The Joy of New Habits

Life-change is an ongoing process. It is easy to look for a one-off experience that acts like a silver bullet, and there is one. It’s called putting your faith in Jesus for the first time and being counted as crucified and raised with him. Baptism in water is the physical outworking of that commitment, so it’s fair to say that water baptism is the silver bullet. It is for us what crossing the Red Sea was for the Israelites (1 Corinthians 10:1-2). It brings us total freedom from our former slave-masters ... and yet the Israelites still had a desert to cross in order to reach the Promised Land. That’s where we are as believers, right now. We have crossed the Red Sea through our baptism, but we haven’t yet been glorified on Christ’s return. We need to take hold of our freedom in Christ every day until it becomes a way of life to us.