Gateway Church Live | “The Baptism” by Pastor Josh Morris | March 21

all right what a cool story welcome welcome thanks for being here welcome to gateway church welcome this weekend guys that was phil wickham that was just up here a moment ago here's how cool i am i was running late today and uh uh i'm sorry to admit that but uh i got to the back room i was supposed to review the the scriptures that we're going to go over today with the team and i walked in there's a big group of people there and uh so uh phil wickham reached out his hands like hey my name is phil wickham and i was like oh yeah of course you are wow i didn't have any idea who's going to be here this weekend and uh i forgot in that moment that when someone introduces themselves it's customary to introduce yourself back and so there was just a long pause and he was like and what's your name bud i was like oh yeah my name is josh and i'm an idiot uh nice to meet you what a great time of worship that was so cool i love that all right let me remind you of a couple things the first is that pink impact is this week it's entirely online if you haven't registered please register for that ladies we'd love for you to join us for pink impact and also our easter services are coming up that's the first weekend in april and i'd like to make a request of you that if you're someone who regularly attends gateway if you would if you can make it work with your family and your friends and whoever you're attending with if you can make it work to come either on friday or saturday to those services lots of guests come on sunday and so we want to make room for as many of those guests to come as possible so that they can hear the gospel on that sunday so those easter services are coming up you can check the website for those times and then also as you just saw in the video water baptism is happening on the weekend after easter and you can sign up by following this link here and uh we're actually gonna talk about baptism this weekend so let me kind of remind you of where we are in the series we're talking about the story of moses uh and uh we start with an element of the story of moses and then use that to connect it to something that's taking place in the new testament and it all correlates with our walk with christ it all correlates with our journey with christ as we step into salvation so the first week we talked about the curse the curse that we're under the next week we talked about the salvation that was last week this week we're talking about water baptism and then next week we'll talk about baptism in the holy spirit and so this follows the path of uh of our our walk with god and our entry into salvation and so we'll get to in a moment uh how uh this story of moses teaches us these things about water baptism but let me remind you as well that what we're talking about is that the the movement of god through the israelites as moses would was leading them was an attempt to help man get back into the garden so we remember that in genesis 3 is the fall of man that is where adam and eve were living in the garden in perfect uh harmony with god they were living there in that in that garden and uh they they sinned but the sin was that they ate of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil and because of that we know that we are impacted by that every single day of our lives that our temptation is to step outside of the authority of god and instead to choose for ourselves what is right and wrong to choose for ourselves what we want to do and not do and that is our temptation that we continue to struggle with and god's uh movement towards us his perpetual movement of grace towards us is to pull us back into the garden so we want to remember that we we are to eat of the tree of life which is christ we are not to eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil so uh i give you a little example of a way that you could remember that every week uh and this week the example's a little bit strange um but i've got a question for you how many of you have ever eaten at the cheesecake factory and go ahead it's okay don't be ashamed raise your hand i see i see your hand sir i see your hand uh man i see that hand um this is this is a safe place you could just admit it okay you just say that um now if you've been there then you know uh that the menu to the cheesecake factory is the exact same length as the bible that's science that's just the fact okay it's the exact same length as the bible and uh and so i want you to imagine then that um all of us we could get in my car real quick we could run over to cheesecake factory we could sit down to have a meal and i want you to imagine i tell you i'm starving i'm just i'm i'm dying to eat i can't i'm i can't tell you how hungry i am and when the waiter or waitress comes along and says what would you like to eat today uh i would my response might be i actually have been spending a lot of time memorizing this very very long menu and so i'm good i i feel full i i memorized and studied your menu so i feel full this is the temptation that we often do if i could just learn more of the bible if i could just memorize more of scripture if i could just read it in a better way then that would make me full and the truth is that without the spirit without eating from the tree of the light of life this all can still become the knowledge of good and evil so of course we're supposed to memorize scripture of course we're supposed to read and study but what we remember in this is that without the leading and the guiding of the spirit we are continuing to eat of our own knowledge of good and evil the bible's been used in atrocious ways to to victimize human beings because of misreadings and misrepresentations of the bible what we need is to remember that christ is life and through that our eyes are open to the truth and the revelation of the bible and so our journey then our walk in christianity is our goal in mind is to return to the garden with christ to return back to that place of living in the garden living under his authority not our own so today we're going to talk about baptisms and what we're talking about is the water the water is the water of life and so uh as we talk about the water of life we remember that where there is no water there's no life that if you compare the desert to the rain forest the amount of life that can thrive in the rain forest is vastly different than what can survive in the desert and at the fall he tells the serpent you will eat dust all the days of your life not literally eating dust but but what it's saying is you are expelled you are in