SPEAKER_00: Honestly, we were able to go out into the community and literally take uh we we honestly decided this year that instead of uh buying flowers and doing a bunch of, we want to say happy Mother's Day to all the moms, but we really decided just to take that money and literally give thousands of dollars to families who need it.
SPEAKER_00: And I do want to say this if you are a single mom or a single parent at one of our campuses today and you're struggling and you've got some needs, man, we're for you and we want to be with you.
SPEAKER_00: And so we just encourage you to go out to Information Central at your campus.
SPEAKER_00: We've got some staff there that would love just to get your name, your number for us to be able to help you and be there with you.
SPEAKER_00: And so again, happy Mother's Day to our moms.
SPEAKER_00: I want you to get to Matthew chapter three.
SPEAKER_00: Matthew chapter three.
SPEAKER_00: We've been in this series and we're continuing today.
SPEAKER_00: Series have been called What's the Deal With?
SPEAKER_00: We came out of Easter and uh we just decided to do a series where we would tackle some big theological issues.
SPEAKER_00: Because I think there's a lot of questions.
SPEAKER_00: We have a relationship with God, and we know that Jesus died for us and sacrificed himself for our sins, but how do we actually connect?
SPEAKER_00: And what are some of the answers to these big questions about things like the resurrection?
SPEAKER_00: Like for some of us, we're like, the resurrection, okay, help me understand.
SPEAKER_00: How do we know that's true?
SPEAKER_00: And so, week one, we just dove in and we said, What's the deal with the resurrection?
SPEAKER_00: How can you trust it to actually happen?
SPEAKER_00: And then we went into week two and three and we talked about the Bible and asked the question, how do we know it's reliable?
SPEAKER_00: What's the deal with the Bible?
SPEAKER_00: And then last week we talked about this idea of what's the deal with prayer?
SPEAKER_00: Like, how do we pray and what is prayer and how do we connect with God?
SPEAKER_00: And I hope you prayed that kind of format of the Lord's Prayer and those ideas this week.
SPEAKER_00: And I hope it encouraged you.
SPEAKER_00: I hope you jumped into our guided prayers.
SPEAKER_00: Today, with it being Mother's Day and not just Mother's Day, we also have a baptism celebration day.
SPEAKER_00: We've got over 30 people that scheduled their baptism.
SPEAKER_00: And so far in Thursday night, we had one person that was scheduled.
SPEAKER_00: We had eight people get baptized.
SPEAKER_00: Last service we had four people and we had six people get baptized.
SPEAKER_00: And I would imagine across our campuses, after today, there's gonna be some people that didn't plan on it, but I think they're gonna get they're gonna get baptized today.
SPEAKER_00: And so I want you to be listening to the spirit about that.
SPEAKER_00: But we're just asking this question what's the deal with baptism?
SPEAKER_00: And and here's the reality: we we have a lot of baptism around this place.
SPEAKER_00: We're celebrating, super excited, celebrating.
SPEAKER_00: We've had 635 people since August that have made the decision to go public with their faith and get baptized.
SPEAKER_00: That's something to celebrate.
SPEAKER_00: That's exciting.
SPEAKER_00: But some of you may be sitting there going, okay, what's the deal with that?
SPEAKER_00: Like you may not have grown up in a church tradition where you saw many baptisms, right?
SPEAKER_00: The average church across America sees less like single-figure baptisms throughout the year.
SPEAKER_00: Like that, that's a lot of churches just didn't have a lot of baptisms, or maybe they didn't teach a lot about it.
SPEAKER_00: Or maybe you're a person who's just kind of walked in and and you're like, man, I love this Jesus thing, and I'm excited about you know the values of Jesus first and people always and made for more.
SPEAKER_00: But what is this baptism thing?
SPEAKER_00: Like, like when they dunk people under the water and you're going, what's this cultist thing my church does?
SPEAKER_00: And and what is it?
SPEAKER_00: Like, how do we understand baptism?
SPEAKER_00: And so today, what I want us to do is I just want us to walk through it.
SPEAKER_00: Not just for the people who are getting baptized, but for all of us to understand why it's significant.
SPEAKER_00: Why did Jesus make a big deal about it?
SPEAKER_00: Why does the New Testament make a big deal about it?
SPEAKER_00: What does baptism actually mean?
