Good morning. Do you know anyone who's superstitious? When we use that word superstitious, what comes to mind? Well, we know people who don't walk under ladders, who throw salt over their shoulder, or other things. We talked this morning in the Spanish ministry about el mal de ojo and how You shouldn't put your purse on the ground or you'll lose your money and things like that. There's different cultures of different superstitions. Do this, don't do that, for this reason, for that reason. Sometimes we associate superstitions with mothers in the kitchen and the things that they say to their children and to their daughters. But I think the most superstitious people are actually men. Why? If I don't wear this jersey, if I don't sit in this place, if I don't do this thing, my team won't win. So if we're pointing a finger, we've got plenty more pointing back at us. The point is, we all know superstitious people. But we often talk about superstition in a more religious context, don't we? Superstition in a religious context, which basically has the same meaning and the same use. But what exactly would be superstition? How could we define it? And superstition is doing something without a reason to do it and expecting to get a result out of it. Well, I'm just going to keep doing this. I'm going to keep doing this because I'm hoping that this will happen. But no one told you to do that. No one commanded you to do that and no one promised you a blessing as a result of it. So it's just superstition. You just made something up and decided it's going to help you. And in a religious context, the reformers made a lot of arguments against the Roman Catholic Church and said things like, why are you doing these things when you haven't been commanded? You've just made them up. And you're telling the people of God that you're going to get a result. We think often of the saying Hail Marys or the Rosary and such things. You can repeat them all you want. It's not going to help you. There's no blessing. There's no command at all. It's just superstition. People wear a cross around their necks and they think it will protect them from something or who knows what. It's superstition. There's no command to do so and there's no result promised. It's just as valid as wearing your favorite jersey in hopes that it will make your team win, which sadly I've tried that and it doesn't work. So why do I bring up superstition? I bring it up to ask this question, Hannah entered these waters today, the waters of baptism, why did she do that? Why did she go into this water and why did we plunge her into it and bring her out and everyone said amen? Why did we do that? Was that just superstition? This isn't something that normal people do. When they get into the water, they sit in the water and they enjoy it for a bath or for a hot tub or whatever. Hannah just got in and got out of the water. Why did she do that? Why did this happen? Why in the world are we baptizing? And so I want to use a series of questions this morning, which you'll find in an outline that I've prepared for you. to help us better understand why we baptize, what baptism is, and other such questions so that we know, A, that we're doing this for a good reason, and that, B, there is a blessing that comes as a result of baptism. And so this is quite the opposite of superstition. And so to begin that series of questions, the very first one, as you can see in your outline, is why do we baptize? Why did we do this in the first place? And the reason why we baptize in a very straightforward answer is simply because we have been commanded to do so. Our Lord and Savior, the lawgiver, Jesus Christ, in Matthew chapter 28, at the end of his earthly ministry, after having risen from the dead and right before he ascended into heaven, Jesus said to his disciples, all authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations. baptizing them, there's the command, in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you, and behold, I am with you always to the end of the age." So if someone asks why we're doing this, we can answer very clearly with a direct command. We have been commanded to baptize those who respond to the preaching of the gospel among the nations. Those who respond in faith are baptized in the triune name of God. So we're not being superstitious. We're doing something that we've been told to do, and that is the very first reason why we do it. But this leads us on to the second question. What is baptism? One of the things that I try to emphasize in my sermons is to help us to understand the Christianese that we speak. We use Christian words all the time, and we sometimes forget the richness of the meaning or why they mean what they mean in such things. And so if you go to an English class that's teaching English to someone as a second language, and they're learning vocabulary words, among the words that they're learning, baptism will not be found. Because it's not a part of regular English. It's not a part of the regular language that we speak. It's pretty much only something we say in a religious context. And so when we use it over and over and over, we may forget what it means. Well, what's baptism? Well, baptism is baptism. Yes, okay, but what does that word actually