A Servant King!

Sermon Summary:

What kind of king would we choose to follow? When we explore the baptism of Jesus in Matthew 3, we encounter something unexpected and revolutionary. Instead of arriving with fanfare and military might as first-century Jews anticipated, the Messiah quietly joins a line of ordinary people at the Jordan River, waiting to be baptized. This stunning act of humility reveals the heart of Jesus’ kingship—He is a servant king who identifies with humanity rather than standing above it. The baptism marks a pivotal moment in salvation history, inaugurating Jesus’ public ministry and declaring that God’s righteousness will now be on display through Him. When heaven opens and the Father proclaims His pleasure in the Son, we witness the Trinity affirming this path of humble obedience. This passage invites us to examine our own understanding of flourishing and success. True flourishing, as demonstrated by Jesus, means living in the center of God’s will, maintaining deep relationships, living purposefully, and embracing humility. As we journey through this Lenten season, we’re challenged to follow this servant king who didn’t come to be served but to serve, whose baptism foreshadowed His ultimate sacrifice and resurrection. The question for us becomes: Will we embrace the same humility and obedience that characterized Jesus’ life?

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Sermon Points:

FLOURISHING – Living life as God intended!

EXAMPLE – The best example of human flourishing is the Lord Jesus!

SERVICE – Jesus was completely committed to serving the Father and obeying His will.

For I have come down from heaven not to do my will but to do the will of him who sent me. -John 6:38

HUMILITY – Through His baptism, Jesus identified with all humanity – thus demonstrating His humility as the Son of God.

HISTORY – The Baptism of Jesus is the inauguration of the public ministry of Jesus, and it marks a significant moment in salvation history. The righteousness of God will be on display through Jesus – His life, teachings, example, death, burial, and resurrection.

Then Jesus said to them, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.” -Matthew 28:18-20

BAPTISM – Baptism is an ordinance of the church (ordained by God, communicated through Christ) to be performed by an agent of the local church. Baptism is an outward sign of an inward reality. It points the congregation and the candidate to the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus. It is reserved for believers only as it is a public profession of faith that ushers the believer into the regenerate church. It is not salvific nor is it necessary for salvation. However, it is a sign of obedience, humility, and discipleship.

Key Takeaways:

• The theme of flourishing is central, defined as living life as God intended, and is connected to the broader church initiative in partnership with Harvard and Baylor through a global study.
• Jesus is presented as the ultimate example of human flourishing through His life, relationships, and purposeful living.
• The baptism of Jesus is a key theological moment, marking His public ministry and embodying humility and obedience to God’s will.
• The theological significance of Jesus’ baptism includes its role in the salvation history, His anointing by the Holy Spirit, and the fulfillment of all righteousness.
• Baptism, both for Jesus and His followers, serves as an outward symbol of inward faith and commitment, aligning believers with Jesus’ death, burial, and resurrection.

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Scripture References:

• Matthew 3:13-17 (The Baptism of Jesus)

Stories:

• The story of Sam Houston’s humorous baptism and his subsequent commitment to supporting the church financially.
• The historical account of George Blaurock and Conrad Grable in Zurich, Switzerland, who initiated the Anabaptist movement by baptizing each other, symbolizing the start of believers’ baptism.

Sermon Transcript

Well, good morning church. It’s good to see you this morning. And thank you Michael and worship ministry for leading us. We appreciate Emily King with her testimony about our work in West Africa. And certainly Nathan and Beth have sacrificed a great deal for that ministry to continue. We’re grateful for it. Well, you know that our theme for 2025 is Flourishing Together. In fact, that theme is going to guide us over the next few years.

Rooted in Christ is what we’re focused on this first year, and we’re learning more about that. And for the intern season this year, our theme is the real story. And we are letting the Apostle Matthew be our guide as he has written this gospel account of the life of Jesus. And so, excuse me, we’re going toa make our way through portions of Matthew’s Gospel as we walk down this ancient path toward_ter so with that said, today, if you have your copy of the New Testament, I’ll invite you to look with me @Matthew 3. Very famous story out of the life of Jesus, the Baptism of Jesus.

And I’ve entitled the message today a Servant King. And so let’s look at this text. And it’s our custom to stand in the honor of the Lord Jesus when the Gospel is read. So I’ll ask you to stand if you’re able. Matthew 3:13 reads like this. Then Jesus came from Galilee to the Jordan to be baptized by John. But John tried to deter him, saying, I need to be baptized by you, and do you come to me? And Jesus replied, let it be so. Now it is proper for us to do this, to fulfill all righteousness.

Then John consented. As soon as Jesus was baptized, he went up out of the water. At that moment, heaven was opened and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and alighting on him. And a voice from heaven said, this is my son, whom I love. With him I am well pleased.

Thank you. May be seated.

