**Overcoming Bad Habits and Addictions — Part 10 **
Once you are born again, it is especially important that you are baptized. Baptism is a necessary next step in your new life of freedom from old habits and cravings.
“And Peter answered them, Repent (change your views and purpose to accept the will of God in your inner selves instead of rejecting it) and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of and release from your sins; and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.”—Acts 2:38 (AMPC)
Just before Jesus left this Earth after His resurrection, He commissioned His disciples, saying, “Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit” (Matthew 28:19 NKJV). “He who has believed [in Me] and has been baptized will be saved [from the penalty of God’s wrath and judgment]; but he who has not believed will be condemned.” (Mark 16:16 AMP).
Baptism is much more than a symbolic gesture. Baptism is a powerful spiritual act in which you join Jesus Christ in His death.
“Or have you forgotten that when we were joined with Christ Jesus in baptism, we joined him in his death? For we died and were buried with Christ by baptism. And just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glorious power of the Father, now we also may live new lives.”—Romans 6:3-4 (NLT)
When Jesus died, He took on all of the sins of humanity, including all of your bad habits and addictions. He did this in order to pay the price for all of your sins.
“Christ didn’t have any sin. But God made him become sin for us. So we can be made right with God because of what Christ has done for us.”—2 Corinthians 5:21 (NIRV)
After Jesus death, He was buried in a tomb and rose from the dead three days later to a new life. When He rose again, He was completely free of all of the sins that He had carried in His death. Those sins were no longer a part of Him. His life after resurrection was completely free of all of those sins.
When you are baptized, you actually enter into this experience.
“This is because all of you who were baptized into Christ have put on Christ. You have put him on as if he were your clothes.”—Galatians 3:27 (NIRV)
When you were born again, you received new life in God. You became a new person. The person that you used to be, with all of its bad habits, sins, and addictions, died along with all of its cravings and its influence on you. You actually entered into Jesus’ experience, and your old self was crucified with Him.
“Since we have been united with him in his death, we will also be raised to life as he was.*** We know that our old sinful selves were crucified with Christ so that sin might lose its power in our lives. We are no longer slaves to sin. For when we died with Christ we were set free from the power of sin. ***And since we died with Christ, we know we will also live with him. We are sure of this because Christ was raised from the dead, and he will never die again. Death no longer has any power over him. When he died, he died once to break the power of sin. But now that he lives, he lives for the glory of God. So you also should consider yourselves to be dead to the power of sin and alive to God through Christ Jesus.”—Romans 6:5-11 (NLT)
When you are baptized, you bury that old dead self once and for all. When you come up out of the water, the old, dead self does not come with you. It is buried there, never to return. You rise up out of that water and into a new life as a child of God. Nothing of the old, addicted self remains.
“For you were buried with Christ when you were baptized. And with him you were raised to new life because you trusted the mighty power of God, who raised Christ from the dead.”—Colossians 2:12 (NLT)
When you go under the water in baptism, you actually bury your old self with its habits and cravings. When you rise up out of the water, you leave your old self behind. It is buried forever. It is no longer part of you, and it can never come back to influence you. When you rise up out of that water, you are rising up into your new life in Jesus Christ, completely free of your old self. Your old habits, addictions, and cravings are buried with your old self forever. The new life that you rise up into is completely free.
Your baptism is actually a burial service. When you go under the water, your old self is buried, and when you come up out of the water, you enter into a resurrection and into a new life, just as Jesus did.
Passing Through the Flood Waters
In Noah’s time, the whole Earth was “baptized” in the waters of a worldwide flood. Those people whose nature it was to sin and indulge in bad habits and wrong behaviors were buried in the flood waters. They were never seen again after the water consumed them. Noah and his family were raised up by the same waters which had buried those whose nature it was to sin, and those same waters carried Noah’s family into a new life of blessings and a new covenant with God.
This is a picture of what baptism does for you. When you are baptized, your old self that was a slave to sin and bad habits is buried, once and for all, never to be seen again. When you rise up out of the water of baptism, you leave behind that old self, and you step into a new life that is completely free of that old self with all of its cravings and addictions. After burying your old self in baptism, you are resurrected with Jesus into a completely new life of freedom.
“Christ suffered for our sins once for all time. He never sinned, but he died for sinners to bring you safely home to God. He suffered physical death, but he was raised to life in the Spirit.
“So he went and preached to the spirits in prison—those who disobeyed God long ago when God waited patiently while Noah was building his boat. Only eight people were saved from drowning in that terrible flood.*** And that water is a picture of baptism, which now saves you, not by removing dirt from your body, but as a response to God from a clean conscience. It is effective because of the resurrection of Jesus Christ.***”—1 Peter 3:18-21 (NLT)
Passing Through the Red Sea
To secure freedom from their Egyptian slave drivers, the children of Israel had to experience the Feast of Passover. During this feast, each family was saved though the sacrifice of a lamb (Exodus 12:1-30). The blood of the lamb saved them and resulted in them being freed from slavery to those who had controlled their lives for so long. This was a picture of them being born again to new lives of freedom from slavery to sin, bad habits, and their cravings.
Paul speaks of the children of Israel being baptized when they went through the Red Sea with Moses after leaving Egypt.
“They were all baptized as followers of Moses in the cloud and in the sea.”—1 Corinthians 10:2 (ICB)
After the Israelites went through their baptism in the Red Sea, they rose up out of it into new lives of freedom to pursue all the promises that God had for them. At the same time, the old enemies that had caused them to suffer in their former lives of slavery were buried in the Red Sea (Exodus 14:15-31).
“The water flowed back and covered the chariots and horsemen—the entire army of Pharaoh that had followed the Israelites into the sea. Not one of them survived.”—Exodus 14:28 (NIV)
They left their old lives behind, never to be bothered by those old slave masters again. The ones who had controlled their lives in slavery were powerless to try to pursue them through the waters of baptism. All of their old influence over the Israelites was buried in those waters forever.
“Moses told the people, … the Egyptians you have seen today you shall never see again.”—Exodus 14:13 (AMPC)
This is a picture of what happens to you when you are baptized. Your old self that was a slave to your old habits, addictions, and cravings is buried, once and for all in the waters of baptism. It can never influence you again. It is buried and gone from your life forever. When you rise up out of the water at your baptism, there is no trace of that old self left with you. You rise up into a new life, completely free of your old self and anything that made you its slave back then.
“So now, what are you waiting for? Get up, be baptized, and have your sins washed away as you call on his name.”—Acts 22:16 (ISV)
Believe This Truth
Take time to let this truth sink into your thoughts and become part of you. In order to experience the full benefits of baptism, the truth of what happened to you in baptism must become real to you.
Take time to focus your thoughts on the truth in these words until it becomes your experience and you truly live the truth contained in these words. It may help to memorize the Bible passages that are quoted in this article and repeat them to yourself, especially Romans chapter 6, meditating on them throughout your days and nights until they become part of you.
Be careful not to look back. Only look at your new life in Jesus Christ. Do not allow thoughts of your old habits and addictions. Focus on your freedom now, not on your addictions of the past. You give more power to whatever your focus on, so focus on the truth of your freedom in Christ Jesus. As you believe it, it will become real for you, and you will live it daily!
