Baptism is not a work by which we merit salvation. It is a work of God in us, by Water and the Holy Spirit, and manifests our salvation in a very tangible way. It is a participation in salvation, in the death, burial and resurrection of Jesus Christ.
Do you not know that as many as were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? Therefore we have been buried with him through baptism into death, in order that just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we too may live a new life. For if we have become united with him in the likeness of his death, we will certainly also be united in the likeness of his resurrection. (Romans 6:3-5)
God really does something in baptism. We are really and truly baptized into the death of Christ. By baptism, we are really and truly buried with Christ. We are born again through the resurrection of Christ (1 Peter 1:3), and in baptism, we are really and truly united with Christ in his resurrection to walk in newness of life.
Baptism is symbol, but it is not empty symbol. A true symbol is a joining together; it is from the Greek symbolos, a compound of syn, together, and ballein, to cast or throw. Baptism truly casts us together with the death, burial and resurrection of Christ.
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