This is the first of what we hope to be many “Mailbag Monday” questions we answer here at Grafton Baptist Church. We ask that if you have any questions about specific Bible passages, theology questions, or questions about how to view current events from a Christian worldview, please submit them via email or the box we have in the lobby of the church. Our first question that we are going to answer is the following: “Please explain “baptism for the remission of sins—according to the creed.” 


Great question! Before we answer, I want to give a little background to the Nicene Creed, which this question is about. This creed was formed in full after the council at Constantinople in 381 AD. The creed sought to define what it meant to worship one God in three persons, what we call the Trinity, and to combat false teachings (heresy) that crept into the church. One of those heresies is known as Arianism, which stated that Jesus was the first created being God made, but He Himself was not God. The Nicene Creed, along with many other creeds and confessions, have stood the test of time to help understand Scripture and give us guard rails for our understanding of God and His Word. 


Now, to answer the question at hand this comes from the third paragraph of the creed dealing with the person of the Holy Spirit. The sentence states “I acknowledge one baptism for the remission of sins; and I look for the resurrection of the dead, and the life of the world to come. Amen.” The word “remission” simply, according to the Cambridge English Dictionary, is “the fact of being forgiven for breaking religious laws or rules.” “Forgiveness” is a synonym for “remission.”

Now, we understand that the act of baptism does not save us, however, it is necessary for the Christian to be baptized to be in obedience to the command of Jesus (Matthew 28:18-20). To help us answer this question, I believe Romans 6:3-5 can shed light for us on what this phrase means in the Nicene Creed. Romans 6:3-5 says,"

Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life. For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we shall certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his.

When we are baptized, it is an outward sign of the inward reality that we have been crucified with Jesus and are raised to newness of life. The death we identify with, is the death of Jesus who paid for sin. The resurrection we identify with is the resurrection of Jesus that defeated sin and death and is a foreshadow of the resurrection that is going to come at the end of the age. This fits within the context of the creed, since the resurrection is what we await in the following part of the sentence after the phrase in question. So, when the Holy Spirit gives life to the believer, He creates a new creation in Christ (John 3:3; 2 Corinthians 5:17). This is the moment we call “regeneration,” or when the Spirit gives life to a Christian, so that they are granted spiritual life from spiritual death. At this time, when a believer puts their faith in Jesus, their sins are washed away by the work of Jesus that is applied by the Holy Spirit. 


When the Creed says, “baptism for the remission of sins”, it is just affirming what we already affirm as Bible-believing Christians: We are washed clean of our sin when we believe in Jesus. The Holy Spirit is applying the finished work of Jesus on the cross, which was the eternal plan of the Father. 


Thank you for your wonderful question! I hope that this helps you to understand the Nicene Creed better and the wonderful truth it communicates. Again, feel free to submit questions through email or in the box in the church lobby. We will keep your identity anonymous, but we want to answer your questions.