SPEAKER_00: And here's what I know that usually the people who understand baptism the most aren't always the people who've been around the longest.
SPEAKER_00: I want you to take a look at the screens and check out this kid's baptism moment.
SPEAKER_01: He will demonstrate his faith in the Lord Jesus Christ by willingly being baptized this morning.
SPEAKER_01: He's been waiting on this thing a long time.
SPEAKER_01: And subjoin upon the profession of your faith in the Lord Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_01: I'm not baptized you in the name of the Father, and of the Son.
SPEAKER_00: That kid is like, that guy's like, he's been waiting a long time.
SPEAKER_00: He's like, I'm not waiting any longer.
SPEAKER_00: Let's get this done.
SPEAKER_00: So I love that, and I think every baptism should be that exciting.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, that kid was like super excited.
SPEAKER_00: Now, I think that kid probably needs a little bit more understanding of the moment of like, you know, what's actually happening and what that symbolizes, and that's what we're gonna talk about today.
SPEAKER_00: But man, how exciting! Like, baptism is an exciting moment because it symbolizes some things that are really important to Jesus in Scripture.
SPEAKER_00: Matthew chapter 3, let's talk about it.
SPEAKER_00: What's the deal with baptism?
SPEAKER_00: Matthew 3 is the story of Jesus' baptism.
SPEAKER_00: Okay, so it's actually his baptism that we get to kind of look through today.
SPEAKER_00: And what happens in Matthew 3 is Jesus shows up to the Jordan River, kind of out in the wilderness, away from Jerusalem, and he shows up, and there's a guy named John the Baptist.
SPEAKER_00: Okay, his name was John the Baptist because he baptized a lot of people.
SPEAKER_00: That's what he was always doing.
SPEAKER_00: John was actually Jesus' cousin, and so he was Jesus' cousin.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus would have known John, John would have known Jesus, but what John was is John was also a prophet.
SPEAKER_00: So in the Old Testament, it was prophesied many, many years before that there would be a person, a great preacher, a great prophet that would come and he would prepare, it said he would prepare the way for the Messiah, who was Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: And so John comes and he goes out in the wilderness and he just kind of sets up camps.
SPEAKER_00: Says John was a little bit of a weird guy as far as like what we would see.
SPEAKER_00: You just imagine, like it said, in those days he wore clothes made of camel hair, says he ate locust and wild honey.
SPEAKER_00: So I just imagine this wild-haired, big bearded, crazy guy, you know, that's out there next to the Jordan River, and he's preaching these big sermons about forgiveness of sin and telling these people that they need to be baptized.
SPEAKER_00: And so crowds would just come out and they would just gather around John and he would preach, and at the end, he'd give an invitation, and people come forward, and he'd just start baptizing people, and all of a sudden, one day he stands up, he just brings somebody out of the water, and he looks up, and there's Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: And Jesus is wanting to be baptized by John.
SPEAKER_00: Matthew 3, verse 13, starting there, it says this Then Jesus came from Galilee to the Jordan River to be baptized by John.
SPEAKER_00: But John tried to deter him, saying, I need to be baptized by you.
SPEAKER_00: And do you come to me?
SPEAKER_00: Jesus replied, Let it be so now.
SPEAKER_00: It is proper for us to do this to fulfill all righteousness.
SPEAKER_00: And then John consented.
SPEAKER_00: Can you imagine being John?
SPEAKER_00: I mean, you've just been preaching, you got people gathered around, you're excited that they're coming down, you're baptizing them, and then you look up, and the one you've been preparing everybody for, like the one you've been talking about, that someday this one will come that will be the Messiah, means Savior, the one who will forgive the people, be the Lamb of God that forgives everyone that saves them from their sins, and you're staring him straight in the eyes, and he's saying, John, I need you to baptize me.
SPEAKER_00: And John's like, Jesus, no, no.
SPEAKER_00: And I could see a side conversation.
SPEAKER_00: It's kind of like, hey, hold up, everybody.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus, come here.
SPEAKER_00: This is not the way this is supposed to be.
SPEAKER_00: Like, if anybody needs to get baptized, it should be me.
SPEAKER_00: You should be baptizing me.
SPEAKER_00: And Jesus' like, No, John, this is the way it's supposed to be.
SPEAKER_00: And he says, and I quote, he says, we must do this to fulfill all righteousness.