the garden you are in the dust where there is no life this is a reference to being in the desert to the man he said the ground will produce thorns and thistles for you we remember that in the desert the only plant forms that we often see are ones that are spiny and and and thorny and they they're difficult they are it's a hard land to live in it's a hard land to thrive in and so all of these are pointing us to the fact that life in the desert is really really difficult but if we can return ourselves to the garden it says in genesis 2 that there was no life on the earth until god caused springs of water to come forth from the earth he's the beginning of life he is that stream of living water that sprouts forth life adam and eve are then expelled from the garden and into the desert but god through abraham is going to start a new covenant people and jacob even meets his wife at the well at the water signifying that a new tribe a new group of israelites are going to be my covenant people and they are going to help my people return to the garden jacob's offspring make up the 12 tribes of israel and many years later when jesus meets the woman at the well which we've been talking a lot about in this series he meets her at one of jacob's wells and he's telling her there i am the water of life and to pass through the waters of baptism is to pass through his life and be cleansed by it and then to live through him on the cross we remember that when they took the spear and stabbed jesus with a spear outflowed blood and water that at the moment of his death he once again became the fountain of life for us and we are called to look to him on the cross the power and the saving grace of what he did on the cross to remember to to pull ourselves back into the water of life and hanging from a tree his blood represents the sanctifying nature that he pours out of his body and the water baptizes us into a new life jesus said let anyone who is thirsty come to me and drink and when the water of life flows through you you can begin to grow your own fruit of eden which is love joy peace peace patience kindness self-control all of these things are fruits of living in the water of life and experiencing the water of life that christ brings to us and so the very beginning of the world starts with a river a river of life that sprouts forth and this is found right in the beginning of genesis a river of life that we know that god is in that garden where the tree of life is which is god and not only does the world begin in that way that it also is how the bible starts right there in the beginning of genus there's water and the tree but because of the curse man loses access to those things and the water and the tree of life so how does the bible end let's go then to the very last book of the of of the bible it's in revelation chapter 22 this is the last book of the bible and the last chapter of the bible and it says then the angel showed me the river of the water of life as clear as crystal flowing from the throne of god and the lamb down the middle of the great streets of the city on each side of the river stood the tree of life bearing 12 crops of fruit yielding its fruit every month and the leaves of the tree are for the healing of the nations no longer will there be any curse for me that's pretty cool for me that's pretty cool that the bible starts with the tree and the water and ends in explaining to us that the curse will be over when we return to the tree of life and the flowing river of water and that as those things happen we return to the garden that the bible wraps up in that way that it reminds us of those things that after over 40 authors and thousands of years of people writing this that it culminates and pulls us back to the garden returns us to the tree of life and the fountain of christ that is amazing to me so the first thing that we need to understand about the water the waters of baptism the first thing that we need to realize about it is that the water brings death now that sounds weird because i've just been telling you for quite a while that the water is life-giving water um and so uh that sounds kind of weird but the water brings death as well so let's go now to the story of moses where we have been going through as we've been passing through this uh series and we start in exodus chapter 14 starting in verse 29. it says but the israelites went through the sea on dry ground with a wall of water on their right and on their left that day the lord saved israel from the hands of the egyptians and israel saw the egyptians lying dead on the shore and when the israelites saw the mighty hand of the lord displayed against the egyptians the people feared the lord and put their trust in him and in moses his servant it says it says that when they saw that the egyptians were lying dead on the shore that that is when they put their trust in god when you go through the water of baptism and you get to the other side and you emerge to the other side and you see the bodies of all the things that kept you in sin and bondage on the other side of those waters that is when you will say god is a mighty god that is when you will realize and point to the fact that only god can redeem us only god can save us from these things and when the israelites began to leave egypt believing that they had been released by the pharaoh we see that evil cannot resist but continue to chase us down evil cannot resist but to continue to try to ensnare us to trap us if if the israelites had just gone another way the egyptians never would have stopped pursuing them if on your own you just try to be more holy or righteous or do the right thing the enemy will never stop attacking you if on your own you remain on the run you will never be able to defeat the enemy yourself but god leads them through the water of baptism so that he can bring death to what it is that's keeping them in slavery and as they pass through the waters and they get to the other side they see the dead mangled drowned bodies all over the shore and they realize only god can save us it is only god that can redeem us that can save us that can win this battle for us and so those bodies the testament of what we overcome and defeat as we become saved and go through water baptism that is the testimony of how powerful god is not of how well we learn to follow the rules not of how well we learn to do the right thing not because we figured out by our own knowledge of good and evil how to do the right thing and avoid the wrong thing but by god's almighty hand he delivered us from those things that's the testament of the israelites as they walk