Baptism VI: Baptism is Eschatological

Now that school is out for the summer and I have a little more time on my hands, I’m picking up where I left off several months ago in my discussion of the sacrament of Christian baptism.

In Titus 3 Paul tells of how God mercifully saved us “through the washing of regeneration and the renewal of the Holy Spirit, whom he poured out on us richly through Jesus Christ our Savior, so that being justified by his grace we might become heirs according to the hope of eternal life” (vv. 5-7).

What is this “washing of regeneration” through which God has saved us? That is, what is regeneration, and how is it a “washing”? In a word, regeneration or rebirth is the work of the “living water” of the Holy Spirit in uniting us to Jesus Christ. In union with him by faith, his Spirit not only cleanses from the stain of sin (as in our sinful nature, not just sinful deeds), but he also remakes us as God’s children for “newness of life” in Christ (cf. Rom. 6:3-4). Commenting on John 3:3-8, John Murray explains being "born of water and the Spirit” in this way, which certainly applies equally well to Titus 3:5:

Entrance into the kingdom of God could only be secured by purification from the defilement of sin. The water of purification is as it were the womb out of which must emerge the new life which gives entrance into and fits for membership in the kingdom of God. This is the purificatory aspect of regeneration. Regeneration must negate the past as well as reconstitute for the future. It must cleanse from sin as well as recreate in righteousness. (Redemption Accomplished and Applied, p. 98)

This sounds an awful lot like Noah and the flood, in which God also judged and renewed by water. He erased the old world in which sin abounded in all its ugliness and rebellion and simultaneously re-created the world, as it were, in hope and peace. Water both wiped out the old in judgment as well as birthed the new. Peter teaches this in saying that “the heavens existed long ago, and the earth was formed out of water and through water by the word of God, and . . . by means of these the world that then existed was deluged with water and perished” (2 Pet. 3:5-6).

But Peter also explicitly says that the Noahic flood was a shadow or type that finds its fulfillment in Christian baptism. “In which [the ark] a few, that is, eight persons, were saved through water. And baptism, which this prefigured, now saves you--not as a removal of dirt from the body but as an appeal to God for a good conscience, through the resurrection of Jesus Christ” (1 Pet. 3:20-21, NRSV).* Baptism is an even greater saving and recreating event than the Flood ever was!

So we see that baptism involves a watery “flood” that condemns unrighteousness and recreates in righteousness and hope. Even though God will again destroy the world, he will recreate it as “new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells” (2 Pet. 3:7, 13). Interestingly, Jesus speaks of this same event in Matthew 19:28 as “the regeneration” (Greek palingenesia, “rebirth”; ESV “the new world,” NIV “the renewal of all things”). The only other NT use of palingenesia is in Titus 3:5. Our spiritual rebirth is a foretaste of the great recreation of the coming age (cf. 2 Cor. 5:17; Gal. 6:15), the future reaching back into the present.

But if this regenerating salvation-flood that eradicates that old and forms the new finds its fulfillment in the waters of baptism, in what way can we link baptism with the “washing of regeneration” in Titus 3:5? Peter explicitly states that baptism does not have its efficacy in the outward washing itself (1 Pet. 3:21); the water works only by the word of God (2 Pet. 3:5). It is perhaps best, then, to understand it this way: Just as washing with water is seen and experienced visibly in baptism, so is the inner, spiritual cleansing promised in the gospel visibly offered to believe in. For all who by God’s grace repent and trust in Christ, they are not merely washed with water externally; they are also cleansed within. Thus we can call it a “washing of regeneration.” (See also Ezekiel 36:25-29a, where cleansing, rebirth, water, and the Holy Spirit are all linked in God's new covenant promises.)

God does not sport with us by unmeaning figures, but inwardly accomplishes by his power what he exhibits by the outward sign; and therefore, baptism is fitly and truly said to be “the washing of regeneration.” . . . It is therefore the Spirit who regenerates us, and makes us new creatures [not the water ritual itself]; but because his grace is invisible and hidden, a visible symbol of it is beheld in baptism. (John Calvin, Commentary on Titus)

Note also that this “washing of regeneration” is done by the Holy Spirit, who is “poured out on us richly” (Tit. 3:6). Where else do we read of the Spirit being “poured out”? Pentecost. When the apostles begin preaching of Christ in many languages, it is because God had fulfilled his promise to pour out his Spirit on all people—a promise to be fulfilled only in “the last days” (Acts 2:16-21, 33; cf. Joel 2:28-32). This outpouring sheds abroad God’s love in our hearts, marking us no longer as slaves but as his children, heirs in hope of our eternal inheritance.

Therefore we can say that baptism is eschatological. (Eschatology is the study of the “last things,” the future kingdom of God.) It’s not so important to think about the link between baptism and the future as it is to realize that the regeneration in Christ it signifies is both real and necessary for entering the kingdom. And it is a regeneration not somewhere off in the distance, but one that has happened to you if you believe in Jesus. You have a new hope and a new identity. A new power is at work within you, and sin no longer has mastery over you. The coming destruction of sin and rebirth in everlasting life and righteousness are offered and pledged in baptism to all who embrace Jesus as their Savior and Lord—and for those of us who do, we possess even now the beginnings of our great future hope.

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*I prefer the NRSV over the ESV here because it more clearly indicates that baptism is the antitype (Greek antitupon) of the Flood. A type is a pattern or foreshadowing that finds its deeper fulfillment in a future counterpart, its antitype. Think of the type as the mold into which a plaster sculpture is poured; it provides the shape but lacks the substance. The antitype is the plaster that fills the mold's form. This means that the events of the Flood were always meant to point toward their greater, eternally significant counterpart, baptism.