 Hi, this is Pastor David Rosales of Calvary Chapel of the Chino Valley, California. Romans chapter 6 verse 4 reads, We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death in order that just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life. Many years ago, I remember standing with my father at the front of a small funeral chapel, together gazing into the casket at the body of my father's beloved mother. Sadly, my grandmother died on her 90th birthday, and she was buried on my father's birthday. As we stood together by her casket, my father quietly said to me, Do you see her hands? I looked down and could see her hands gently folded. They were gnarled, wounded by an arthritic condition she had suffered with for many years. As I looked at her hands, my father said, Those hands made a lot of tortillas. Then he went on to whisper, She used them on me a few times too. I smiled with my father as he lost in his quiet memories of his mother, silently gazed at her for a few moments, and then we turned and moved away. A few minutes later, my father and I were standing at her graveside as the minister spoke a few closing words, and then my grandmother's shell was finally planted in the earth. As the casket was lowered into the ground, my father remained quiet. But when the dirt was poured over the casket, he he let out a muffled sob and quickly turned and walked away. With the pouring of the dirt on the casket, my father realized with finality that his mother truly was dead. It took the pouring of dirt into her grave and upon her casket to awaken him to the reality of her death. There's something about the pouring of dirt into a grave and covering the casket that cries out. It's done. It's all over. They are really and completely dead. The one thing that comforted my father at the death of his mother was his belief that she had come to know Jesus as her savior before she died. Yet even with this knowledge, when the dirt covered her coffin, he knew he would not see her again, this side of heaven. And that knowledge struck something deep in his soul. She'd been buried. The dirt covered her coffin. She died. Christian baptism speaks of this in a powerful way. We are dead in sins and trespasses, and yet are made alive when we trust Jesus. As a dramatic picture with incredible spiritual ramifications, we journey to the watery grave and are silently and forever buried in the water. When the believer slips under the water, it is a beautiful picture of being dead and buried in Christ. The old life is forever gone. Our old nature is declared to be completely dead. We have attended our own funeral. When we break the surface and come out of the water, we are identified as being resurrected in him and are declared to be more fully alive than we have ever been. We are raised in him. The water that we are immersed in is a picture of our grave. When we go down and are covered by the water, it's a picture of the finality of death, like the dirt poured on my grandmother's coffin. Yet it also becomes a symbol of our life, our new life in Jesus. When we break the surface and come out of the water, we are now shown to be alive, more alive than we have ever been before. We are alive in Jesus and now possess a brand new life, a life of faith in him. It is a life that is lived in love, faith and obedience to the one who has granted us life. It is a life that is set apart, revealing that we truly are new creations in Jesus Christ. The oldest pass away, behold, all things have become new. It is a life that understands that grace was not given to us to encourage us to continue in sin, but that grace has been granted to us that we might be freed from its bondage. The old man is dead and the new man is alive because of Jesus Christ. Because of this, we do not desire the old way of life. We begin to understand what Paul meant when he wrote, I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live but Christ lives in me, the life which I now live in the flesh. I live by faith in the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me. We live as new people made new because of Jesus and our new life in him. This did not come through any good works on our part, but completely through his loving grace that was given to us and our receiving of his gift of life by faith. We were lost in sin, living in darkness, but Jesus, who was the light of the world, enlightened our darkness. If you are saved and have not yet identified with Jesus and water baptism, I encourage you to be baptized and to declare openly to the world that you are his disciple. Today, I encourage you to live the new life that was granted to you gracefully through the Lord Jesus Christ. And remember, we are in him truly alive. This is David Rosales, pastor of Calvary Chapel of the Chino Valley, California.