mean? And so when Jesus says, baptize, we need to know what he's telling us to do. You can't just say, well, we know what baptism is because baptism is baptism. No. What does baptism mean? Which is a long question for a short and simple answer. We use the English words baptism and baptize simply as transliterations. In other words, they're just Greek words that we've put into English. The same thing happens in Spanish, bautismo y bautizar. We have baptism and to baptize. The Greek word for baptism is baptizmos, the verb is baptizo, and those words mean to plunge or to wash. And so baptism is the plunging of the body in water, dipping. Baptists were sometimes called dippers in the 17th century. And the Anglicans who wanted to make fun of them wrote a book and said the dippers dipped and such things, which was not very nice. But the reason why they called Baptists that is because Baptists said baptism, the word itself means to dip. or to plunge, and so anything other than that is really not properly baptism. And so when Jesus says, preach the gospel to the nations and those who respond, baptize them, he's saying put them underwater and bring them back up out of it. If you keep them there too long, bad things will happen. So why do we baptize? Because we've been commanded to. What is baptism? It's the plunging of the body in the water. And here's an interesting tidbit that you've probably never thought about, depending on your background, is the early Baptists had differences of opinions on this. And they said it can go either way. You can baptize face first. Or the other way around, back first, I guess you might say. I'd never really thought about that until I read it, and I thought, that's really interesting. But both are a plunging of the person into the water and bringing them back up again. This leads us to the third question, and we'll spend the most of our time on questions four and five. The third question, whom should we baptize? Whom should we dip in the water? Whom should we plunge into these waters? And the answer is we should baptize disciples. That is the way that the command is expressed in Matthew chapter 28. All those who respond to the preaching of the gospel in faith, those who profess faith in Jesus Christ, and none but those who profess faith in Jesus Christ are to be baptized because they alone are the disciples of Christ. Who are disciples? They are learners, those who have submitted themselves, those who have proposed themselves to the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ by faith, they are to be baptized and none others. And so we don't baptize unwilling persons. Unwilling persons are not disciples. Maybe you've seen Nacho Libre, and Nacho baptizes Escalito. He just suddenly puts his face into the water. Ha ha, you've been baptized. We don't do that. Hannah was not saying, please, no, don't let me, no, don't put me in the water. She wanted to be in the water. She applied for baptism. Her testimony was in the bulletin. She spoke with the elders and the members of the church. So we don't baptize the unwilling, we baptize disciples, those who have responded to the gospel by faith. And that is the practice of our church where our baptisms are preceded by testimonies and brief interviews and other such steps of orderliness. Now, to be clear about what a disciple is, it's not just someone who says, I believe in Jesus. It's someone whose life matches that profession as well. Someone whose life shows repentance and faith ongoing, not just having said something once and immediately being put into the water. This is why we have to be careful with our children's profession of faith. We would not deny that children can be baptized. They certainly can be baptized, and they should be baptized when they are shown to be true believers, but we have to show that their life, that their profession of faith is accompanied by a genuine life of repentance and faith in Jesus Christ, running from sin and running to Jesus Christ. So why we baptize, what baptism is, and whom we should baptize are relatively straightforward questions and answers. And we're going to spend more time on the fourth and fifth questions and answers because, again, we don't want to be superstitious. And what I mean by that is that, yes, we've been commanded to do this, but if we don't know what it means, then we're still just doing it to do it. So what is the symbolism? What is the significance of baptism? What does it symbolize and express? Because when God commands us to do something, he doesn't command us to do it as robots, Well, we are going to do what God said and we have done it because he said we should do it. No, there's a rich meaning and there is a rich significance in which we participate. Think about some of God's commands throughout history to his people. The trees in the Garden of Eden for Adam. Were they just trees and fruit? No, the commands relative to them, to not to eat of some, were very significant. There was rich symbolism in the trees, symbolism of life and death. Think about the Passover meal. Is this, all right guys, I want you to eat this meal on this date. No, it was so much more than that. It had a rich symbolism. So also the sacrificial lamb on the day of atonement. Why should the high priest