The Sacraments in Worship 2 - Baptism

My previous posts have discussed what it means to be a word and sacrament church. As a reminder, a sacrament is a means through which God gives us His grace through a material and earthly element that is connected with God’s Word. Using that definition, the two sacraments are Holy Communion and Baptism.  Last post, I discussed the sacrament of Holy Communion, so this post I will begin the discussion of sacrament of Holy Baptism.

The word baptize in Greek essentially means to wash with water. In the sacrament of Holy Baptism, we believe teach and confess that we are washed clean of our sins and are reborn and renewed in Christ (Titus 3:5). We receive the actual gift of eternal life (Mark 16:16) through the water combined with God’s Word (Titus 3:5)! When we do this, we are also drowning the old Adam and are baptized into the death of Jesus (Romans 6:4).

Why do we baptize infants? Since baptism is a means God uses to give us the gift of faith, our age has nothing to do with it. Anyone, of any age, can and should be baptized.  Everyone, including infants and children, are sinful and in need of redemption by God’s grace, through faith, which is given in baptism. In the great commission (Matthew 28:19), Christ tells us to baptize all nations, and children are included in that. In fact, Jesus specifically invites little ones to come to him (Luke 18:15-17). We know that infants can be given faith because the unborn John the Baptist had faith and leaped in his mother’s womb when he heard the word of God (Luke 1:41-44).

So, once we are baptized are we done? By no means! The great commission and the rest of the Bible always puts teaching alongside baptism. As I discussed previously, we daily need to be learning and growing in the faith by being in the Word. We also daily need to return to our baptism both in the continual renewing of our faith as well as to look back on it as assurance of our salvation. Our Baptism is always there for us to point to and know that we are saved! What a wonderful gift of God!