[Be sure, when you get to heaven, you let Peter know that...The New American Standard is one of the most literal versions of the Bible: ...the ark, in which a few, that is, eight persons, were brought safely through the water. 21 Corresponding to that, baptism now saves you—not the removal of dirt from the flesh, but an appeal to God for a good conscience—through the resurrection of Jesus Christ... (1 Peter 3)]
(And Luke): 38 Peter said to them, “Repent, and each of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins; and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. 39 For the promise is for you and your children and for all who are far off, as many as the Lord our God will call to Himself.” (Acts 2)
(And Paul): 5 He saved us, not on the basis of deeds which we have done in righteousness, but according to His mercy, by the WASHING of regeneration and renewing by the Holy Spirit, 6 whom He poured out upon us richly through Jesus Christ our Savior... (Titus 3)
Noah was obedient to Jehovah because he completely trusted in Christ. According to The God's specific direction, dear Father Noah (and his family following him by faith in Christ) were saved by grace through faith, not by being dipped in water (Eph. 2:8, Heb. 11:6-7)
This saving of Noah is not by water. The verse completely well defined that the washing was a figure of speech. It is the faithfulness of God that saved, with Noah and his family completely relying on the Word of God. Relying on water for Eternal Life? Duh.
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Acts 2:38 is almost always completely misinterpreted by mistranslating the function of the preposition εις in Acts 2:38, where the AV has "... be baptized ... for the remission of sins ...". The casual (lazy/ignorant/unregenerated?) expositor would just put in place of "for" the common clause "with a view toward", which is very frequently a correct translation of εις -- but in this case it is not, because it makes verses such as Eph. 2:8 doctrinally nonsensical and inconsistent, along with the overall context that salvation is truly by faith, not by works/literal aitch-too-oh.
If you had Thayer's Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament, you would find out that there are many different uses of the preposition in view, to which 70 column inches of very fine print are given over to εις. And you would find that, taking the Bauer-Arndt-Gingrich The Greek-English Lexicon (2nd revision by Gingrich & Danker) in one hand, and Scrivener's Textus Receptus in the other, you would find thirteen different ways that implementation of εις in a sentence needs to be translated just for the Gospels.
The correct hermeneutics of Acts 2:38 demands that where the action contemplated is based on a previous action, the foundational use is to be applied, which has the sense of εις being translated as "on the basis of" or "based upon." One such related passage is from Mt. 12:41 where:
οτι μετανοησαν εις το κηρυγμα ιονα
"because they repented on the basis of Jonah's proclamation as an herald"
(This is what we call a literal/grammatical/syntactical/cultural hermeneutic.)
Thus, theologically and doctrinally Peter (only within the last few days converted, and giving this sermon on the very day he was spiritually reborn) was urging these listeners who had already just themselves demonstrated belief and thus been saved, to "... be baptized ... on the basis of sins remitted/abandoned ...". Now, the intolerable doctrinal discontinuity is relieved, and Eph. 2:8 and Acts 2:38 are wedded in inseparable unity, rather than diametrically opposed by interpretive ignoramuses.
Furthermore, the Great Commission was being carried out as Christ authorized and delegated. This baptism, according to Christ's command of Mt. 28:18-20 was being fulfilled. The end of this baptism was not like John's, which was a baptism unto repentance (but not salvation); nor was it a baptism like that of Jesus, which was a baptism to fully fulfil all righteousness (Mt. 3:15). No, it was a baptism unto discipleship, by which the 12 had been ritually inducted by Jesus (Jn. 4:1), after which they continued to induct more disciples by mikvah-type immersion baptism of grown, decision-capable adults (Jn. 4:2) to follow Jesus as a Teacher. Most unarguably certainly these baptisms did not and could not impart regeneration of the spirit, for Peter was not converted until days after the Crucifixion, Judas Iscariot was absolutely a partaker of this baptism unto discipleship, and regeneration by the agency of the Indwellimg Holy Spirit did not happen until Pentecost Sunday!
The baptism that Peter supervised was NOT one of baptismal regeneration. It was a public affirmation of commitment of thousands of new followers of The Way into union with the local εκκλησια at Jerusalem, on the basis that they had repented and committed full trust on the authority of the Risen Christ, with sins washed away (not just blotted out) by His Precious Incorruptible Blood, their minds washed by the water of The Word (Eph. 5:25-27), a new spiritual man born inside by regeneration; then accepted ritual mikvah-immersion whilst being made to figuratively drink into one spirit of unity as local disciple-members (1 Cor. 12:13). =========
Now, dealing with your waving Titus 3:5 again, regeneration is not in the water by washing with it literally, even ritually. Do you not know about mikvah ceremonies? It is a ritual cleansing, requiring full, complete immersion and soaking in "living" water. This is still going on, across the world in the Jewish practice at synagogues. It is so thorough the women even have to unbraid and comb out their hair to make sure it is wet out on the minutest scale. But above all, it is a work, which is unacceptable as a precondition for Biblical salvation/regeneration/sanctification. Come on!
The washing is one on the inside of a sentient logical/reasonable human accountable for both mindset and behavior, in whom the regenerative seed (1 Jn. 3:9; Ps. 126:6; Mt. 13:33)--the voice of the Holy Ghost--has lodged, echoed in the halls of the soul, convicted in the intellect(Jn. 16:7-15), brought a godly sorrow in the heart (2 Cor. 7:9-11), imparted the essence of The Faith to the mouth, brought a saving belief, and a call out to the Lord for salvation (Rom. 10:8-10, 13), and regenerated in the spirit.
We don't birth physical babies under water. Why then a spiritual one? The washing here is by the Blood of The Christ and the Water of The Word. Tap or river water has nothing to do with spiritual regeneration. And it most certainly can never save someone who went to their grave rejecting Christ--or even being ignorant of Him.
I think it's about time to give up false doctrines and cry out for instruction, as did the believing eunuch (Acts 8:37).
The Plan: Washing by the Word-->conviction-->repentance/belief-->crying out to the Lord-->regeneration-->baptism affirmation of commitment to discipleship for ever-->union with a local assembly.
Give it up, FRiend, give it up!
And, oh! If I were you I would toss the New American Standard Version, and a lot of other versions like it, all of which are translated from a poisoned stream of corrupted textforms.
Peter and Paul seem to have a different take on it; don’t they!