SPEAKER_00: Meaning, this is the right thing to do.
SPEAKER_00: And understand, it was not the right thing to do because Jesus needed to be baptized.
SPEAKER_00: No, it was the right thing to do because we need to be baptized.
SPEAKER_00: And Jesus was instituting kind of a new symbol, a new sign, a new mark on his people.
SPEAKER_00: In the Old Testament, that mark was circumcision.
SPEAKER_00: The men were circumcised, and that for them and their family meant that they belonged to God.
SPEAKER_00: And then in the New Testament, there was this new thing that God was doing.
SPEAKER_00: And so Jesus did not need to be baptized, but we do.
SPEAKER_00: So what did he do on the first day his ministry started?
SPEAKER_00: He was baptized himself to set the example for us so that we would be able to understand that if Jesus did it, we should also do it.
SPEAKER_00: He set the example, and examples are meant to be followed.
SPEAKER_00: And so Jesus says to John, John, we need to do this.
SPEAKER_00: Now understand, there's one part of the scripture, like one part of the text that you don't catch, like you don't understand by just reading the passage.
SPEAKER_00: Like it's written to the people in that day.
SPEAKER_00: And so there are some things that are assumed that they know that we don't actually know.
SPEAKER_00: And so here's what they knew that we didn't.
SPEAKER_00: It wasn't just anybody getting baptized by John.
SPEAKER_00: Like John's down there baptizing people, and this is not just people who did not really know God, didn't grow up in a background.
SPEAKER_00: It's not people who were just sinners that did that maybe messed up their life and backslid, and now they're saying, hey, I need to come back.
SPEAKER_00: These were not non-Jewish people.
SPEAKER_00: That were Gentiles, that were wanting to convert to Judaism.
SPEAKER_00: What these were is these people who were lined up, were coming from Jerusalem and the surrounding areas.
SPEAKER_00: They were Jewish people that were asking John to baptize him then.
SPEAKER_00: They were responding to his message and getting baptized.
SPEAKER_00: And you're like, okay, big deal.
SPEAKER_00: No, it was a big deal.
SPEAKER_00: Like this was a really big deal.
SPEAKER_00: Why?
SPEAKER_00: Because culturally speaking, religiously speaking, Jewish people did not get baptized.
SPEAKER_00: Again, we go back to the Old Testament sign.
SPEAKER_00: The Old Testament sign was circumcision, it was not baptism.
SPEAKER_00: The only people that got baptized were non-Jewish people that wanted to convert to the Jewish religion, religion, Judaism, and there was a process for that.
SPEAKER_00: They were actually called Jewish proselytes.
SPEAKER_00: So stick with me here for a second.
SPEAKER_00: What was a Jewish proselyte?
SPEAKER_00: Well, the word proselyte means stranger or newcomer, meaning a person who was a stranger to the Jewish faith, that now was a newcomer that was stepping into that faith, saying, I want to adopt the religion, the laws, the customs, and the Jewish God.
SPEAKER_00: I want to follow him.
SPEAKER_00: This is a marker moment.
SPEAKER_00: And so there was a process.
SPEAKER_00: And that process for these non-Jewish people, non-Jewish people were Gentiles, but in this case, when they converted to Judaism, they were called Jewish proselytes.
SPEAKER_00: So the process was that there was circumcision, then there was sacrifice, and then there was baptism.
SPEAKER_00: So there was a sacrifice.
SPEAKER_00: They would actually go to the temple, and there would be a sin sacrifice that they would meet with the priest.
SPEAKER_00: There would be a sin sacrifice that they would have for the forgiveness of their sins, and then they would be baptized, a spiritual bath, you might say, a spiritual cleansing to mark the moment when they turned from this to now this, to adopt now the religion, the customs, the laws, and the relationship with the Jewish God.
SPEAKER_00: And so when John stands up there to Jewish people and he preaches to them, these people that what they basically had was not really a religion.
SPEAKER_00: They had a religion, but it was actually more of a tradition with a bunch of laws.
SPEAKER_00: I explain it this way.
SPEAKER_00: There was a group of friends that we had in Colorado, a basketball team that my wife coached, one of the girls that played basketball with my oldest daughter, her name was Ava, Ava's mom Lori, and their dad Kevin.