through the waters of baptism we're not fast enough to get away and that's why god needed to make a way for us and so he parted the sea for the israelites and he parts the waters for you in baptism so that he can close them back on the old man and destroy the evil that chases you down the water of baptism we've been talking about the knowledge of good and evil the water of baptism distinguishes good and evil for you so you don't have to the water of baptism chooses what is right and wrong it allows what is good to emerge on the other side and drowns what is bad it's the ultimate redemption from our attempt to know good and evil on our own it is the water of baptism that separates those things for us it is the water of baptism that destroys everything that is evil and hurting us and keeping us in bondage and allows the good to pass through the waters of baptism they they undo this this curse of living under the knowledge of good and evil and paul addresses uh this this idea that that one once we are baptized and we accept the grace of god should we just go on sinning should we just return it's the same as the the the israelites if the israelites as they did often times desired to go back into their life of slavery it is to say i enjoyed the curse more than the difficulties i experienced under the grace paul's addressing that in in romans and we'll look at that in just a moment but he's saying if grace abound should we just keep returning to our old life of course not every time that we decide as a believer as a baptized believer every time that we decide that we want to go back to living on our own knowledge of good and evil every time that we decide that god doesn't know best and that we need to to take control of our own lives we need to to to retake power of our own lives every time we do that it's as if we put the egyptian on our back and carry him through the waters and say i want to keep this one it's as if we say god no longer do i want to serve you but i'd like to keep my old masters every time we willingly allow sin to remain in our lives when we know that it is wrong of course we will we won't be perfect after baptism we'll continue to sin but every time we carry around a new master it is to say that we want to put that egyptian on our back and carry him through the waters with us we ought to be changed beings after baptism the egyptian is dead in the water of the slavery that ensnared us before is dead in the water and we emerge as someone who now has the power of christ to lead us and to guide us into new levels of grace and so it says in romans chapter 6 starting in verse 1 what shall we say then shall we go on sinning so that grace may increase by no means we are those who have died to sin how can we live in it any longer or do you not know that all of us who were baptized into christ jesus were baptized into his death we were therefore buried with him through baptism into death in order that just as christ was raised from the dead to the glory of the father we too may live a new life now i'm skipping down to verse 11 it says in the same way count yourselves dead to sin but alive to god in christ jesus now this word here whenever he says count yourselves dead to christ but alive in jesus is actually a bookkeeping term it's actually a bookkeeping term that that that uh means tally it up literally count it up count up what took place so i want you to imagine for a moment that you are you you own a shop maybe here in town you own a shop and uh you sell uh goods and so uh you're there running your shop and it's the best day that you've ever had uh customers are in and out all day long you can't get away from the cash register because people just keep buying things and buying things and buying things and you know that it's a really good day you know that something really really good happened but but the extent of it you don't know now whether or not you know how much money you made that day or not that doesn't change how much money is in the cash register when you count it up you realize how much money you made but it was there for you all along when you count it up is when it becomes real to you but the funds were already there when paul says count yourselves dead to sin and alive to christ what he means is that every time that temptation arises in you you should go back to the cash register of grace you should count up exactly what god did for you and realize the gift that you got through salvation and remind yourself that you thrive under the authority of god count it up count it up this exercise is something we ought to do often we ought to realize we ought to remember just what shape we were in and that's what happens to the people the israelites who are walking through the wilderness with moses over and over as they say it would have been better for us to be back in slavery with the egyptians and they lack the ability to count up what god has done for them it's hard to imagine seeing god part the waters of a sea and wish to go back but we do it all the time we have to count it up the powers of god's grace are profound and powerful in our lives and and this tallies up the mighty work that god has done in us it is true all along your salvation is true from the moment you receive christ it is there it is in your account it is waiting for you but you must count it up baptism is the method and the symbol where we die to that old life and are resurrected to a new life it is the moment where the old man or woman is buried and a new man or woman is resurrected to a new life in christ and more particularly uh the the act of baptism which uh as far as paul was concerned here was the practical and physical beginning of the christian life it is not simply a metaphorical act when you go down into the waters the old man is left behind and the new man arises jesus even said in mark chapter 10 verse 38 jesus said can you drink the cup i drink or be baptized with the baptism i am baptized with that baptism is his death when you go into the water a place where there is no possible way to breathe it is as if you participate with christ in going into the grave and just as christ did you will emerge on the other side you will come out of the grave with a new life that is the power of baptism in baptism we die we go into the grave and we rise again just as christ did now the second thing we need to remember about baptism is that the water brings life the water brings life although it causes a death of the old man a new man arises and new things are going to take place because of the life that it gives in romans chapter 6 still we're just going to read