In I John 5:6-8 we read, This is He that came by water and blood, even Jesus Christ; not by water only, but by water and blood. And it is the Spirit that beareth witness, because the Spirit is truth. For there are three that bear record in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost: and these three are one. And there are three that bear witness in earth, the Spirit, and the water, and the blood: and these three agree in one.” Most commentaries apply the reference in verse six ‘water and blood’ to John 19:34, where the piercing of the side of our Lord took place. Some say it is a statement of symbolism. I believe it has reference to His baptism, which was His public inauguration into His public ministry. Now if this is so, and I believe it is, baptism has a lot more to do with the believer’s public testimony than what is generally considered. John sets forth a double ‘three-fold’ witness here, the one in heaven, the other in earth. The first is the witness of the Godhead, the Father, because in divine order He is first, it was the Father that gave audible approval from heaven at the baptism of His Son Jesus. The next in the divine order is the Son, here referred to as “the Word,” by which John speaks of Him in chapter one of his account of the Gospel. The third is the Holy Ghost, not because His is less, but because He (in sequence) took His place as the Servant of Jehovah in the economy of redemption once Christ accomplished His service by satisfying the Father’s Holy justice as a sacrifice on the cross. The three-fold witness on earth is said to be the ‘Spirit,’ not the Holy Spirit, nor the spirit of man as some insist, but ‘the Spirit of the Gospel.’ Second the ‘water’, which is the ordinance of baptism. The ordinance of baptism stands as a public testimony to Christ. If a person has experienced the ‘Spirit’ of the Gospel, that person, because of the validity of the testimony, must follow up the experience through the ordinance of baptism. I believe this is consistent with the three-fold witness in earth when we apply the ‘blood’ to the ordinance of the Lord’s Supper. I will say quickly that a person’s baptism does not regenerate that person; salvation cannot be traced to a person’s baptism. I say with sorrow that I have baptized some, according to apostolic precedent, who have gone back into the world and wander into the foulest sin and their baptism has scarcely been so much as a restraint to them, because they have not believed in the Lord Jesus Christ. Facts all show that whatever good there may be in baptism (and it is right according to scripture), it certainly does not make one a member of Christ, a child of God, and an inheritor of the Kingdom of Heaven. I must conclude that baptism is baptism, and in no way is infant sprinkling’ to be considered baptism. ~~Terry Worthan, (1938-2022)
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