Hey bling.
It's important to note that the word baptism simply means to place into, or immerse. I think a mistake that many people make today is that they assume water into the definition of the word baptize. I baptize my French fries with catchup, but catchup is not any more part of the definition of the word baptize than water is. Many times the context will explain what that agent is, or who the baptizer is, like
Matthew 3:11. Jesus is the baptizer, and the Holy Spirit is the Agent of that baptism.
Do you believe John the Baptist was baptizing people with water?
John 1:26
Do you believe Jesus was baptized with water?
Jesus' disciples were baptizing lots of people before Pentecost, but Jesus did not baptize anyone.
John 4:1 Now Jesus learned that the Pharisees had heard that he was gaining and baptizing more disciples than John— 2 although in fact it was not Jesus who baptized, but his disciples.
Acts 8:36 As they traveled along the road, they came to some water and the eunuch said, “Look, here is water. What can stand in the way of my being
baptized?” 38 And he gave orders to stop the chariot. Then both Philip and the eunuch went down into the water and Philip baptized him. 39 When they came up out of the water, the Spirit of the Lord suddenly took Philip away, and the eunuch did not see him again, but went on his way rejoicing.
Peter in
1 Peter 3:21 made it a point to contrast the "type" water baptism, with the "antitype", or real thing, that being Spirit baptism. The agent of the baptism that saves is the Holy Spirit, rather than water, which is, as you noted, just a symbolic public display of an inward reality that has already taken place. Some people at this point will claim that the water baptism initiates the Spirit baptism, but that's not true either. It's a baptism by faith, as Paul noted over and over in Galatians 3.
I specifically in my post: Water baptism is not a “requirement” for salvation, since God does the saving, but is something Christians get to do to help them and others.
1 Peter 3:...In it only a few people, eight in all, were saved through water, 21 and this water symbolizes baptism that now saves you also—not the removal of dirt from the body but the pledge of a clear conscience toward God. It saves you by the resurrection of Jesus Christ,
The water (and Peter is talking about real water here) is not to cleanse (wash the body), but the water (coming up out of the water) represents Christ resurrection.
R.C. Sproul believes that water baptism replaced circumcision. It sounds right but I don't really know. The types only point to the spiritual truths. unfortunately, when a person is not seeing the spiritual truths, for whatever reason, they sometimes try to apply the power to the types, and not the truths that those types point to. False teachers do this all the time, knowing that many people who cannot see will fall for these things.
Circumcision was not done away with (replaced) on Pentecost water baptism. Paul never said Jews should not be circumcised and/or baptism replace circumcision. I think we can agree John's water baptism stopped, so did Christian water baptism replace John's baptism?
Again water baptism does not save you, but does it help you?