Peter also instructed the Spirit-moved ones to be baptized upon the name of Jesus Christ. To baptize people is to immerse them, to bury them in water, signifying death. The command that a repentant one be baptized indicates that such a one is good only for burial. Baptism, therefore, signifies the termination of the old person so that a new beginning may be realized in resurrection by Christ as the Life-giver. Baptism in the Bible implies death and resurrection. To be baptized into the water is to be put into death and buried. To be raised up from the water means to be resurrected from death.
In Matthew 28:19 the resurrected Christ charged the disciples to go and disciple all the nations, baptizing them into the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. The purpose of baptism is to bring repentant people out of their old state into a new one by terminating their old life and germinating them with the new life of Christ. After the Lord Jesus accomplished His ministry on earth, passed through the process of death and resurrection, and became the life-giving Spirit, He charged His disciples to baptize the discipled people into the Triune God. This baptism has two aspects: the visible aspect by water and the invisible aspect by the Holy Spirit (Acts 2:38-41; 10:44-48). The visible aspect is the expression, the testimony, of the invisible aspect, whereas the invisible aspect is the reality of the visible aspect. Without the invisible aspect by the Spirit, the visible aspect by water is vain; and without the visible aspect by water, the invisible aspect by the Spirit is abstract and impractical. Therefore, both are needed.
Not long after the Lord Jesus charged the disciples to carry out this baptism, He baptized them and the entire church in the Holy Spirit (1 Cor. 12:13) on the day of Pentecost (Acts 1:5; 2:4) and in the house of Cornelius (11:15-17). Then, based on this, the disciples baptized the new converts, not only visibly into water but also invisibly into the death of Christ (Rom. 6:3-4), into Christ Himself (Gal. 3:27), into the Triune God (Matt. 28:19), and into the Body of Christ (1 Cor. 12:13). The water, signifying the death of Christ with His burial, may be considered a tomb to terminate the history of the baptized ones. Because the death of Christ is included in Christ and because Christ is the embodiment of the Triune God, who is one with the Body of Christ, to baptize new believers into the death of Christ, into Christ Himself, into the Triune God, and into the Body of Christ is to do just one thing: on the negative side, to terminate their old life, and on the positive side to germinate them with new life, the eternal life of the Triune God, for the Body of Christ. Hence, the baptism ordained by the Lord Jesus is to baptize people out of their life into the Body life.
In Mark 16:16 the Lord Jesus said to His disciples, “He who believes and is baptized shall be saved.” To believe is to receive the Lord (John 1:12) not only for forgiveness of sins (Acts 10:43) but also for regeneration (1 Pet. 1:21, 23), so that those who believe may become the children of God (John 1:12-13) and the members of Christ (Eph. 5:30) in an organic union with the Triune God (Matt. 28:19). To be baptized is to affirm this by being buried to terminate the old creation through the death of Christ and by being raised up to be the new creation of God through Christ’s resurrection. Such a baptism is much more advanced than the baptism of repentance by John (Mark 1:4; Acts 19:3-5). To believe and to be so baptized are two parts of one complete step for receiving the full salvation of God. To be baptized without believing is merely an empty ritual; to believe without being baptized is to be saved only inwardly without an outward affirmation of the inward salvation. These two should go together. Moreover, water baptism should be accompanied by Spirit baptism, even as the children of Israel were baptized in the sea (water) and in the cloud (Spirit—1 Cor. 10:2; 12:13).
In Acts 2:38 Peter speaks of being baptized “upon the name of Jesus Christ.” The name denotes the person. Here Peter tells the people to be baptized upon the Lord’s name.
The New Testament uses three different prepositions to describe the relationship of baptism to the Lord. The first of these prepositions is en, in (Acts 10:48). To be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ is to be baptized in the sphere of the name of Jesus Christ, within which is the reality of the baptism. The second preposition is eis, into (Matt. 28:19; Acts 8:16; 19:5; Rom. 6:3; Gal. 3:27). To be baptized into the name of the Father, of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, or into the name of Jesus Christ, is to be baptized into a spiritual union with the all-inclusive Christ, who is the embodiment of the Triune God. To be baptized into the name of the Lord Jesus is to be baptized into the Person of the Lord, to be identified with the crucified, resurrected, and ascended Christ, to be put into an organic union with the living Lord. The third preposition used to describe the relationship of baptism to the Lord is epi, upon or on, used in Acts 2:38. To be baptized upon the name of Jesus Christ is to be baptized upon the ground of what the name of Jesus Christ stands for. It stands for all that the Person of Jesus Christ is and all that He has accomplished, both of which constitute the belief (the faith) of God’s New Testament economy. It is on this ground that the believers in Christ are baptized.