[Iscool]

Are you saying Noah wasn't saved? Peter says "eight souls were saved by water". Read it again. Were they saved or not saved by water?

Certainly not in the same sense Christians are saved...The water was able to float his boat...He was saved from drowning...It had nothing to do with the death, burial and resurrection of Jesus...

And it doesn't do anything else either, except get us wet...

[LearsFool]

And it doesn't do anything else either, except get us wet.

So you say. But the apostle Peter says baptism saves us.

Do you believe I Peter 3:21?

[Colofornian]

...Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her 26 to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the word... (Eph. 5:25-26)

OK, there's nothing magical about water per se...it's a common element...

Paul clearly says here how this "cleansing" is accomplished...It's the power of God's word enacted via water.

People need to show more respect to God's Empowering Word by writing it off as merely resulting in "wetness."

That's 100% disrespectful to God's Word, to the apostle Paul's claims in this passage alone, let alone all of the other divine empowerings associated with baptism (see, for starter's CraigEsq's list in post #155).

I will also have you note that just about all of the key players in the Protestant Reformation showed 100% more repect for baptism (& not just your reductionism of Baptism of the Holy Spirit) that your flippant comment.