This past Sunday I preached another message in my current sermon series  "Sermons From The Stained Glass."  There are twenty stained glass windows in our church and I'm preaching messages from the scenes depicted in those windows.  So far, I've used  6 of the windows.  Last Sunday was on scene of Jesus baptism. 

In Matthew 3:13-17, the Bible says Jesus was baptized by John the Baptist.  This scene highlights one of the two ordinances that Southern Baptist churches observe; the Lord's Supper and baptism.  In the message Sunday we looked at...

I.  The Meaning of Baptism.

The greek word that is translated "baptize" is the word "baptizo."  It means to "immerse" which means to totallly submerge someone in water for baptism.  There are Christian groups who practice a form of baptism known as "sprinking."  Obviously, that's different from immersion.  Baptists believe that the Biblical mode of baptism is immersion and then, it's for believers only. 

This is so important that our belief in baptism by immersion led to the formation of the Baptist church.  In 1609 in Holland, a minister by the name of John Smith baptized himself and others and formed the first Baptist church in history.              

              II.  The Message of Baptism. 
             The apostle Paul explained the message of baptism when he said, "Or do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus have been baptized into His death?  Therefore we have been buried with Him through baptism into death, in order that as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life" (Romans 6:3-4).

                When a person goes under the water they are being buried with Christ.  When they come up out of the water, they are being raised to walk in newness of life. 

Charles Haddon Spurgeon said, “Christ came not to make bad men good or good men better, but to make dead men live.”