take a sacrifice, the blood of the sacrifice, into the Holy of Holies and sprinkle it on the mercy seat once a year? Should he do it just to do it? No, there was a rich symbolism and significance ongoing in those commands. And so also in baptism, we will see that there is a rich symbolism involved and we want to understand that so that we can participate with knowledge and with willingness as those disciples who invest themselves in Jesus Christ. And so as we discuss the symbolism of baptism, I want to point out to you that it's going to be a two-way street. Baptism involves, on the one hand, God speaking to us, and on the other hand, us, or we, responding to God. So the symbolism goes two ways. John Calvin expresses this well, which is in the outline. He said a sacrament is a testimony of God's favor towards us, confirmed by an outward sign, it is God communicating to us, with a mutual testifying of our godliness towards him. And so it is God speaking to us and us responding back to God himself. Now as we discuss this two-way symbolism, we're going to begin with that first part, God speaking to us. And you can see there in your outline that I have expressed it in this way. What does baptism symbolize and express in terms of God towards us? Baptism is God's visible promise. that all those who trust in Christ by virtue of their union with Christ in his sacrificial death and victorious resurrection have been reborn unto eternal life and consequently their deaths will not be a judgment but a deliverance leading to an assured and glorious resurrection. Think about that for a moment. That was a thick sentence. Baptism is a visible promise. It is God's word made visible to us, and the message of that promise, the message made visible to us, is that all those who are united to Christ in his death and resurrection, they also, though their bodies die, nevertheless their deaths will not be a judgment, but rather it will be a deliverance awaiting a future and a final assured and glorious resurrection. So how can it be that such a simple symbol involves so much symbolism or so much meaning? Well, think about the image itself for just a moment with me. You have a person who gets into the water and they're laid down into it and they come back up out of it. It is a very simple and vivid picture of death and rising again from death. It is a very appropriate symbol of being laid into the ground, buried in the ground, and rising up from the grave itself. And it's kind of neat, but if you go to London and you go to Bunhill Fields where many of our Baptist forefathers are buried, a lot of the tombs actually look like this. They're shorter because people aren't that tall, but they look like our baptismal. So it's really perfect symbolism. The person is laid in the grave and they rise from the grave symbolically. But I want us to understand that the symbolism of baptism in terms of life and death or death and resurrection does not simply flow out of the picture itself, being laid down and rising up again, but also the scriptures throughout the Old and New Testaments give us a rich symbolism of life and death and creation related to water. And so think about with me the fact that when baptism is instituted, It does not simply have meaning because it portrays death and resurrection, but because of everything that preceded it in the Old Testament. So just think with me for a moment about Genesis 1. You have the dry land, the new creation emerging out of the water. The waters cover the face of the earth and the dry land emerges. This is creation emerging from water, new life emerging from water. We see the same theme in the flood. When the flood waters cover the earth and then they recede and the dry land again appears and it is portrayed as a new creation. And the flood, however, is a little bit different from the initial creation because the flood waters become judgment upon God's enemies and death for them. as well as salvation and deliverance and new life for God's people, Noah and his family in the ark. And so water begins to develop a symbolism in the scriptures of new creation as well as judgment and death and salvation and life. The same is pictured in the Exodus as the Israelites leave Egypt and they're fleeing, heading towards the Sinai Peninsula. As they enter into the waters of the Red Sea, it becomes salvation and deliverance unto life for them, and it is rather death and judgment upon the Egyptians as a converse or an inverse. We can also think of the consecration of Aaron and his sons for the priesthood. A large bath was constructed for them where they could ritually purify themselves for their priestly duties. And so baptism, therefore, is a symbol of death, burial, and resurrection, not merely because it naturally portrays those in the event itself, but also because of all of the symbolism and rich imagery that the Old Testament gave to us to prepare us to understand the symbolism of baptism on a more profound level. Now, the point of all of this is to remind us that baptism is God's word to us. The symbolism is a message. The symbolism is communicating to God's people certain things. Just like the Lord's Supper is a visible word, God's word made visible to us and has a message, so also baptism is God's word made