by His broken body and shed blood (Lord’s Supper).
There is an additional problem with the immersionist reading of Galatians 3:27. What is the function of the (postulated) robe? To get rid of the water (which pictures the washing away of sins) by drying it up! In other words, Christ the robe dries up His cleansing blood and Spirit!
So what is Galatians 3:27 teaching? As we said earlier, its subject is real baptism, not ritual baptism by water (though the latter symbolizes and seals the former). The doctrine of our text is neither baptismal regeneration nor the immersionist mode of baptism. It is union with Jesus Christ! By inner, spiritual baptism, we come under the blessed influence of our Saviour, so as to be changed and transformed by Him or, to use the language of Galatians 3:27, we are clothed with Him!
We are often spiritually timid and in need of encouragement. “I believe that I am saved by God’s grace and baptized into Jesus,” we think, “but am I really clothed with Him? Could someone as weak and foolish as I am actually have put on Christ as my imputed righteousness and infused holiness? Could it be true that I, all over and permanently, am enveloped by the Lord Jesus in His threefold office and adorned with His image, so that He alone covers my nakedness, protects my vulnerability and makes me beautiful in God’s sight?”
Galatians 3:27 states, “For as many of you as have been baptized into Christ have put on Christ.” Therefore, a person is either both “baptized into Christ” and clothed with Him or neither. This text proclaims that you, believer, are both: “For as many of you as [1] have been baptized into Christ [2] have put on Christ.” Rev. Stewart
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For more on the Bible’s teaching on the mode, meaning and subjects of baptism, read this excellent work, which is now on-line for the first time: “Sprinkling, Infant Baptism and the Bible” by Rev. Ron Hanko.
Why Baptize All the Infants of Believers?
Here is our question for this issue of the News: “Seeing that baptism is a sign and seal of the covenant and the covenant promise, if only the elect are in the covenant, if they only and only they are embraced in the promise of God, and the reprobate are not, why does God still will all the children of believers to be baptized?”
The reader of the News is correct that only the elect are in the covenant. Galatians 3:29 is clear: “if ye be Christ’s, then are ye Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise.” The seed of Abraham is a spiritual seed, defined not by physical descent from Abraham but by faith in Abraham’s God. All who believe are the spiritual children of Abraham (7) and the children of God (26). Only these spiritual children of Abraham are the heirs according to the promise. The promise is the covenant promise, I will be your God and you shall be my people (Lev. 26:12; Jer. 30:22). That promise was made to Abraham in Genesis 17:1-7 and through him to all his spiritual descendants. They are those who belong to Christ by election and by the blood of atonement. They alone are in the covenant and they alone are heirs according to the promise.
The reader who submitted this question is also correct that the promise of God, the promise of the covenant, is also only for the elect. Like the covenant itself, the promise is not made to all baptized children conditionally but only to the elect. It is not, as some have said, a cheque presented by God to all baptized children, a cheque which they must endorse before it becomes valid and payable to the bearer. Acts 2:39 teaches that the promise is only for the elect and not for all baptized children conditionally: “For the promise is unto you, and to your children, and to all that are afar off, even as many as the Lord our God shall call.” The promise is to those whom God calls, and they are always called irresistibly and effectually. They are the elect, therefore.
The heresy of the Federal Vision denies any connection between the covenant and election, and many Reformed theologians also hesitate to affirm such a connection. The Federal Vision teaches that baptized children may be elect but still go hell on account of their covenant unfaithfulness; they may be elect and end up out of the covenant. Others want a covenant that is in some sense with all baptized children, not just with those baptized children who are elect. Thus they teach a covenant that is conditional, that is, with all baptized children, but conditioned on their faith and obedience.
Romans 9:6 addresses this issue: “Not as though the word of God hath taken none effect. For they are not all Israel, which are of Israel.” The Word of God in the context includes the promises, and the Israel to whom the promises belong is defined not by physical descent from Abraham but by election. Only true Israel, elect Israel, has the promises. This is Paul’s conclusion: “What then? Israel hath not obtained that which he seeketh for; but the election hath obtained it, and the rest were blinded” (Rom. 11:7).
That raises the question: “Why does God still will all the children of believers to be baptized,” if “baptism is a sign and seal of the covenant and the covenant promise”?
The answer to this insightful question is that just as the gospel must be preached to the non-elect, so also must the sacraments, in the purpose and will of God, be administered to many non-elect. It is, of course, impossible to administer the sacraments only to the elect, just as it is impossible to preach the gospel and its call to the elect only. Only God perfectly knows those who are His own (II Tim. 2:19). Some try to limit the preaching of the gospel and/or the administration of baptism to the elect by requiring a profession of faith in Christ of all those who are baptized, but the latter does not guarantee that the sacrament is administered to the elect only.
It is the error of hyper-Calvinism to attempt to limit the preaching of the gospel and its call to the elect, and the error of credo-baptism to attempt to limit the sacrament of baptism to the elect only. Both are impossible. Not only that, but God has His sovereign purpose in willing children who are not elect to be baptized and it is the same purpose He has in sending the gospel call to many who are not elect.
The sacraments, we should remember, are a visible and tangible gospel which declare Christ crucified as the only way of salvation. When the gospel is preached, God wills that many hear who are not elect and who do not believe. He wants them to hear for their hardening and condemnation. Hardened in their unbelief and disobedience, they also serve God’s purpose, just as Pharaoh did (Rom. 9:17-18). By their disobedience, they bring Jehovah’s just wrath upon themselves and they are the means He sovereignly uses to chastise His people, to deliver them from the wicked world in which they live and to make them ready for eternal glory.
The same is true of baptism. Many who are baptized, instead of “improving their baptism” (Westminster Larger Catechism, A. 167), reject all that baptism signifies, are hardened in their faithlessness and unbelief, and bring the judgment of God upon themselves. This does not happen only for their destruction, however, since they are sovereignly used by God within the church for the final salvation of the elect. Their hatred of the gospel is often the beginning of persecution, an important, though distressing, part of God’s deliverance of His church. Introducing heresies and godless living into the church, they are used by God in the church to separate wheat from chaff, to waken His people out of spiritual indifference and sloth, and to occasion the development of the truth.
I Corinthians 11:19 says, “For there must be also heresies among you, that they which are approved may be made manifest among you.” So it is with the gospel and so it is with the sacraments. In God’s purpose to save His people and His church, He does all things in perfect wisdom to realize His purpose and to bring all things to their appointed end. Those who do not believe, even under the gospel and the sacraments, who fit the description of Jude 4, are part of that all-wise plan. They are the chaff without which the wheat cannot grow and ripen.
So let us not hesitate to apply the sacrament of baptism to all the children of believers, knowing that some who receive it are not among God’s elect people. Likewise, let us not baulk at preaching the gospel wherever and whenever God gives us opportunity, never hesitating because we preach to a “mixed” audience but trusting that it will be the power of God unto salvation to all whom He has chosen. Rev. Ron Hanko