a few of the the passages that i skipped over just a moment ago starting in verse 5 it says for if we have been uni united with him in a death like his we will certainly also be united with him in a resurrection like his for we know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body ruled by sin might be done away with that we should no longer be slaves to sin because anyone who has died has been set free from sin now if we died with christ we believe that we will also live with him for we know that since christ was raised from the dead he cannot die again death no longer has mastery over him the death he died he died to sin once for all but the life he lives he lives to god and this is the verse we read just a moment ago in the same way count yourselves dead to sin but alive to god in christ jesus i want you to imagine for a moment that you you live in a rent house and you've rented this house and you've done a long-term agreement with the landlord and uh and and it looks like a great place but once you get into the house uh the landlord uh he he just keeps showing up he just he's got a key to your house and he just walks in whenever he wants to and then he walks around he's like i don't like that you did that no don't do that i i i have to charge you a cleaning fee the dishes were still in the in the sink and you should do the dishes every time you eat and he just assesses fees constantly and as you review the contract you realize that there's no way to get out of it you you can't afford to buy out your contract with him and you can't afford to keep paying the the rent on that place and another place and and he's making your life miserable and he comes in and he's charging you all of this money and he's threatening you and he's pushing you around and bullying you and he's doing all of these things to you and you have just the worst landlord that you can imagine and then one day someone comes to you and says hey uh i got an idea for you i will pay all of the money that it takes to buy you out of your contract and i have a new place that you can live it's rent-free but all i ask is that you follow the very simple things that i ask of you but it's rent-free it's an amazing place it's better than your place it's bigger than your place everything about it is better and i want you to i want you to consider letting me buy you out and you're hesitant maybe at first you say well i've had a really bad experience and how much will i owe this person because this this my current landlord makes my life miserable and i i can't stand to live like this anymore and finally you just decide that that this life is so bad that you you need to accept this life with the new landlord and so finally you say that's fine buy me out so he goes through all the legal paperwork and he pays the entire price for you to be free from your old landlord he pays all of it and then he puts you in your new house and says here this this place is for you this this very special place this is just for you well that's that that would be awesome that's an amazing great thing that could happen to you but what if your old landlord kept walking into that house showing up and saying hey you still owe me money hey you you got to pay me more i just realized there was more damage to the house i just found this you got to keep paying me more you got to do this you i'm requiring you to do this i'm going to show up here every day i'm going to pester you i'm going to knock on your door until you pay me the the new price in realizing and reckoning with your baptism you now have the ability to say you have no legal authority over me all the price has been paid and i've been released from that contract i have a new landlord and if i have to i'll call the cops or the angels of heaven will come down and take care of you because i have a new landlord and he is great he paid all the price for everything that i've experienced we're afraid sometimes of of of living this life and not reckoning the baptism that we've been baptized into but we ought to remember that we have a brand new landlord one that is kind one that will not intrude in the same way that the last landlord did you are free from that landlord legally jesus paid the price so that you would never have to be under the thumb of the old landlord the price has been paid you are legally free of everything from the old landlord through baptism you emerge as a new person we remember the story of the prodigal son uh how he said i i want to get out i i want my inheritance early and i want to get out and so he left living under his father's provision he left sitting under the tree of authority the tree of life he left drinking from the river or the springs of life-giving water and he left to go pursue his own things and eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil it's the classic story of every single one of our own stories of salvation that while we were there in the garden just like adam and eve and we had everything provided for us we said you know what i think i'd rather make my own decisions and live on my own knowledge and so the prodigal son leaves the house and he goes and he lives and he soon discovers that that life is not very rewarding he soon discovers that he's living in the mud with pigs and and that life is not the way that it used to be that life is not what it was before and he realizes all of those things and he makes the decision that he wants to go back to his father's house and he goes back and we know the story that a party has thrown for him that he's received back into the house and the story ends there in the bible but let me ask you this what would it be like if he said you know what um i think uh i think i i remember that it was really cool that there was a party for me when i came back and now that i'm here i'm realizing that life is difficult it is sometimes difficult to stay under my father's authority instead of uh being able to make all of my decisions for myself and so maybe i'll just leave and if i want to i'll come back that's what paul's talking about should we just keep on doing what we want just because we have grace just because we were welcomed back into the house should we just keep living however we want he says of course not you've been changed you've been received back into the house and every time we stop living under that authority we are tempted to go back out on our own and and the the reality of it is you have already been welcomed back into your father's house there's no reason to go anywhere else there's no reason to do that when we make a marriage vow we make promises and those promises