visible to us and has a message. What is that message? Well, it's that thick sentence that we already read. Baptism is God's visible promise, his word for the eyes, that all those who trust in Christ by virtue of their union with Christ in his sacrificial death and victorious resurrection have been reborn, their new creations have been reborn unto eternal life, and consequently their deaths will not be a judgment, but a deliverance leading to an assured and glorious resurrection. One of our catechisms sums this up very well, an Orthodox catechism, which is the Baptist version of the Heidelberg, question and answer 74. How are you admonished and assured in baptism that you are a partaker of the only sacrifice of Christ? And notice how the question phrases itself. It's asking you, what does baptism say to you? What does baptism tell you? What does baptism assure you of? What does it admonish you to think about? Answer, because Christ commanded the outward washing of water, joining this promise to it, that I am no less assuredly washed by his blood and spirit from the uncleanness of my soul, that is from all my sins, than I am washed outwardly from the filthiness of the body with water. just as assuredly as my body just got wet in a ritual cleansing So also the blood of Jesus Christ has cleansed me from my sins. The waters tell you that. The waters proclaim that very message. They speak it to God's people. And the beauty of this is that the message of baptism, the message of these waters, God's word before you today, is not just for Hannah. It's not just for her in these waters. It's the same message to all of God's people. And that's why we say when people are baptized, remember your baptism. And it's not so much remember the event of your baptism, but remember the promise of God made to you when you were baptized, because it's the same promise today. And that is a wonderful and reassuring truth. Some people get baptized at a spiritual high, while the Lord has delivered me from great sin, and I've come away from that sin, and I love the Lord, and I want to serve Him, and I want to be baptized, and they're on fire for the Lord, and we rejoice in that. That's wonderful. And then a few years later, they're spiritually depressed for one reason or another. And they think to themselves, I don't even feel like when the Lord first saved me, or I thought he did, and such things. And they're all over the place. And we can say to them, you know, Baptism wasn't just about you being on a spiritual high. Baptism was about God speaking to you. And that same message on that day is the same message today. That same gospel promise has not changed. You've changed, yes, but you're always going to change. And so remember your baptism, not to say, boy, I was doing so much better back then. Remember your baptism because it's the message of the gospel that has persevered and been the same every day from then till now and will preserve you. So remember your baptism, not, oh yeah, I got wet too, but I entered into those waters and God made the same promise to me then as I am hearing again today. God still speaks to you through your baptism, and so the benefit that flows from your baptism is not in any way limited to the day or the time when you're baptized. You can continue to derive benefit from your baptism every day of your life, and especially when you see it, when you see that promise made visible again to you. Very much like the Lord's Supper, every time we partake, we are reassured of those things. We might think, well, I like that logic, let's get baptized every week. No, of course not, we wouldn't do that. That's a symbol of new life, and we are commanded to do it once. But the point is, it still speaks to us. The message still speaks, and we need to hear that message and get that message. And the definitive proof that this is the message of God in baptism is found in Romans chapter six, verses three through five. God says through Paul, do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death in order that just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life. For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we shall certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his. All those who are united to Christ in his death and in his resurrection, they too will have a glorious resurrection from death indeed for themselves. And baptism does not just speak this to us, it shouts it to us. It's so vividly portrayed before our very eyes. And so we can see and understand God's message to us. And we need to sort of retrain our minds at times. Because this right here, these waters, are just as much God's word as this. The bread and the wine in the Lord's Supper are just as much God's word as the words and the sentences and the paragraphs and the chapters and the books in the Bible. And so we need to hear God's word, understand God's word, and believe God's word. We'll get to that later in the sermon. The point being, this is God's message not just to Hannah, but to all of God's people. Now let's think about what baptism symbolizes and expresses in terms of us towards God, us responding to God's word to us. And you can see there in your outline that I've put in the point, baptism is an outward expression of inward