Swallowed up in baptism

3 min readApr 17, 2022

1 Peter 3:18–22,

18 For Christ also died for sins once for all, the just for the unjust, in order that He might bring us to God, having been put to death in the flesh, but made alive in the spirit;

19 in which also He went and made proclamation to the spirits now in prison,

20 who once were disobedient, when the patience of God kept waiting in the days of Noah, during the construction of the ark, in which a few, that is, eight persons, were brought safely through the water.

21 And corresponding to that, baptism now saves you — not the removal of dirt from the flesh, but an appeal to God for a good conscience — through the resurrection of Jesus Christ,

22 who is at the right hand of God, having gone into heaven, after angels and authorities and powers had been subjected to Him.

Romans 6:1–7,

1 What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin that grace might increase?

2 May it never be! How shall we who died to sin still live in it?

3 Or do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus have been baptized into His death?

4 Therefore we have been buried with Him through baptism into death, in order that as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life.

Baptism and the death and burial of Jesus correspond. The old man Adam was done away with, crucified and buried with Jesus, only to be raised up a new creation freed from sin, as the word says…

5 For if we have become united with Him in the likeness of His death, certainly we shall be also in the likeness of His resurrection,

6 knowing this, that our old self [that is, Adam] was crucified with Him, that our body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves to sin;

7 for he who has died is freed from sin.

He who has died is freed from sin because each Christian is a part of a new creation, the body of the risen Christ. This is made possible by the death and resurrection of Jesus, for we were both crucified and raised up with Him, and our new lives are now hidden with Him in God. We were given new life by the very same Spirit who raised Jesus from the dead.

Just as God brought forth the Israelites from Egypt with a powerful hand, even so He raised us up with Jesus by His divine power. And we, like Israel, can now say, “With a powerful hand the Lord brought us out of Egypt, from the house of slavery,” Exodus 13:14. By the mighty power of God Israel escaped the slavery of Egypt and we escaped the slavery to sin.

As the Egyptians pursued the Israelites while the Red Sea was still parted, so also does Satan pursue us while we are still living in our bodies of flesh. However, just as God released the waters to swallow up the Egyptians, even so He releases His power to swallow up Satan in his underhanded attempts to entrap us.

The enemy has most definitely been swallowed up in our baptism into Christ. Our old sinful self was crucified with Christ and buried with Him in baptism, after which we were raised up into newness of life, and became citizens of the heavenly Jerusalem, the city of the living God. The enemy can no longer harm us as we walk by the Spirit and set our minds on the things above, and not on the things of earth. We have, in fact, died and our lives are hidden with Christ in God. Christ is now our life.

To God be all glory and honor and reverent worship before time and now and forever. It is by His grace, His choice, and by His doing we are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom from God, and righteousness and sanctification, and redemption, that, just as it is written, “Let him who boasts, boast in the Lord.”

Jon David Banks, God’s most unworthy servant

Swallowed up in baptism

Written by Jon David Banks