SPEAKER_00: They were Jewish.
SPEAKER_00: And I remember going to Ava's uh bots mitzvah and actually going to that and celebrating with them.
SPEAKER_00: And then we had these conversations, and my wife remembers a conversation with Lori where they were talking about, and she was asking questions about the Christian faith, and we were asking questions about the Jewish religion.
SPEAKER_00: And we got part way through the conversation, and Jen said that Lori looked at her and said, understand, we don't really have a religion, we have a tradition.
SPEAKER_00: If you know anything about the Jewish religion now, it really is more of a tradition based on the laws of the Old Testament, based on the customs and the celebrations and the different things that they do, like Passover and that.
SPEAKER_00: And Lori was just very now there's some Jewish people that it's it's more than that, but for a lot, what they would say is it's more of a tradition than it is a religion or especially a relationship with God.
SPEAKER_00: When John stood up there at the Jordan River and he preached to these groups of people, what John was saying was something very controversial.
SPEAKER_00: John was saying to them, it does not matter what family you were born into.
SPEAKER_00: It doesn't matter how religious you've been.
SPEAKER_00: It doesn't matter that you kept the laws or the feasts or the traditions of the Jewish people.
SPEAKER_00: None of that matters.
SPEAKER_00: He says, bloodlines don't matter, none of that matters.
SPEAKER_00: He says, What matters is that you take your faith and you make it a personal relationship between you and God.
SPEAKER_00: And there were people out there that were like, I've been looking for something more than just this tradition.
SPEAKER_00: I've been looking for something more that's more meaningful, and there can't just be a God that gave us all these laws, and then it just seems distant.
SPEAKER_00: There has to be something more.
SPEAKER_00: And John was saying, there is something more, and I'm preparing you for that way.
SPEAKER_00: And so John preached the forgiveness of sins, and he says, if you want more, then you should mark this moment and you should be baptized and you should seek something greater because there is one who's coming that will do something greater.
SPEAKER_00: And here's what I know that there are people sitting right here, there are people sitting right there at your campus, the people watching online right now, that you resonate with that because all you've really had throughout your life has been more of a tradition.
SPEAKER_00: Your family came to church, you went to church, whether it was like consistency consistently, or you showed up on Christmas or Easter.
SPEAKER_00: And you've been good and you've you've like been moral, and there's times you've kind of backslid and you came back and you pray to God every once in a while, and you've you've been good, and you're like, Well, I hope my good deeds outnumbered my bad deeds, and and that'll help me get there.
SPEAKER_00: Man, the New Testament story is that you cannot be good enough.
SPEAKER_00: Actually, the Old Testament and New Testament story is you cannot be good enough.
SPEAKER_00: Your sin is what separates you from God.
SPEAKER_00: And what John was doing in this moment is he was saying, There is a moment, there is a marker moment where you decide that this faith is going to be more than just a tradition or a group of laws or a code of morality.
SPEAKER_00: It is a relationship with God that not only says, This is how you live life and get the most out of life because God designed it and he said this is the best way to live it, he says, No, here's the power behind it to give you a life of purpose that you never could have imagined.
SPEAKER_00: And in that moment, Jesus walks down into the water and he gets baptized.
SPEAKER_00: And it's incredible what happens.
SPEAKER_00: It it is a marker moment.
SPEAKER_00: It is Jesus starting his ministry, and let's take a look at verse 16.
SPEAKER_00: It says that John takes him, they get into the water, says, as soon as Jesus was baptized, he went up out of the water.
SPEAKER_00: And at that moment heaven was opened, and he saw the Spirit of God descending on him like a dove and alighting on him.
SPEAKER_00: And a voice from heaven said, This is my son, whom I love, with him I am well pleased.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus goes into the water, he's lowered underneath the water, he comes back up.
SPEAKER_00: There is God the Son who was standing there, who was being baptized.
SPEAKER_00: And understand, if anybody did not need to be baptized, it was Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: He had all the marks of being a good Jewish man.
SPEAKER_00: He was circumcised, he'd gone to the temple, he had memorized the Old Testament, first five books of the Old Testament.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, he was he was the epitome of a good Jewish person, and he was sinless, he was God.
SPEAKER_00: Yet in that moment, he said it was important that he be baptized.
