“By ... With ... Into”

   The language of baptism found in the Bible is simple and clear.  People were baptized by John the Baptist with water, and later, people were baptized by Jesus with the Spirit:

Matthew 3
11.  I indeed baptize you with water at repentance, but after me, one mightier than I is coming, whose    sandals I am not worthy to remove.  He will baptize you with holy spirit.

Mark 1

8.  I indeed baptize you with water, but he will baptize you with holy spirit.

Luke 3
16.  John answered and said to them all, I baptize you with water, but one mightier than I is coming, the strap of whose sandals I am not worthy to loosen.  He will baptize you with holy spirit and fire!

   Jesus said the same thing:

Acts 1

5.  John indeed baptized with water, but you will be baptized with holy spirit not many days from now.

   And so did Peter:

Acts 11

16.  Then I remembered the saying of the Lord, how he used to say, John indeed baptized with water, but you will be baptized with holy spirit.

   The water that John baptized with and the Spirit that Jesus baptizes with are substances; they are both things.  John used the thing God commanded him to baptize with, and Jesus uses the thing God commanded him to baptize with.

   Finally, whenever people are baptized, they are baptized by someone with something into something.  Paul said that the thing we are baptized into by Jesus is the body of Christ on earth:

1Corinthians 12

13.  For by one spirit were we all baptized into one body . . . 

   It is obvious from the scriptures, then, that a person is not in the body of Christ unless he has been baptized by Jesus with the Spirit into that body.  In other words, the new birth is the baptism of the Spirit that the resurrected Jesus ministers to those who repent and believe the gospel.  And it is that baptism that gives us the hope of eternal life (1Pet. 3:21).