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-E.P., England
Answer: You are right in stating that it requires the application of the sacrificial blood of Jesus Christ to make the forgiveness of our sins possible. This is confirmed in Revelation 1:5: "From Jesus Christ, the faithful witness, the firstborn from the dead, and the ruler over the kings of the earth. To Him who loved us and washed us from our sins in His own blood" (emphasis added throughout).
Revelation 7:14 further speaks of "the ones who come out of the great tribulation, and washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb."
The New Testament abounds in scriptural passages affirming the majestic importance of Christ's sacrifice to cover our sins. Yet Ananias instructed Paul, after God had miraculously struck him down on the road to Damascus, "Arise and be baptized, and wash away your sins, calling on the name of the Lord" (Acts 22:16).
As you have written, and as Paul explains in Romans 6:2-6, water baptism symbolizes the death of the old sinful, selfish man. But in a figurative sense it also pictures the washing away of our sins.
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