The Family Of God

 It is very important to get a biblical understanding of the word 'baptism' as recorded in the Bible. Some baptisms are wet, such as John's 'baptism of repentance'. Other baptisms are dry, such as the baptism of the Spirit when we are placed into Christ's mystic Body by the Holy Spirit, at salvation.
 Because we are saved by grace through faith, we are identified with JESUS and so we receive the benefit of identification with Jesus. Having been convicted by the Holy Spirit of sin, righteousness, judgement, and recognizing our need of salvation in Christ, we are placed into His Body. We are positioned in Christ by the Spirit. We are placed in union with Christ by the Spirit, we are baptized, by the Spirit, into the Body of Christ, by faith. The moment that inner, heart-conviction takes place, we are born-again, born from above, born into The Family Of God, baptized into Christ - and identified with Him and His righteousness.
 In this verse, Paul is describing the process of our justification in the eyes of God. Christ died for our sin, and at the point of our salvation we became identified with Him We became fully identified with Christ, we died in Christ. Although we still live in a body of sin, we are nonetheless identified with Christ's death, burial, and Resurrection, and all that it stands for.
 Whether talking about our spiritual baptism into the Body of Christ by faith, or our water baptism as the outward sign of our trust in Christ's finished work as Savior, we can say, with all other members of the Body of Christ.
Colossians 2:12 Buried with him in baptism, wherein also ye are risen with him through the faith of the operation of God, who hath raised him from the dead.

Our United Prayer:
Heavenly Father, how we praise and thank You for Your wonderful plan of redemption. How amazing to think that Christ identified with us and our sin so that we could be identified with Him and His righteousness. Thank You that by faith we have been crucified with Christ, buried with Him, and raised into newness of life. Thank You that we have been taken out of the old creation in Adam and identified with the new creation in Christ. How we praise You that the same Spirit that raised Christ from the dead is now working in us  so that the power of sin and death is broken in our lives. Thank You, in Jesus' name, AMEN.