faith in God's word. Think about it for a moment. If being dipped in the water before all the church is a symbol of dying and rising in Christ, what does it mean when someone asks to go into those waters? It means that they trust in that promise. It means that they believe in that word of God. They trust in the promises declared in baptism. If they disagreed with the symbol of the event, if they disagreed with the message of baptism, why would they ever go into those waters? It would make no sense. And so what does it mean when someone goes into the waters of baptism and is baptized? It means that they trust in Jesus Christ. They trust in the promise of God portrayed in the symbol. And they don't trust in the waters, and they don't even trust in the event. They trust in the message of the waters, and they trust in the event that the waters portray. They trust in the death and the resurrection of Jesus Christ made visible again in this baptism. And they say, I am united to him. I am united to Jesus in his death and in his resurrection, trusting that because of my union with him by faith and by the spirit, my death will not be a judgment, but a deliverance unto resurrection on the final day. And even on the simplest of levels, what does this mean for that person? It means they're obeying Jesus' very first command to his people. Command number one, be baptized. and they are obeying his first command. Now we can also talk about the fact that not only does this declare the person's trust in the promises of the gospel portrayed in baptism, it also declares they are a new creation. They're saying, I have been born again. That's why I believe in Jesus Christ. That's why I'm able to believe in Jesus Christ. And so this is a picture of a newborn child of God. New creations emerge from water. This person who leaves the water is a new creation, not by virtue of the water, but it is a symbol of the reality that they claim for themselves. I am a child of God, a newborn, spiritually reborn by the power and grace of God, and I trust in Jesus Christ. Baptism says, as I have died to sin and been made alive in Christ, and as I trust in Him for my salvation and future resurrection, so now do I enter these waters as the symbol of God's promises to me and as an expression of my new life in Christ and trust in Him. And then what happens? The person's baptized and then what happens? Well, in the New Testament, then they are added to the number. That is the way that it is expressed in the book of Acts. They're added to the number, they join the membership of the church. When someone is baptized, they're added to the number of an identifiable, a concrete, knowable body of Jesus Christ that is a church. And they live under the authority of that church exercised through the elders. When the scriptures say submit to your elders or obey your elders, who are your elders? There has to be a church, there has to be a particular body of those over whom the elders rule and those who are in submission to the elders. And so also baptism presupposes joining a definable and identifiable visible church through profession of faith. And it is natural. The church, which is in many ways the womb that gives birth to the children of God, has seen a new child born and welcomes that child into the body, into the body of Jesus Christ. It is entirely unnatural if we disconnected membership from baptism or disconnected integration into a local church from baptism, it would make no sense. It would be like giving birth to a child and just sending them off saying, we love you so much, but please just go somewhere else. No, when you baptize someone, you integrate them into your body, into your family, into your home. Well now we've understood, we've taken time to understand the meaning of baptism. We know why we do it, we know what it is. We understand the symbolism of baptism as God speaking to us and us responding to God. Let us bring this towards a conclusion with a fifth and final question. How should we respond to the meaning and command of baptism? How should we respond to the meaning and command? And I'll give you two responses that again you can see in your outline. First, all those who trust in Jesus Christ must be baptized. I use the word must in the sense of complete obligation. And all those who trust in Jesus Christ should want to be baptized, not only because it is Christ's first command, but also for the wonderful and rich symbolism that we have studied and understood today. And if you think about it with me, it would make no sense. It would make no sense to say that you trust in Jesus Christ, but you will not enter the waters that portray his death and resurrection for you and your death and resurrection in him. If you say, yes, I trust in the one who died and rose again. Okay, come to the waters that portray that. No, no. You'd say, there's a problem here. There's a disconnect somewhere. What's the issue? And the issue can only be on our side because there is a clear command from our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. And so I exhort you all today to repent of your sins, to trust in Jesus Christ, and to be baptized. This is the great commission in Matthew 28 that we've already read, and this is the shape of the apostles' ministry