SPEAKER_00: He is raised up out of the water, and God the Holy Spirit descends upon him, and then God the Father affirms this moment and says, This is my son, whom I love, with him I am well pleased.
SPEAKER_00: We're gonna talk about the Trinity next week.
SPEAKER_00: God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Spirit, try to explain that.
SPEAKER_00: But in this moment, this is one place in Scripture that you see them all together, three in one, right there, affirming this is the moment that we are starting something new.
SPEAKER_00: See, Jesus didn't get baptized need to get baptized, but Jesus said it was important for him to get baptized to not only mark his ministry, but to set an example for you that you would understand the significance of this moment.
SPEAKER_00: Now, let's ask that question Why is it that that moment is so significant to Jesus?
SPEAKER_00: Why is it that in that moment the Holy Spirit descended on Jesus and affirmed him and his ministry starting, and then God the Father affirmed him as his son and the Messiah?
SPEAKER_00: Why is it so important to Jesus?
SPEAKER_00: Well, if we're gonna understand Christian baptism, now let's separate that from John's baptism because John's baptism was a baptism of repentance that was saying, you need something more, let's mark this moment.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus was getting ready to take that and make it into something even so much more significant.
SPEAKER_00: And to understand the significance of Christian baptism, you have to understand what it symbolizes.
SPEAKER_00: Because Christian baptism is a picture of the moment that's the climax in history that saves us.
SPEAKER_00: It's interesting.
SPEAKER_00: Paul writes about it.
SPEAKER_00: Paul explains it.
SPEAKER_00: So for the Apostle Paul, he wrote half of the New Testament, and in the book of Romans, he gives a picture of what Christian baptism actually is.
SPEAKER_00: And so in Romans chapter three, uh chapter six, starting at verse three, here's what Paul says.
SPEAKER_00: He says, Or don't you know that all of us who are baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death?
SPEAKER_00: So so just pause for a moment and get your mind wrapped around this.
SPEAKER_00: You think about Jesus' baptism.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus' baptism, he's buried underneath the waters, he's raised up.
SPEAKER_00: And then Paul is taking that and he's just talking about this idea of when a person is baptized, think about what you see.
SPEAKER_00: Think about what you actually see, a person down under the water and then comes back up.
SPEAKER_00: Or don't you know that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death.
SPEAKER_00: 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.
SPEAKER_00: So catch the picture.
SPEAKER_00: Every time a person is baptized, like when you see at your campus, somebody getting baptized today, you're gonna watch them walk into a baptistry and understand, is there anything significant about the water?
SPEAKER_00: No.
SPEAKER_00: Is there actually anything significant about the person baptizing them?
SPEAKER_00: No.
SPEAKER_00: What's significant is the picture.
SPEAKER_00: They walk into that baptistry and when they are lowered underneath the water, they hold their breath, they close their eyes.
SPEAKER_00: It is a picture of death.
SPEAKER_00: They are being buried.
SPEAKER_00: It's the picture of Jesus' death and his burial.
SPEAKER_00: They're being put under that water.
SPEAKER_00: When they go under that water, they can't see, they can't breathe.
SPEAKER_00: It is a symbolic picture of the death of Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: And then when they are raised up out of that water and the eyes open and they breathe in and the water's flowing down and the smile and the joy, it is a picture of the resurrection power of Jesus being applied to them.
SPEAKER_00: Now, understand this.
SPEAKER_00: Does baptism save you?
SPEAKER_00: Okay, let's think about this.
SPEAKER_00: Does baptism save you?
SPEAKER_00: No, the cross of Christ saves you.
SPEAKER_00: That is the moment where Jesus was hung on a tree, nailed to a tree.
SPEAKER_00: He was crucified, he was executed.
SPEAKER_00: The Old Testament said, His blood was shed so that our sin might be washed what?
SPEAKER_00: Whiter than snow.
SPEAKER_00: The penalty for our sin that keeps us separated from God was paid for at the cross.
SPEAKER_00: Ephesians says that it is by grace we are saved through faith.
SPEAKER_00: Okay, this is not our own works.
SPEAKER_00: We cannot be good enough.
SPEAKER_00: We place our faith in God, our faith in what happened at the cross and the resurrection, that Jesus is God, not just the Son of God, He is God.
SPEAKER_00: He is the one who paid for our sins and He is the one who defeated death.
