Baptism

"By Small And Simple Things" By the California San Jose Mission

 Having faith in Jesus Christ and repenting of our sins leads us to our first ordinance of the gospel which is baptism. An ordinance is a sacred ceremony or rite that shows that we are entering into a covenant with God. A covenant is a two way promise between you and God in which the terms are set by God. God has always required His children to make covenants.

  God is a just God and will keep His promise to bless us as we live up to the covenants we make with Him. Keeping covenants brings blessings in this life and exaltation in the life to come. Covenants place us under a strong obligation to honor our commitments to God. Our covenants should be reminders to us that we need to repent every day of our lives.

 When we are baptized we make our first covenant with God. We covenant to take upon ourselves the name of Jesus Christ, always remember Him, and keep His commandments. As we keep our part of the covenant, God promises us in return the constant companionship of the Holy Ghost, a remission of our sins, and to be spiritually born again.

 

  Jesus taught that "except a man be born of water and of the spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God" (John 3:5). We must follow the example of Jesus Christ and be baptized by immersion for the remission, or forgiveness, of our sins. Baptism by immersion is symbolic of the death, burial, and resurrection of the Savior. Similarly, it represents the end of our old life of sin and a commitment to live a new life as a disciple of Christ. The Savior taught that baptism is a spiritual rebirth. When we are baptized we begin the process of being born again and become spiritual sons and daughters of Christ.

 Another reason we must be baptized is for membership into Christ's true church - The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. This ordinance is a law of God and must be performed by His priesthood authority.

  Little children do not need to be baptized and are redeemed through the mercy of Jesus Christ (Moroni 8:4–24). They are not to be baptized until they reach the age of accountability, which is eight years of age. 

  Because nobody is perfect and we all sin, God has provided a way for us to be spiritually renewed every week. The way that we do this is by worthily partaking of the sacrament. Partaking of the sacrament weekly is a commandment. We partake of the bread and water in remembrance of Christ's body and blood which was shed for us. When we worthily do this, we are renewing the covenants that we made at baptism. We have a renewal of the Spirit and we are perfectly clean again just like we were at baptism. Neato, eh!? The sacrament is a weekly reminder of our covenants. Jesus Christ introduced this ordinance to His Apostles just before His Atoning sacrifice. 

  Jesus Christ was the only perfect person to ever walk the earth. He didn't need to be baptized for the remission of sins, but he did need to be baptized to fulfill all righteousness and be perfectly obedient to His Father in Heaven. Alma gave great counsel in the Book of Mormon when he said, "And now, if the Lamb of God, he being holy, should have need to be baptized by water, to fulfill all righteousness, O then, how much more need have we, being unholy, to be baptized, yea, even by water!" (2 Nephi 31:5).