can be broken but they cannot be unmade when you receive christ as your savior you enter into a covenant with him you can try as hard as you may to break that covenant but the covenant he made with you cannot be unmade the power of christ through the waters of baptism pulls you in and of course you can try to shirk it off or shrug it off to get rid of your new responsibilities you can pretend that you don't after all have a new status but you what you cannot do is get unbaptized don't even think of trying to go back to egypt you are now on your way to the promised land look forward count up the gift that god has given you set your gaze on christ and christ alone all the other things will fall away but when we are baptized we set our face forward and we say we are on a journey to the promised land you know that the israelites wandered in the wilderness for 40 years i've heard estimates that say that the reality of how long that journey should have taken is around two and a half months set your eyes on the promised land you've been saved your salvation is there for you that is a work that has been done and cannot be undone and if you've never been baptized get baptized it is not a symbolic act it is the reality of the salvation that christ has offered us and then set your face forward and move to the promised land return to the garden of eden and eat of the fruit of the tree of life martin luther it is said when he was tempted would uh shout out baptizatus some and it means i have been baptized i hope that one day we we we can be in a store and maybe someone's thinking about spending money they shouldn't spend or we can be in a location and somebody's thinking about doing a sin that they should not do and you would just hear someone yell out i have been baptized remind yourself today i have been baptized and i no longer live the life of the old man i have been baptized would you bow your heads and close your eyes with me if you will for some of you maybe you are realizing today that maybe when you were a child maybe at some point in your life maybe you you felt the conviction during a message or at camp or something like that and you knew something needed to change and so you you prayed to receive christ but maybe you're realizing today that you never left your own authority and stepped back into the house of your father you can do that today today you can return to the garden to the tree of life you can eat of the fruit be baptized through the water of living water maybe you've been saved but you didn't get around to getting water baptized maybe you experienced it at a a different church and it was done in a different way or something like that and you say i'm not sure i've really been baptized it's just a few weeks away for others of you today maybe you're a believer and you've been baptized but you say i really need to count it up i keep trying to go back to living under my own authority i keep questioning god and his goodness i keep wondering because of the difficulties that i'm going through if he really has my best interest in mind you've been baptized count it up [Music] and so lord today we receive your grace all over again god we remember that you paid the ultimate price through giving your only begotten son who is tortured beaten crucified who died and rose again so you could pay the price and release us from our old landlord and we receive that powerful gift of grace today lord may we walk in your presence live under the authority of the tree of life and drink from the fountain of life we praise you today god we pray that lord you would give us strength and courage to keep moving forward stepping our way one step at a time to the promised land and god we know that the only reason we can do that is because of your powerful grace and we thank you for we pray all these things in the name of the father and the son the holy spirit amen amen amen wasn't that an encouraging and yet challenging message i know i'm going to remind myself to count it up this week as i go about my week fuel i invite you to stand with me if you'll join me in standing at the conclusion of every service we always make a priority to pray we want to minister in prayer after we release we have prayer tables per team up here if you would like to come up for one-on-one prayer but i'm going to pray for us all right now if you have a need a prayer need it may be a financial need a relational need an emotional need whatever needs you have if you just raise your hand so i can see you i would love to pray with you yeah we all have needs right so let's join together in prayer lord thank you that you know your people that you are god emmanuel you are with us even now that before we can even ask you know our needs and you love us and you are the provider and the healer that you mend broken hearts you mend relationships you provide finances you provide healings lord lord we thank you for the abundant life that we have through your son jesus christ father we love you and we receive your gifts today in jesus name amen if you'd like one-on-one prayer you can um come up to the front after we dismiss if you would like to text your prayers to 7 10 10 you can also do that that's another option that you have i just have a couple of announcements three announcements that's it first is pink impact our women's conference is this week i'm excited i know you're too right okay it's this week if you haven't registered make sure you register um it's thursday and friday if you cannot attend um it's all online but if you can't attend on thursday or friday you can watch it on demand after just go on to pinkinpak.com to register second thing is we're about to celebrate easter which i love celebrating our risen king it's awesome we have services on a friday saturday and sunday so just go online and check the times figure out what works best for your family we know we'll have lots of visitors so if you would consider coming on maybe the friday or saturday that would be a great option then that would be awesome and the third thing is we have water baptisms coming up which we heard about water baptisms today it's an amazing opportunity if you have not yet been baptized then please go to register at gatewaypeople.combaptisms and we can do that i'll say a prayer over us and then you'll be released lord thank you so much for your blessings thank you for your favor thank you for just who you are to us father we love you we love you we love you bless your name in jesus name amen you're released we'll see you next week [Music] you

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Published: Sun Mar 21 2021