SPEAKER_00: And at baptism, what it is, is because of our faith, we are responding to God.
SPEAKER_00: And we are saying, I believe in the death, the burial, and the resurrection of Jesus, what gives me life.
SPEAKER_00: And we are declaring our faith in him.
SPEAKER_00: We are being lowered underneath those waters as pictures of the death and then raised up as a picture of the new life in Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: Understand, baptism was so important to Jesus because it was a picture.
SPEAKER_00: What Jesus was doing was taking something that was Jewish and not actually just Jewish.
SPEAKER_00: Do you know that military leaders throughout history, even before Jesus' time, they would take their armies, they would walk them down into rivers and have them walk through the river and duck their heads under and baptize themselves, baptize themselves, set themselves apart for service in the military.
SPEAKER_00: And Jesus was taking something that was already in culture and was already in the Jewish culture.
SPEAKER_00: And what he was doing was putting a A spiritual significance and picture with it to remind us and remind us and remind us of what he has done for us and how much he loves us.
SPEAKER_00: That's the significance and the picture of baptism.
SPEAKER_00: And you go all throughout the New Testament and you see Paul write about it, you see Peter write about it, you see multiple places where it says at our baptism that we are clothed with Christ, meaning we trade our sin and he gives us his righteousness.
SPEAKER_00: And when Jesus looks at you, what is it, or when God looks at you, what does he see?
SPEAKER_00: Not you.
SPEAKER_00: In your sin, he sees Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: It says it is a pledge of good conscience toward God.
SPEAKER_00: Again, baptism not saving us, Jesus saving us, but baptism is a moment of declaration saying, Because of my faith, I am responding to what Jesus has called me to do.
SPEAKER_00: Now, catch this.
SPEAKER_00: You want to know how significant baptism was to Jesus?
SPEAKER_00: It was this significant.
SPEAKER_00: It was the first thing he did on day one of his ministry.
SPEAKER_00: He walks down in with John and he says, John, we need to do this to fulfill all righteousness.
SPEAKER_00: He's baptized as an example.
SPEAKER_00: You know what he did on his last day of ministry?
SPEAKER_00: He looks at his disciples and he gives what's called the Great Commission.
SPEAKER_00: And he says to them, This, this is the last thing we have recorded him saying to them.
SPEAKER_00: Therefore, go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I commanded you.
SPEAKER_00: And then there he went.
SPEAKER_00: Ascended into heaven.
SPEAKER_00: That's the last thing he says to his disciples.
SPEAKER_00: He tells them to go into Jerusalem.
SPEAKER_00: And they know that they're going to start this thing called the church.
SPEAKER_00: And they go into Jerusalem, and Acts chapter 2, it says that they're meeting together.
SPEAKER_00: It's about 50 days after Passover.
SPEAKER_00: It's the feast of Pentecost.
SPEAKER_00: God timed it perfectly, where like hundreds of thousands of Jews came not only for Passover, but they would also come for Pentecost to Jerusalem.
SPEAKER_00: Jews from all over the place, even different languages and different cultures of Judaism.
SPEAKER_00: And they came and they were there and they're celebrating.
SPEAKER_00: And it says the Holy Spirit came upon the 120 believers, and they began to be able to speak and to preach and to share the gospel.
SPEAKER_00: And people began to be able to hear it and understand it in their own native tongue.
SPEAKER_00: And they stood up and Peter preaches this great sermon to the people.
SPEAKER_00: And some of them who lived in Jerusalem had been there before at Passover, and they were in the crowd that was paid off to say, crucify him.
SPEAKER_00: Peter preaches to this crowd and he just lays out from the beginning all the way through Jesus and through the resurrection and says, This is the one who's been prophesied.
SPEAKER_00: This Jesus whom you crucified, he said, is Lord and Christ.
SPEAKER_00: And they look at him and they're like, What do we do?
SPEAKER_00: And what does Peter say?
SPEAKER_00: Acts chapter 2, verse 38.
SPEAKER_00: Repent and be what?
SPEAKER_00: And be what?
SPEAKER_00: Baptized.
SPEAKER_00: Repent and be baptized, every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_00: The picture of the death, burial, and resurrection in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins, and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_00: Here's the deal.
SPEAKER_00: For a Christian, baptism is not optional.
