Wednesday

Related Verses
Acts 2:38
38 And Peter said to them, Repent and each one of you be baptized upon the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins, and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.

Acts 19:5
5 And when they heard this, they were baptized into the name of the Lord Jesus.

Acts 8:12, 36, 38
12 But when they believed Philip, who announced the gospel of the kingdom of God and of the name of Jesus Christ, they were baptized, both men and women.
36 And as they were going along the road, they came upon some water, and the eunuch said, Look, water. What prevents me from being baptized?
38 And he ordered the chariot to stand still, and they both went down into the water, Philip and the eunuch, and he baptized him.

Acts 10:44, 48
44 While Peter was still speaking these words, the Holy Spirit fell upon all those hearing the word.
48 And he charged them to be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ. Then they asked him to remain for some days.

Eph. 1:13
13 In whom you also, having heard the word of the truth, the gospel of your salvation, in Him also believing, you were sealed with the Holy Spirit of the promise,

Gal. 3:14
14 In order that the blessing of Abraham might come to the Gentiles in Christ Jesus, that we might receive the promise of the Spirit through faith.

Related Reading
Baptism brings the 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, that they may become the kingdom people. John the Baptist’s recommending ministry began with the preliminary baptism, a baptism by water only. Now, after the heavenly King 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. (Life-study of Matthew, 2nd ed., pp. 787-788)

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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…Both are needed. Not long after the Lord charged the disciples with [the] baptism [in Matthew 28:19], He baptized them and the entire church in the Holy Spirit (1 Cor. 12:13), the Jewish part on the day of Pentecost (Acts 1:5; 2:4) and the Gentile part in the house of Cornelius (11:15-17). Then, based on this, the disciples baptized the new converts (2:38) not only into water but also 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 in which the baptized ones’ old history is ended. Since the death of Christ is included in Christ, and since Christ is the very embodiment of the Triune God (Col. 2:9) and the Triune God eventually 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 here baptizes people out of their life into the Body life for the kingdom of the heavens.

The word into in Matthew 28:19 indicates union, as in Romans 6:3 and Galatians 3:27. The same Greek word is used in Acts 8:16; 19:5; and 1 Corinthians 1:13, 15. To baptize people into the name of the Triune God is to bring them into spiritual and mystical union with Him.

There is one name for the Divine Trinity. The name is the sum total of the Divine Being, equivalent to His person. To baptize someone into the name of the Triune God is to immerse him into all that the Triune God is. (Life-study of Matthew, 2nd ed., p. 788)

The all-inclusive Spirit of the processed Triune God in His New Testament economy, both essential for life and economical for power, [is] given to the believers at the time of their believing in Christ (Eph. 1:13; Gal. 3:2), as the all-inclusive blessing of God’s full gospel (Gal. 3:14) that they may enjoy all the riches of the Triune God (2 Cor. 13:14).

The apostles preached and ministered Christ, but when their hearers repented and believed in Him, they received this wonderful Spirit of the Triune God. This implies that this Spirit is just the resurrected and ascended Christ Himself. The receiving of the Spirit here is both essential and economical, in a general and all-inclusive sense, differing from the receiving of the Spirit in Acts 8:15-17 and 19:2-6, which is particularly the receiving of the Spirit in His falling upon the believers economically. (Acts 2:38, footnote 7)

Further Reading: The Conclusion of the New Testament, msg. 265