A Bible History of BaptismBaird, Samuel J. (Samuel John)
Religion
A Bible History of Baptism
Baird, Samuel J. (Samuel John)
Baptism -- Biblical teaching
Sin is, in its very existence, an insult to the holiness and sovereignty
of God. Its unclean and evil aspect is a disgust and abomination in his
sight, and a pollution and deformity on the fair face of his creation.
In its first beginning by Satan, it was an immediate assault upon the
very throne in heaven. Its introduction into the world was a Satanic
device to mock God’s proclaimed purpose of favor to man, and to insult
His love by rendering its object unworthy of His regard, and loathsome
to His holiness. At the creation of man, God had said, “Let us make man
in our image, after our likeness, and let them have dominion over the
fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle and
over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the
earth.”—Gen. i, 26. In the eighth Psalm, this decree is anew rehearsed.
(Psa. viii, 4-8.) Again, in the epistle to the Hebrews, Paul transcribes
it from the Psalmist, and expounds it. “For unto the angels hath he not
put in subjection the world to come whereof we speak. But one,” that is,
the Psalmist, “in a certain place testified, saying, What is man, that
thou art mindful of him, or the Son of man that thou visitest him? Thou
madest him a little lower than the angels; thou crownedst him with glory
and honor, and didst set him over the works of thy hands; thou hast put
all things in subjection under his feet.”—Heb. ii, 5-8. From this
language of the Psalmist, Paul proceeds to argue the extent of the
dominion thus given to man. He insists, (1) that the decree is
unlimited. “In that he put _all_ in subjection under him, he left
nothing that is not put under him;” (2) that man does not now have such
dominion. “_Now_, we see _not yet_ all things put under him;” (3) that
the decree is already fulfilled in the throne which Christ now fills.
“But we see Jesus crowned with glory and honor;” (4) that to that same
glory the Father is now “bringing many sons,” the brethren of Christ and
co-heirs with him of the kingdom. Vs. 10.
In another place, Paul completes the view, in this direction. “For he
must reign, till he hath put all enemies under his feet. The last enemy
that shall be destroyed is death. For he hath put all things under his
feet. But when he saith, All things are put under him, it is manifest
that He is excepted which did put all things under him.”—1 Cor. xv,
25-27. It is a legal and common sense rule of interpretation, as to
deeds of grant or conveyance, that an exception on one point proves the
intention of the grant to be otherwise unlimited. So it is here. The
apostle, in excepting God the Father from the grant of dominion to the
Son of man, leaves all else in the universe under his subjection. It
thus appears that, in the decree of man’s creation, a dominion was
assigned him which in the purpose of God comprehended all the power
which Jesus, the Son of man, now exercises, over the whole creation of
God.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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