God has always used water as a sign to cleanse and consecrate His people. When He made the world, the Lord created a garden in which to place Man, and in that garden there was a river. The garden at the end of the Bible has a pure river of water of life in it too. When God judged the ancient world for its wickedness, he used water both to drown the ungodly and to bear up the Ark and deliver Noah and his family. The Lord brought His people out of slavery in Egypt and saved them from their enemies by leading them through the Red Sea. Forty years later He led their children into the Promised Land by leading them through the water of the Jordan River. In the days of Elijah, God withheld rain and then he gave rain in great abundance as signs of power, judgment, and salvation. Jesus turned water into wine, stilled stormy waters by the power of His word, and walked not through but on top of the sea. These and a dozen other stories like them are the background for what we are about to do today.
Baptism is a picture of judgment and of salvation. It is a sign to mark, cleanse, and dedicate God’s servants. It is a ritual by which we are brought into covenant with the Lord and made part of his family. It is a sacrament, a means of grace, whereby through the outward application of water, we are assured of God’s inward application of the blood of Christ which washes away our sins.
Baptism is sometimes administered by sprinkling, sometimes by pouring, sometimes by immersion. We are persuaded that any one of these modes is acceptable. Today water will fall upon our brother’s head just as the rain fell upon Noah’s Ark. It fell to destroy the sin in that ancient world, and it fell to save Noah and his family. The waters of baptism remind us that we are sprinkled with the blood of Christ, the Lamb of God. The application of water is like the anointing of a priest or a king, and we are called to be priests and kings in the service of our Lord. It is the Holy Spirit who descends upon us to mark us as the people of God. It will not take long for this water to dry, but the Holy Spirit and blessing of God which it signifies and seals will remain with you and upon you forever. --JME
