There is no question that according to the Scripture, Noah’s flood is to be understood as a type for the water immersion practiced by first century Christians.

In 1 Peter 3:21, Peter writes “and baptism which is a fulfillment of the type (gr. antitupos) now saves you...through the resurrection of Jesus Christ.”

Clearly, Peter teaches that Noah’s flood was a type, which was fulfilled in the water immersion, which was actively saving his audience. The problem however, arises when these comments are taken out of the historical context of 1 Peter. It is evident that Peter uses the word “now”, not only to assure his audience that salvation is a reality through immersion in the name of Christ, but to also assure them that salvation from “the end” is assured, “the end” obviously referring to the end of “all things” discussed just a few verses later (1 Peter 4:7), i.e. the end of the old covenant. In 1 Peter 4:17 he even mentions the fact that “the time has come to begin the judgment with the house of God” – making an obvious and unmistakable parallel to Noah’s preaching of “the end” and coming judgment of God over creation through the destruction (washing away in the waters of the flood) of wickedness.

While we all agree on Peter’s parallel between the flood and baptism, for some reason no-one mentions what happens next. In Noah’s case, after the righteous was saved through the flood (while the wicked was destroyed), a “new covenant” was made between him and God, which was that “God will never destroy every living thing again…” In the first century, after the righteous Christians were saved through baptism (while the wicked were destroyed through lack of baptism), a “new covenant” was instituted between man and God. It is evident that in both cases, Noah’s flood and water immersion are indicators of a transitional period to a new covenant between man and God.

Even Paul makes a similar parallel when associating the passing of Israel through the Red Sea to baptism in 1 Cor. 10:1-4: “I want you to know, brethren, that our fathers were all under the cloud, and all passed through the sea, and all were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea, and all ate the same supernatural food and all drank the same supernatural drink. For they drank from the supernatural Rock which followed them, and the Rock was Christ.”

Evidently, the destruction of the Egyptian armies in the Red Sea goes very well together with the “water washes away the evil ones” theme already established, so in Paul’s parallel, we see yet a third time an example of “baptism” moving a body of God’s followers from a non-covenantal position into a “new covenant” position with God. This cannot be a simple coincidence, so the question is immediately raised: if Noah’s flood ceased with the institution of a new covenant, why does water immersion continue after the institution of a new covenant in A.D. 70? In other words, in each example, once the covenant is instituted, the actions which brought about the destruction of the evil ones and the institution of a new covenant are not continuously repeated.