SPEAKER_00: It's not extra credit.
SPEAKER_00: You know, it's not something we do and we we pray for Jesus to be a part of our life, and then we wait for two years and we're like, okay, I think maybe they got a baptism service.
SPEAKER_00: And no, every time you see in scripture that a person placed their faith in Jesus, the natural response, the next thing they did immediately was to be baptized into the death, the burial, and the resurrection of Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus was setting apart a moment to say, this, this is what declares us as followers of Him.
SPEAKER_00: Now, around baptism, there's a lot of different teaching, a lot of different things, a lot of different backgrounds, and there's a lot of questions that people have.
SPEAKER_00: And so I do want to answer just a couple questions that there might be some of you are sitting here going, I have a couple questions, and so help me.
SPEAKER_00: And one of those questions is when am I ready to be baptized?
SPEAKER_00: Like, like when is it the right time?
SPEAKER_00: What's really interesting in the book of Acts, you see 16 different places where people respond in faith to Jesus, whether it be individuals or crowds, respond in faith to Jesus, and there's always a pattern.
SPEAKER_00: Acts chapter 8, the simplest verse that gives you that pattern is uh is a guy named Simon.
SPEAKER_00: Philip has come, he's come to Samaria, he's preaching this big revival, and there's a guy named Simon the Sorcerer.
SPEAKER_00: He's a sorcerer, witchcraft, all of that.
SPEAKER_00: And he just he puts his faith in Jesus and realizes that the resurrection is true, and he's he's called and like just his heart and he responds.
SPEAKER_00: And in Acts 8 13, it simply says this Simon himself believed and was baptized.
SPEAKER_00: That's a pattern.
SPEAKER_00: Like every time, all 16 times that you see in the book of Acts, whether it says it, says it um just out loud or it's just implied, the pattern was they believed and then they were baptized.
SPEAKER_00: And and that's like so let's think of it this way: that's you.
SPEAKER_00: If at Easter you were here in this crowd, and I asked you if you wanted to pray to receive Jesus and want to ask forgiveness of your sins and make Jesus the Lord of your life, and you raised your hand and you prayed that prayer, that's you.
SPEAKER_00: Like your next step is not to stay in that seat, not just to raise a hand, it's to declare your faith before God and say, I'm in with him.
SPEAKER_00: The death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus being applied to me.
SPEAKER_00: Now that's also why we don't baptize babies.
SPEAKER_00: Okay, and some of you might be saying, Well, I was baptized as a baby.
SPEAKER_00: What do you what do you mean?
SPEAKER_00: Well, if the pattern is believe and then be baptized, a baby can't do that.
SPEAKER_00: And there are no places in scripture where you see that example given of them baptizing babies.
SPEAKER_00: Every single example in Scripture was a person who believed and was able to make a decision to be baptized.
SPEAKER_00: Now, before you get a little tense there, and I understand that because that's a big moment and a big tradition for your family.
SPEAKER_00: If you grew up in a Catholic family or a Methodist family or a Lutheran family or some of those traditions, you may be sitting there and saying, My family did that for you.
SPEAKER_00: You know what I'd say?
SPEAKER_00: That's awesome.
SPEAKER_00: Does this baptism nullify that?
SPEAKER_00: No.
SPEAKER_00: That was a marker moment for your family where they say, and aren't you so glad that you have a family that said, we want our son or our daughter to know God, to be raised to know God.
SPEAKER_00: Man, what an incredible blessing that that is for you and your family.
SPEAKER_00: But I would also say this that is a decision your parents chose from you, for you.
SPEAKER_00: And when you understand the pattern and understand the picture, why not add to that and say, I want to be baptized because I want to have the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus applied to me because of my faith.
SPEAKER_00: Now, does it nullify your faith or does it say you're not saying no?
SPEAKER_00: You know how many Catholic people throughout history that there have been that have never been immersed in water?
SPEAKER_00: I think we have a huge God.
SPEAKER_00: But what you see and what we teach here at Central is to stay as close to the picture that we see in the early church, and when you see in the book of Acts, every time a person was immersed, not sprinkled, not poured, but was immersed under water as a picture of the death, burial, and resurrection.
SPEAKER_00: Now, last question.
SPEAKER_00: Last question would be I hear a lot of people saying, Should I get baptized again?
