A circumcision and a burial. Those are two very vivid images Apostle Paul uses in Colossians 2 to describe what happens when we trust in Jesus. He speaks of a spiritual “circumcision”—not a physical ritual, but the cutting away of our sinful nature through Christ’s work. That old part of us is cut away and dies.

And what do you do with dead things? You bury them. This death of our old self finds powerful expression in baptism.

When a new believer goes under the water, immersed completely under the water, it pictures a burial. We’re saying goodbye to the person we were—controlled by sin, separated from God, living for ourselves. It pictures the old you dying with Christ on the cross.

But baptism doesn’t end in the watery grave of baptism there under the water. No, just like Christ came bursting forth from that tomb alive, believers come up out of that water, rising to walk in new life with Christ. So, this isn’t just positional truth. It’s also a practical reality. God’s power that raised Jesus from the dead now works in us, giving us life, enabling us to live differently than we did before.

Apostle Paul reminds us that his transformation comes “through faith in the powerful working of God.” That means we can’t manufacture new life on our own. God does the work. Our part? Trust Him.

If you’ve been buried with Christ in baptism, live like you’ve been dead and raised! The same power in Jesus that conquered death lives in you. Let that reality shape how you face today.

Change begins in you!