Metaphor is of constant use in the language of Scripture, and no more dangerous and deadly error exists than that of attributing to the sign what belongs only to the thing signified. It’s effect is at once to construct a counterfeit Christianity. No book approaches the Bible for the frequency and richness of figurative language and of figurative acts. The amount of truth, enfolded in awn but perceptible to the eye of faith, commands our highest admiration. One of the most common, as it is one of the most beautiful, figures in the Bible is that of water, in allusion either to its cleansing, or to its refreshing and vivifying effects. The Gospel of John abounds in the most remarkable instances of the use of this figure,—chapters 3. and 13. in allusion to its cleansing property; chapters 4. and 7. to its refreshing or vivifying qualities. In chap. 15: 3 the Lord says, “Now ye are clean, through the word which I have spoken unto you,” —the effect produced upon the conscience, the heart, the mind, the walk, by the word of God in the power of the Holy Spirit. So in Eph. 5:25, 26, “as Christ also loved the church, and gave Himself for it, that He might sanctify and cleanse it, with the washing of water by the word.” In John 13:10, the Lord says, “He that is washed (bathed) needeth not save to wash his feet, but is clean every whit"; i.e., there is the one grand washing of regeneration which can never be repeated, but there is the need of constant washing of the feet, prone as we are to contract defilement in our daily walk,—defilement which would hinder communion unless removed. And so, in the type, we find the priests washed all over, at their consecration, but afterward needing only to wash the hands and feet at the laver before approaching to serve God. Thus also water as well as blood came from the side of a dead Christ,—water to cleanse, and blood to expiate.
As regards expiation, we are washed from our sins in the blood of Christ; as regards the new or morally clean nature, we are washed as it were by the water. Neither of these can ever be repeated,—they occur once for all, and forever;—but thanks be to God, there is provision also for the daily cleansing from daily defilement: “He that is, washed (all over) needeth not save to wash his feet.” John 3:5 has no reference to baptism, for Christian baptism was not yet instituted, and therefore our Lord would not have blamed Nicodemus for being ignorant of it. “Born of water and of the Spirit,” —purification and renewal, alludes to the moral cleansing and new life, of which every one has been the subject who ever was saved, from Adam downwards. The same things,—water or purifying, and the Spirit, or a new life,—are spoken of in Ezek. 36:25-28, and it was this that Nicodemus should have known. From other passages in the Old Testament also, he should have been familiar with the figurative use of the term water; for instance, the Red Heifer, or water of separation amongst the types; and Isa. 1:16-18, “Wash you, make you clean though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow, though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool.” Here again we have the water to cleanse and the blood to expiate. Again, as to the refreshing effect of. God's word, “For I will pour water upon him that is thirsty, and floods upon the dry ground “; “He every one that thirsteth come ye to the waters,” &c. If we compare with this John 7:38, 39, we see the meaning clearly, “He that believeth on me, as the Scripture hath said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water, (but this spake He of the Spirit, which they that believe on Him should receive,” &c.) The truth is, that John 3 and baptism allude to the same thing (figurative language and a correspondingly figurative act); and similarly John 6 and the Lord's Supper allude to the same thing. But John 3 does not allude to baptism, nor John 6 to the Lord's Supper, the Lord's Supper not being yet instituted or known to the disciples. Moreover, all who partake of the Lord's Supper have not eternal life, whilst all who in the sense of this chapter eat the flesh of Christ have eternal life.
The term “regeneration,” (regeneratio, ava7jvvrio-ts.), according to this its etymological signification means being born again. In this sense also the term is used by theological writers. But such is not the Scripture sense of the term. The word translated “regeneration” is in Scripture not civaryvviiats, but 7raXtryryeveata, which name means being “born again.” It occurs twice only in the New Testament, viz., in Matt. 19:28, and Titus 3:5, and means a renewed or reconciled state of things—in fact, the Millennium, (compare 1 Cor. 4:8; 6:2; Rev. 20:4; with Matt. 19:28). In their raised and glorified bodies the saints are destined to reign, during the Millennium, over (we do not say on) the earth. This is the period of the regeneration. The words used in Scripture for “born again” are ryeyvtioi livivOcv, John 3:3; and ItvayevvZtio, 1 Peter 1:23. Philo uses the term ra-tnevecria for the renewal of the earth after the deluge,—the latter being, as it were, the washing of regeneration. Doubtless in order to have part in the raXonevecia spoken of by our Lord, a person must be born again, as we learn from John 3:3. Still a new birth is not the scriptural meaning of the word, and the baptismal service of the Church of England is grossly in error in confounding regeneration and the new birth, and still more so in attributing the latter to the ordinance of baptism.
Baptism, like regeneration, imparts, not a change of inward state by the communication of life, but a change of status or position. In Titus 3:5, 6, we read, “Not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to His mercy He saved us by the washing of regeneration, and renewing of the Holy Ghost; which He shed on us abundantly through Jesus Christ our Savior.” We have here three very distinct statements: 1st, He has saved us; 2nd, “by the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Ghost, (i.e., as in John 3, “born of water, and of the Spirit"), moral cleansing or, purification, and a new life or nature; 3rd, “which He shed on us abundantly, through Jesus Christ our Savior.” Here we have more than the life-giving agency of the Holy Spirit,—we have the special Christian privilege, the Spirit of adoption, whereby we are enabled to address God as Abba, Father!—the gift of the Spirit with all the fullness of spiritual blessing connected with His abiding presence in and with us. The order in Acts 2:38, is, “Repent, and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins,” and then, as a subsequent thing, “Ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost.” Compare Gal. 4:6; Eph. 1:13. For a special reason in Acts 10:44 the gift of the Spirit preceded baptism, but this was an exception, both cases proving the distinctness in time and in fact, between baptism and the gift of the Spirit.
Again, in 1 Peter 3:21, “the like antitype whereunto baptism doth also now save us, not the putting away of the filth of the flesh,” &c., i.e., not; literally, but symbolically. As the waters of judgment were death to those not in the ark, (and the ark represents Christ, not the Church, or at least Christ's redemption), so death is judgment to those who are without Christ's salvation, but is the process of salvation to those who believe in Him; for “we are buried with Him by baptism, wherein also we are raised with Him,” Col. 2:12. The death of Christ is the meritorious cause of our salvation,—our death with Him and resurrection in Him is the process whereby we are saved; and to us death, instead of being a destroyer, is the cleanser, as well as the passage into a new scene. Of this, baptism is the symbol or representation of a known truth, and hence may be called an antitype (r%,....1,717U7r Of) to that (the deluge), which, though now seen to have a similar meaning, was destitute of that significance till the gospel was preached and Christian baptism was instituted. No such puerile notion is meant, as that the water of baptism was an antitype of the water of the deluge,—this would be to make water typical of itself, a manifest absurdity. The truth figuratively presented to our minds by baptism is the antitype to the waters, or judgment, of the deluge.