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. (Col 2:12)
Commenting on Paul’s teaching of baptismal regeneration and the importance of Christ’s resurrection for our salvation in this verse, J.B. Lightfoot (1828-1889) wrote:
Baptism is the grave of the old man and the birth of the new. As he sinks beneath the baptismal waters, the believer buries there all his corrupt affections and past sins; as he emerges, thence, he rises regenerate, quickened to new hopes and a new life. That it is, because it is not only the crowning act of his own faith but also the seal of Gods adoption and the earnest of God’s Spirit. Thus baptism is an image of his participation both in the death and in the resurrection of Christ . . . δια την πιστεως κ.τ.λ.] ‘through your faith in the operation,’ ενεργειας being the objective genitive. So St Chrysostom, πιστεως ολον εστιν’ επιστευσατε οτι δυναται ο θεος εγειραι, και ουτως ηγερθητε. Only by a belief in the resurrection are the benefits of the resurrection obtained, because only so are its moral effects produced. Hence St Paul prays that he may ‘know the power of Christ’s resurrection’ (Phil. iii. 10). Hence too he makes this the cardinal article in the Christian’s creed, ‘if thou . . . believest in thy heart that God raised Him from the dead, thou shalt be saved’ (Rom. x.9). (J.B. Lightfoot, Saint Paul’s Epistles to the Colossians and to Philemon [6th ed.; London: Macmillian and Co., 1882], 184, 185)
