He Went Under the Water at Fifteen and Thinks He Broke It

He can tell you the month and roughly what the water felt like and who was standing on the bank.

He was fifteen. He meant it in the way a fifteen year old means things, which is completely and without any information about what the next fifteen years are going to contain.

And what he has carried since is a specific idea that nobody taught him and nobody would defend if he said it out loud.

The idea is that he signed something that afternoon. That he made a set of undertakings in front of witnesses, and that he has since failed to keep them, comprehensively, over about fifteen years, and that the failure is on the record because there were people watching.

He does not think about it often. It comes up when somebody mentions it, or at a wedding, or when he sees a photo. And when it comes up, the thought is always the same, and the thought is that he is in default.

Paul says what the water was picturing

There is a sentence in Romans where Paul explains what that event is a picture of, and the picture is not a signing.

Therefore we are buried with him by baptism into death: that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life. (Romans 6:4, King James Version)

Buried with him.

That is a funeral, not a contract. And in a funeral, the person in the middle of it is not making undertakings. They are being carried.

And the raising, in that same sentence, is credited to the glory of the Father. It is not something the person in the water performs.

Both halves of the picture belong to somebody else.

You were being buried rather than signing something. Romans 6 names it as a burial and credits the raising to the Father, and it is the Holy Spirit who makes an old picture correct fifteen years of a private idea.

Colossians says where the faith was pointed

There is a parallel sentence in Colossians that says the same thing and adds the direction.

Buried with him in baptism, wherein also ye are risen with him through the faith of the operation of God, who hath raised him from the dead. (Colossians 2:12)

Through the faith of the operation of God.

The faith in that sentence is faith in something God does. It is not confidence in one's own future conduct, which is what a fifteen year old on a bank usually thinks he is expressing.

So even the believing part of it was pointed away from himself, and the thing it was pointed at is described in the same verse: God raising somebody from the dead.

You were never putting confidence in your own future conduct. Colossians 2 names what the faith was in, and it is His Spirit who makes a direction of trust matter more than a level of it.

The seal is a person, and He is the one who holds

There is a sentence in Ephesians that uses a legal word and then names what the seal is.

In whom also after that ye believed, ye were sealed with that holy Spirit of promise, Which is the earnest of our inheritance until the redemption of the purchased possession. (Ephesians 1:13-14)

Ye were sealed with that holy Spirit of promise.

A seal in that world was what made a document binding and showed whose it was. It was not applied by the item being sealed.

And the seal here is not wax and it is not a signature. It is named as a Person, and the same verse calls Him the earnest, which is the word for a deposit that guarantees the rest of a payment.

You were sealed rather than being the one who signed. Ephesians 1 names the seal as the Spirit of promise, and it is that same Spirit who is called the earnest on the whole arrangement.

And Galatians describes what got put on

There is a short sentence in Galatians with a clothing image in it.

For as many of you as have been baptized into Christ have put on Christ. (Galatians 3:27)

Have put on Christ.

That is a garment word. It is about what is now covering somebody rather than what they promised while wearing it.

A man measuring fifteen years against a contract is measuring the wrong thing. The sentence is not about his conduct in the coat. It is about the coat.

You have something on you rather than something you undertook. Galatians 3 uses a garment word and not a legal one, and it is the Holy Spirit who makes a small change of image do fifteen years of work.

Titus says which side did the washing

There is a sentence in Titus that names the mechanism and rules out the alternative in the same breath.

Not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy he saved us, by the washing of regeneration, and renewing of the Holy Ghost. (Titus 3:5)

The washing of regeneration.

And in front of it, the ruling out: not by works of righteousness which we have done.

So the washing is described, and then the thing a man might think he was contributing is named and excluded, and the renewing is credited by name.

You are not in default on something you were never a party to. Titus 3 names the washing and rules out the works in one sentence, and it is the Holy Ghost, named in that same verse, who is credited with the renewing.