- Jun 29, 2019
- 747
- 197
- 62
- Country
- United States
- Gender
- Male
- Faith
- Christian
- Marital Status
- Married
In John 3:5, Jesus says to a Pharisee “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God.” There is more than a tenuous relationship between God and water; the relationship is both literal and, by derivation, figurative.
God used water to wash away the sinners in the Flood. You might say that the Flood cleansed the world of man’s evil at the time. This isn’t the only instance in which God saw that some cleansing was necessary. He destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah, and, but for the Ninevans who pleaded with Him for forgiveness, they would have met the same fate. As for the future, the Bible speaks of a future cleansing in which those who are good will be welcome into the Kingdom of God, and those who’ve been judged to be evil in character and by the nature and extent of their sins will eventually end up in the Lake of Fire.
God’s judgement of us is predicated in part upon the idea of water being a cleansing agent, as He has periodically cleansed whole groups of people. As John 3:5 implies, the water of God is a cleansing agent. In order to gain God’s acceptance, it is necessary to agree to be subject to the Water of God, which stands ready to cleanse if need be.
Baptism, then, is in part an initiation to gain God’s acceptance. Those who love God will accept being branded by His Water. It is no guarantee that being baptized alone will gain us acceptance into His Kingdom, since with all the devils running around on earth, the temptation to do evil waits for those who are not wary of evil’s existence around them. Therefore, in addition to being baptized we must work to avoid such evil. it is not that hard, if you consider that Psalms 139:14 says that we have been fearfully and wonderfully made by God. In that sense, we have been equipped to recognize the evil around us and to be drawn to those who are good.
The idea of water as a symbolic instrument of cleansing is not just particular to the New Testament. Ezekiel 36:25-27 says, “I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you shall be clean from all your uncleannesses, and from all your idols I will cleanse you. And I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes and be careful to obey my rules.” How may this apply to the New Testament? By our faith, it becomes a given that we would naturally abide by the rules associated with loving God and eachother, without actually knowing those statutes and rules.
God used water to wash away the sinners in the Flood. You might say that the Flood cleansed the world of man’s evil at the time. This isn’t the only instance in which God saw that some cleansing was necessary. He destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah, and, but for the Ninevans who pleaded with Him for forgiveness, they would have met the same fate. As for the future, the Bible speaks of a future cleansing in which those who are good will be welcome into the Kingdom of God, and those who’ve been judged to be evil in character and by the nature and extent of their sins will eventually end up in the Lake of Fire.
God’s judgement of us is predicated in part upon the idea of water being a cleansing agent, as He has periodically cleansed whole groups of people. As John 3:5 implies, the water of God is a cleansing agent. In order to gain God’s acceptance, it is necessary to agree to be subject to the Water of God, which stands ready to cleanse if need be.
Baptism, then, is in part an initiation to gain God’s acceptance. Those who love God will accept being branded by His Water. It is no guarantee that being baptized alone will gain us acceptance into His Kingdom, since with all the devils running around on earth, the temptation to do evil waits for those who are not wary of evil’s existence around them. Therefore, in addition to being baptized we must work to avoid such evil. it is not that hard, if you consider that Psalms 139:14 says that we have been fearfully and wonderfully made by God. In that sense, we have been equipped to recognize the evil around us and to be drawn to those who are good.
The idea of water as a symbolic instrument of cleansing is not just particular to the New Testament. Ezekiel 36:25-27 says, “I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you shall be clean from all your uncleannesses, and from all your idols I will cleanse you. And I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes and be careful to obey my rules.” How may this apply to the New Testament? By our faith, it becomes a given that we would naturally abide by the rules associated with loving God and eachother, without actually knowing those statutes and rules.
