⁸ Now if we have died with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with Him, ⁹ knowing that Christ, having been raised from the dead, is never to die again; death no longer is master over Him.

Coming to faith in Jesus Christ is like dying, but that is a good thing. The old self had to be put to death, that is, the old arrogance and conceit to think that one could gain godlikeness without any help from God. Our sin nature is the essence that animated Adam in the Garden to take the fruit of the tree in order to be “like God.” Oh, the foolishness of a God-image-bearer trying to be like God by rebelling against God. Adam (and we) wanted independent godlikeness, rather than created or given godliness. That old-man way of thinking needed to die. Could this be what God ultimately meant when He told Adam, “[I]n the day you eat of it you shall surely die” (Gen 2:27)? In the day he ate, the verdict was set. He instantly died spiritually (separated from God), relationally (separated from Eve through accusations and shame) and emotionally (separated from himself through shame). Yet there was another death verdict seeded at that time as well: the death of Christ, the perfect image bearer, the new Adam, the One in whom and through whom we identify in His death (and which baptism symbolizes).

To paraphrase Paul, now that we have that straight, let us go on to say, “We believe that we shall also live with Him.” The layers of metaphor and figures of speech are difficult to sort out from a literary analysis, but the meaning resonates with the believer. In the same way that we died with Christ, so now we live with Him. That old man is dead, so that the true image-bearingness, if I might term it, might rise and live, measuring up to the perfect image bearer. Just as the Law showed us our fallenness, Christ now show us true godliness—it resides in being united with Him!

Just as we identified with Him in His death through our baptism, so also we identified with Him in His resurrection through our baptism. That is why baptism is so important to our Christian life, as those who have come to be justified by grace through faith. Not that baptism saves; it does not. But it is the supreme acknowledgement that a person has embraced the profound transformation that has taken place in justification. It captures in the most picturesque way the immensely profound change that takes place when a person turns from self-exalting efforts to humble acceptance of God’s grace. Over such a person the death sentence on Adam’s family no longer has mastery! It is null and void.

Lord, a billion years would not be enough to praise You for rescuing me from the sentence of death and giving me a permanent, secure eternal life in Christ.