in the book of Acts. Read with me Acts 2, 36 to 42. This is Peter preaching on Pentecost. Let all the house of Israel therefore know for certain that God has made him, that is Jesus, both Lord and Christ, this Jesus whom you crucified. In other words, he is the Messiah. Now when they heard this, they were cut to the heart and said to Peter and the rest of the apostles, brothers, what shall we do? And Peter said to them, repent, and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ, for the forgiveness of your sins, and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. For the promise is for you, and for your children, and for all who are far off, everyone whom the Lord our God calls to himself. And with many other words, he bore witness and continued to exhort them, saying, save yourselves from this crooked generation. So those who received his word were baptized, and there were added that day about 3,000 souls, and they devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching and the fellowship and to the breaking of bread and the prayers. You can see the pattern very clearly. Repent and trust in Jesus Christ and be baptized and join the church. Are you living a life of repentance, fighting against sin, hating sin, and pursuing holiness? Then obey your Savior and seek baptism. You've heard the good news. You've heard the gospel. And you need to realize that when you are called to Christ, It's not just an inward change of mind. It's not just something that happens inside of you. It's something that is also expressed outwardly. You need to combine that inward faith with an outward profession, an outward declaration, indeed an outward obedience. And that happens through baptism. And this is especially important for the young people. Because the young people hear the gospel preached regularly here at our church. And they are told, believe, believe, believe, repent and believe. And sometimes as a young person hearing that over and over and over, you think to yourself, okay, well, what do I do? Do I just ask God to forgive me in my mind and express in my mind that I have trusted in Jesus? But then what if I don't feel like that the next day or the next moment? What do I do? Is this just inward? And we'd say, It is more than that. Yes, you must trust in Jesus inwardly and come to the waters of baptism, be baptized, express that faith, and join the church where you will grow in that profession of faith, where that initial seed of faith sprouts and bears fruit through the means of grace and through fellowship with the brethren. So if you're a young person and you hear the gospel preached and you think, well, what do I do? And you feel a nervousness and a hesitancy and an uncertainty, there's no need for any of that because what you ought to do is perfectly clear. Trust in Jesus, yes, inwardly in your heart. and come to the waters of baptism to express that in obedience to your Lord and join the church where you will grow under the oversight of pastors and with the fellowship of the brethren and the means of grace week in and week out. So you don't need to feel uncertain about what you should do. What you should do is very clear and we would love to talk to you about baptism. Your parents would love to talk to you about baptism. The only one holding you back is you. If there's anything that you need to resolve to do in the new year, it's not so much, well, I'll lose weight, well, I'll read more, well, I'll look at Facebook less, well, I will learn to love hockey. Well, those are all very good, very good resolutions. You should do them. but they really don't matter unless you trust in Christ. And if you say you trust in Christ, but you will not, you will not come to the waters of baptism, I'd say you don't trust Jesus Christ. You say you do, but you can't come to him as Savior, but not as Lord. He is your Lord if you trust in him. And his first command to you, command number one, be baptized. Will you obey that? If you love him, if you love the Lord and you want to express your faith, then you will be baptized. And that is a wonderful and beautiful symbol. And again, we don't baptize anyone unwillingly. No one has ever been dragged into these waters. We want to help you. We want to help you join the church through baptism. And this is a serious matter. because you either trust in Christ and obey his very first command or you don't. And Jesus said in Matthew 10, 32 to 33, so everyone who acknowledges me before men, I also will acknowledge before my father who is in heaven. But whoever denies me before men, I also will deny before my father who is in heaven. This is how you publicly proclaim Jesus Christ before the eyes of the church and the world. And in Romans 10, we are told that those who believe in their heart and confess with their mouth will be saved. Baptism, in many ways it's through our vows of membership, but they are combined with baptism. Baptism, the event, is that confessing with the mouth. And those who will not do that by way of refusal, by way of refusal, do not trust in Christ, and as they have denied him before men, he will deny you before the Father. That is nothing to take lightly. That is something to take very, very seriously. And you might say, but wait a second, you require