In the New Testament, baptism is a specific command for believers. I want to share with you the teaching about baptism and what is happening at FBC.

All churches (to my knowledge) practice baptism, but the way that they practice is very different. All of you have heard me say that we at FBC want to follow as closely as possible the teaching of Scripture concerning all of our practices.

So, what does the New Testament tell us about baptism? First, baptism is an accepted and expected practice in the New Testament and the New Testament church. At the beginning of the story of Jesus, John the Baptist, the forerunner of Jesus, practiced baptism and Jesus came to John for baptism. Obviously, Jesus did not have to have His sins “washed away.” Therefore, we should look for a different meaning to baptism. We find in the Scripture that baptism is not to forgive sin but to show that the believer has submitted to Christ and is following Him. It “marks” the follower as a believer.

This is how we see baptism. Baptism is an outward demonstration of an inward commitment that has already occurred. It always follows the commitment (infant baptism is not found in Scripture) and is always practiced by the person being immersed in water. The word “baptism” actually means “to dip.”

My guess is that you have many questions about baptism. I would love to have conversations and questions about following Christ and baptism. Please allow me and our other pastors to help you with this.

Who is baptized at FBC? Last year, 103 total: 38 children, 20 teens, and 45 adults (21 men and 24 women). This is a fairly typical year, except that we usually baptize more adults than youth and children combined and more men than women. Even this year, adults are the largest group.

I look forward to discussions about following Christ.