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Edward Fudge
ONE LORD, ONE FAITH, ONE BAPTISM (1)
A sister in California asks what Paul means in Ephesians 4:5, when he says that there is "one Lord, one faith, one baptism." This gracEmail concerns the "one Lord."
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The "one Lord" common to all Christians is Jesus Christ, God's Son, our substitute and Savior. Jesus' saving work included both his life of perfect human obedience in our place ("dressed in his righteousness alone, faultless to stand before the throne," as the hymn rightly puts it), and also his atoning death for our sins. We are saved by Jesus' life (Rom. 5:10). Jesus lived out God's will fully in his human body, then offered that body on the cross to make his people holy and perfect (Heb. 10:10, 14).
One way to describe Jesus' representative work for sinners is to speak of his faith or faithfulness to the Father -- a faithfulness we should have shown but have not, a faithfulness which is reckoned to all who place trust in Jesus for right standing with God. Paul literally says that we are "justified by the faith(fulness) OF Christ" and not by our own imperfect obedience to God's commandments (Gal. 2:16). We believe God's promise that he has set us right with himself through the faithfulness of Jesus Christ our representative.
By the sacrifice of his fleshly body, Jesus presented God with his perfect life of human obedience (Heb. 10:4-14). Jesus' blood constituted the atoning sacrifice for our sins (Heb. 1:3; 9:11-14). There is no other sacrifice for sin, and no other offering which can set sinners right with God (Heb. 10:26). All that Jesus accomplished for sinners by his perfect "doing" and his perfect "dying" he did gratuitously, out of God's kindness for sinners, and wholly undeserved by any of us. Our salvation is therefore "by grace" -- for we do not deserve it, earn it, or contribute anything to it.
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Edward Fudge
ONE LORD, ONE FAITH, ONE BAPTISM (2)
A sister in California asks what Paul means in Ephesians 4:5, when he says that there is "one Lord, one faith, one baptism." This gracEmail concerns the "one Lord."
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The "one faith" common to all Christians is saving trust -- dependence -- reliance -- on what God has done for us through the representative life, death and resurrection of the one Lord, Jesus Christ. The work which set us right with God -- Jesus' perfect "doing" and his perfect "dying" as our representative -- was all done outside of us, but for us. It happened before we ever heard of it (2 Cor. 5:18-21). That is what Jesus meant when he cried, "It is finished!" That is why we can sing the old hymn which says, "Believe, obey, THE WORK IS DONE!" Everything we do after we hear the good news is in response to what God has done for us already in the person of Jesus our representative. (When the New Testament speaks of Jesus as our "high priest" and as the second or last "Adam," it is emphasizing Jesus' representative role for his people).
Since the saving work was done outside of us, in the person of Jesus Christ, nothing we do adds anything to that saving work, contributes toward it, or makes it any more sufficient or effective than it already is. Because God's favor to sinners is undeserved, we cannot barter or bargain for it. We can only trust God's promise that he loves us and forgives us for Jesus' sake (2 Cor. 5:20--6:2; Rom. 4:16). Such faith/trust is the doorway into the room of divine grace (Rom. 5:2). Salvation is "by grace, through faith" (Eph. 2:8). It is "by faith, that it might be in accordance with grace, in order that the promise may be certain" (Rom. 4:16).
Our salvation does not rest on what we do but on what Jesus has done. We must trust what God has done for us in Jesus -- and we cannot rely on anything whatsoever other than that. God freely receives every person who trusts his promises concerning Jesus Christ. That is why Peter can promise, in Acts 10:43, that "whoever believes in him has remission of sins." That does not rule out our response of obedience and praise and service (Acts 10:48). It simply means we trust only in what Jesus did to save us and that we do not lean on anything we do as if it helps to set us right with God.
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Edward Fudge
ONE LORD, ONE FAITH, ONE BAPTISM (3)
A sister in California asks what Paul means in Ephesians 4:5, when he says that there is "one Lord, one faith, one baptism." This gracEmail concerns the "one Lord."
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The "one baptism" common to all Christians is baptism in the Holy Spirit, on the inside, which ordinarily is accompanied by gospel baptism in water, on the outside (1 Cor. 12:13; Heb. 10:22; Titus 3:5-6). Man baptizes with water but Jesus baptizes with the Spirit (Matt. 3:11; Acts 1:5). Jesus did not invent water baptism -- it was already a Jewish rite of repentance (Mark 1:4) and discipleship (John 4:1). But Jesus chose it as the tangible, external response to the gospel and commanded his apostles to administer it to new believers as part of the conversion process (Matt. 28:19; Mark 16:15-16).
There is a sort of "mirror" relationship between Jesus' own baptism in water and ours. When Jesus was baptized, he identified with us sinners, whose guilt he would shortly carry to the cross as the Lamb of God (John 1:31-36). When we are baptized, we identify with Jesus and the atonement he has accomplished for sinners (Rom. 6:3-5). The new convert who undergoes Christian baptism does so "through faith in the working of God" (Col. 2:12).
Because water baptism expresses faith in Christ's work, signified by his blood, the "remission of sins" which Jesus' shed blood accomplished (Matt. 26:28) and which God bestows on everyone who believes (Acts 10:43) is associated also with water baptism (Acts 2:38). If baptism did not express trust in Jesus' atonement, it would be worthless. But because it expresses trust in what Jesus accomplished, New Testament writers associate it with all the spiritual blessings Jesus has earned for his people, and which we trust him to bestow as a sheer act of grace.
For more on the meaning of water baptism, click here.
For a detailed study of baptism in the Holy Spirit, click here.