Mark 16:16

He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved is a simple straightforward message that every creature can understand. Only hardened hearts rendered insensitive by theological concepts can be blind or deaf to this command. A lesson from the hardness of the Jews against Jesus because of “Jewish theology” should be a warning to modern man not to allow theological systems to harden them against truth. Many today “see” but do not perceive and “hear” but do not understand what is said in this verse.

The apostles were to preach that those who “believe” and are “baptized” will be saved, meaning clearly that both faith and baptism are essential to salvation in Christ. Only the parsing of words and twisting of meanings can escape this simple fact. Few have problems with the idea that “believers” shall be saved, but to many of the same folks baptism is not essential.

R. C. H. Lenski, a Lutheran commentator, captures the thought of the commission message: “Faith and baptism are combined here as the means of obtaining salvation. For one thing, faith and baptism always go together; the moment a man believes he will want and will have baptism. By believing he clings to the gospel, and part of that is gospel is baptism. But believing is subjective, the act of baptism is objective. They go together in this way. Baptism cannot, therefore, be a mere sign or symbol that bestows nothing. If it were no more, it could not be so vitally connected with salvation. Baptism bestows, and the believing baptized person accepts and receives this great soteria [salvation] from the Savior. For anyone who comes to faith baptism is the great means of grace, that is, the channel by which forgiveness, life, and salvation are bestowed upon him. As he believes the word, so he will demand all that the Word promises in baptism and thus the baptism act itself. He who claims to believe but refuses and rejects baptism most surely deceives himself about believing; his could be only a highly pathological faith” (The Interpretation of St. Mark’s Gospel, pp. 766, 767).

Some scholars appeal to this verse as a “spurious” passage to avoid the truth about baptism. However the textual problem may be resolved, it is clear elsewhere in Scripture that “baptism” is for “the remission of sins” (Acts 2:38); that baptism is necessary to “wash away thy sins” (Acts 22:16); that baptism “doth now save us” (1 Peter 3:21); that out of baptism one arises to “walk in newness of life” (Romans 6:4) in the experience that Jesus called the birth “of water and the Spirit” (John 3:5); that baptism puts one into Christ Jesus where he becomes a new creature (Galatians 3:26-27; 2 Corinthians 5:17); and that baptism is into the Christ’s death (Rom 6:3), where his blood was shed “for the remission of sins” (Matthew 26:28).

That baptism is into the death of Christ shows that it, as Lenski says above, “is the great means of grace, that is, the channel by which forgiveness, life, and salvation are bestowed upon him” (Truth Commentaries Mark, L. A. Stauffer, pp 412-413)