a testimony, a membership class, we have to read the confession, we have to read the Constitution? Yes. Jesus Christ died for you. It'll take you two hours to read the confession, half hour to read the constitution, one Saturday morning for the membership class, three paragraphs in a testimony. Who's stopping you? You're stopping yourself. And if you have questions about those things, if you have concerns about those things, Bring them forward. We can answer your questions. We can address your concerns. We can help you. Those are not obstacles. Those are steps of orderliness, steps of caution and prudence, because we need to baptize Simon the sorcerer who makes a profession, but we also need to discipline Simon the sorcerer who says, can I buy the Holy Spirit? You see, we have to be careful. And so these steps are steps to enable you to come to baptism, not to disable you from coming to baptism. So do not make excuses based on those requirements. They are simple. They're straightforward. You can be helped if they are difficult in some way. And they are more than worth obeying your Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, and being baptized as you profess your faith. Think about it again like this, to reinforce the necessity and what it means if you don't. This month, we've been studying various biblical passages connected to Christ's birth. And when you read the narratives of Christ's birth and the surrounding events, there's something striking that happens. People actually do stuff based on things that are said to them. Wise men take a long journey from the East. Joseph doesn't divorce Mary. The shepherds go to Bethlehem. Why did they do those things that took time and effort and were perhaps difficult in a variety of ways? They took action because they believed God's word. Joseph believed the angel that spoke to him in a dream. The wise men believed the message that was given by the star, if you understand what I mean by that. And so also the angels, the shepherds, when the angels appeared to them and they said, go to Bethlehem, they said, let's go, let's go. If one of the shepherds said, guys, There's nothing there. There's no one in Bethlehem for us to see. They would have just stayed with their flocks. And so also, if Jesus says, believe in me and be baptized in my name and in the name of my Father and the name of the Holy Spirit, and you say, no, I'm not going to do that, it's because you don't believe him. You don't believe in him, and you will not obey him. You are refusing to obey the one you call Savior, and if you refuse to confess him before men, then you should tremble at the thought that he will refuse to confess you before the Father. So the first response to the meaning and the command of baptism is that all those who trust in Jesus Christ must be baptized, and that is a joyous, joyous command. The second and concluding response is that we who have been baptized and who have trusted in Jesus Christ, we need to, as I've been saying, we need to see the message and be refreshed by the message. We ought to rejoice in the new birth that is granted by God, and we ought to refresh our souls in the promises of God made visible in baptism because this is not superstition. It's not something we just do because we want to do. It's not something that we do with no benefit. There's a wonderful benefit in contemplating the message of baptism and believing it and growing in our faith. Jesus Christ died. Jesus Christ rose from the dead. and we in him shall die and yet we shall live, as Psalm 89 says, we shall live eternally, we shall live gloriously, we shall live with Jesus Christ. So remember your baptism, not so much for the event itself, but for the message, because the same message today was the message when you were baptized, and it is this. that all who have been united with Christ in a death like his shall certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his. That is the precious gospel message made visible to you today in baptism for the first time to Hannah and for all of us. Praise God for his glorious and precious and wonderful word. Amen. Let's pray. Our Father in heaven, how we thank you for the wisdom of your commands, that you do not send us to do things that are empty and ritualistic, but rather you give us good commands with wonderful benefit for us, rich meaning, it is your word. And so we ask that you might cause us to not forget our baptisms, but to remember them, to remember the new life that we have been given and the newness of life that we have been called to walk in. Our Father, we ask that you would please forgive us for our sins, not walking in that light, not walking in that newness of life. And yet we thank you that because we have been washed, not just with water, but with the precious blood of Jesus Christ, that our sins, all of them, indeed have been forgiven. And so we thank you and we praise you. We thank you for the baptism of Hannah. We thank you for her profession of faith, giving you all of the glory, knowing that it is you who cause your children to be born again. It is you that grant faith to your children. It is you that have saved us from our sins. And so we thank you and we praise you, O God, our Father, in the name of Jesus Christ, amen.