SPEAKER_00: Should I get baptized?
SPEAKER_00: That's a great question.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, some of you, you were baptized so young that you have a hard time remembering your baptism.
SPEAKER_00: You're like, I want to memory, I want to mark that memory.
SPEAKER_00: Some of you might say, Man, I really backslid and I'm messed up.
SPEAKER_00: And some of you maybe have grown up in a tradition in a church where to be a part of membership, no matter if you were baptized before, was you had to be baptized when you came into another church.
SPEAKER_00: Here's the thing biblically speaking, do you have to get rebaptized?
unknown: No.
SPEAKER_00: There's nowhere in scripture that says you have to get rebaptized.
SPEAKER_00: We we don't see that.
SPEAKER_00: Now, what I would say is this why not?
SPEAKER_00: Because Jesus didn't have to be crucified over and over again every time we sinned.
SPEAKER_00: And you don't have to be baptized every time you mess up.
SPEAKER_00: Like we would be doing baptize baptism service 24 hours a day all the time, right?
SPEAKER_00: If that was the case.
SPEAKER_00: Now, can you be re-baptized?
SPEAKER_00: Yes.
SPEAKER_00: If you need a marker moment, you need a moment of prevent uh repentance, you need a moment to pivot and say, I'm in with God, then yes, you can.
SPEAKER_00: And we would celebrate with you.
SPEAKER_00: Now we're not gonna baptize you every time we have a baptism service, but if you need that moment, that's between you and God.
SPEAKER_00: Now, some of you sit there and you say, I don't know, Sean, is it really that important?
SPEAKER_00: I would say it this way.
SPEAKER_00: For me, 28 years ago, I stood with my wife.
SPEAKER_00: It was our wedding ceremony, and we stood there and we made vows to each other that were promises that she was mine and I was hers.
SPEAKER_00: And then we put on rings.
SPEAKER_00: And those rings, they didn't, they didn't actually like mean we were married, they didn't make us married, but those rings let everybody know we were.
SPEAKER_00: And that's what baptism is is your faith is your commitment and your baptism is your declaration.
SPEAKER_00: And if your savior went to the cross and stretched out his arms and was willing to be crucified on a cross and shed his blood, then why wouldn't we be willing just to walk forward and say, I'm in.
SPEAKER_00: I'm in.
SPEAKER_00: I just want to ask all of you right now, just to stand at all of our campuses.
SPEAKER_00: Let's just stand right now.
SPEAKER_00: And here's what I just want to invite and say to you.
SPEAKER_00: Man, if you're sitting there today and you're just feeling a little bit of that nudge and that tug, man, that's the Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_00: Like that's the Holy Spirit pushing on you to say, hey, I think it's time.
SPEAKER_00: And you might be going, well, I didn't prepare for it.
SPEAKER_00: No problem.
SPEAKER_00: We did.
SPEAKER_00: Like we got shirts, we got clothes, we got clothes of all sizes, we got towels, we got water, we got people to receive you in the back and baptize you.
SPEAKER_00: All you got to do is walk up right front to the baptistry at your campus and just make that decision.
SPEAKER_00: Some of you are like, today?
SPEAKER_00: I'm like, yeah, today.
SPEAKER_00: Today.
SPEAKER_00: Why not?
SPEAKER_00: Don't get there tomorrow or next week and just be like, why didn't I make that decision?
SPEAKER_00: God is at calling you today to respond and declare your faith in Him.
SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna pray, and then the band at all our campuses, we're gonna sing.
SPEAKER_00: And if you want to make that decision, along with all the people who are scheduled to do that today, man, you just walk forward to that baptistry and we will celebrate with you today.
SPEAKER_00: Let's pray.
SPEAKER_00: Father, we are so grateful for Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: And God, thanks for giving us pictures that remind us of just the incredible love and grace that you have for us.
SPEAKER_00: And Father, for the person who's sitting there today wondering, should they, Father, I'd pray you would just reaffirm that they should.
SPEAKER_00: They should, not just not because we're celebrating it today, but because you you did something for us two thousand years ago.
SPEAKER_00: And then you asked us to be able to declare our faith to be unashamed of the gospel because it's the power of God for the salvation of everyone who believes.
SPEAKER_00: Father, let us declare that now.
SPEAKER_00: It's in Jesus' name that we pray.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.