Following Jesus in Baptism

John was one of six people Ken and Martha baptized Wednesday night.

There’s only one thing that excites me more than baptizing people, and that’s seeing people surrendering to the lordship of Jesus Christ.

A first occurred at Love In Action this past Wednesday night. While we have baptized hundreds of people over the years, this was the first time we’ve baptized people on our campus. Usually we baptize in a river, ocean, lake, pond or swimming pool, but Wednesday it was in a trough in our coffee house.

Our brother and friend, Kody Kirchhoff, of The Harbor, let us borrow one of their troughs, and it was a wonderful blessing. Six precious souls followed Jesus in baptism Wednesday. I taught on baptism that night to make sure everyone understood what was taking place. Those being baptized understood.

The Apostle Paul writes in Romans 6:3-4. “Or don’t you know that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? We were therefore buried with Him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life.”

While baptism isn’t what saves us and gives us eternal life, it is very important. It is an outward witness of our faith in Jesus, showing people we are following and committing our lives to Jesus.

It is symbolic of dying to our sins with Christ when we are immersed in the water, and of coming back to new life in Christ when we come out of the water. The water is symbolic of the blood of Jesus washing our sins away.

It is also being obedient to a command of Jesus. He tells us in Matthew 28:19, “Go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.” Jesus was baptized, therefore we should be if at all possible. The thief on the cross next to Jesus couldn’t be baptized, but that was an extreme situation.

One of my favorite parts of baptisms is the excitement of those being baptized. You often see it on their faces when they come out of the water. Pure joy that can only come from following Jesus.

Please pray for those who were baptized as they continue their walk with Jesus by going through our discipleship method Training for Trainers (T4T). Jesus picked the most unlikely of candidates to be His disciples. We have seen Him use the homeless to carry His Gospel to the nations. We are praying these six will be the next disciples who live out our Lord’s Great Commission.