Well, as you know, our theme for these next few years is built around flourishing. And when you ask Tyler Vanderwile, who is head of the Flourishing Program at Harvard, he is a committed Roman Catholic and an epidemiologist by training. When you ask him what is a simple definition of flourishing, he has offered this living life as God intended. Y’all know that our church has joined this journey and Harvard and Baylor are leading this massive research project called the Global Flourishing Study, where they are engaged in a survey of over 200,000 adults across 22 countries. It’s a five year longitudinal study, the largest of its kind in history in the field of sociology.

And you know that we are connected to that journey. We had our launch weekend in January, and Kate Long, who’s A researcher from Harvard, Scott Hare, who is one of the fellows at Baylor, we’re here for that weekend. And we began this journey to learn together about what does it mean to flourish, what is involved in human flourishing. And y’all remember that many of us took this survey that Harvard has made available, and basically looking at the various domains that they have, isolated, that together, they believe, form a composite portrait of a flourishing person. And out of that journey together, we’ve had some small groups that have launched some flourishing groups.

Cindy and I began ours last Thursday night, actually, with some friends of ours from Dallas. A number of you have started some of those. There are more be to be launched as well. And I am writing for you a prayer for flourishing because what we’re most interested in, the research that’s being done globally, we’re interested in exploring what does it mean for a Christian to flourish. What does it mean for congregation to flourish.

And so this prayer that I am working on for you all is a prayer that will engage you in your own personal prayer as a congregate. And then I will invite you to a time of prayer for the congregation, and then I will also guide you in a prayer for the community. And once it’s completed, we’ll distribute those for you. And so our hope is that we will learn more individually, personally, about what it means to flourish. But I also want you to know that we’re interested in that on a corporate scale.

And what I mean by that is we also want our church to flourish. And so we have several groups underway that are researching various things on your behalf, and some of you were involved in those, and all of it is under the heading of flourishing. So, for example, we’ve just completed our budget preparation. Last Sunday, we voted on our annual budget, which takes effect April 1st. And you 99% of us voted in favor of that budget.

And actually, it was prepared with the understanding that our desire is to address flourishing from a financial perspective. And so our conversation’s about stewardship and how we’re going to invest our financial resources, we’re all under the heading of a flourishing congregation. We have also made decisions about our missional investments. We want to be invested in missions in a way that reflects the desire to flourish. Our foundational partners, Mission Arlington and Restore Hope, we want to engage in ministry through them according to our sense of God’s leadership.

In Texas, we primarily support the Baptist General Convention of Texas. When it comes to North America, we believe we’re supposed to be invested in missions and ministry in North America. And so we have joined a new movement called Ascent. And you’re going to be hearing more about it. As a matter of fact, There are about five of us staff members that are flying tomorrow to Washington D.C. and we’re going to participate in a North American wide meeting.

There are about 200 leaders coming from across North America, Canada and multiple places in the U.S. mission leaders, heads of denominational adjudicator, seminary presidents, pastors. And we’re learning together about the calling of God across traditional denominational lines to gather underneath the heading of what we’re calling Ascent. And I am the chair of that council and a lot of us will be there so you can pray for us. We’re investing in re evangelizing North America. When we look at the world, we’re connected to the Baptist World Alliance.

It’s our desire to see the gospel shared with the world and the hardest to reach places in the world. And we also are connected to others as well. All of that is under the heading of flourishing. Believe it or not, we’re even in the process of studying our governance as a church, the charters of all of our committees and all of our councils, and how decisions are made in the life of a church like ours. And all that’s being done underneath the heading of flourishing.

Even our staff structure, as we’re looking at ways that we’re connected as a staff, all of it is in the hopes that we want to help our church flourishes. A congregation. So we’re taking this seriously, we’re going to slow walk it. So I want you to know this is a long conversation that we believe is gonna have impact in our lives individually, in the congregational life, and hopefully it spills over into the community because we believe God has designed his creation to flourish. Now with that said, when you think about examples of human flourishing, can you think of anybody, you know, human being who just flourishes?

Got anybody in your mind when you think, man, when I see that person, they’re flourishing. I would say the best example of human flourishing that I know is the Lord Jesus. How about that? I would point us to Jesus. I believe that Jesus flourished in every respect.

So this Lenton season we are going to follow Matthew and we’re going to learn more about how Jesus flourished. This week I’m going to ask you to read Matthew 3 and focus on the story that’s found on that particular page. And we’re not going to go verse by verse through Matthew on Sunday mornings. We’re doing that on Wednesdays at the pastor’s Bible study. We’re just walking through the Gospel of Matthew.

But we’re going to let Matthew guide us as a church. Eventually we will land a Holy Week. And when we get to Palm Sunday, our own Ryan Chandler has written a Sunday School lesson Bible study curriculum for you if you choose to use it about from the Gospel of Matthew to be used on Palm Sunday. He’s also writing one for Easter Sunday. I’ve written a devotional guide for us all for each day of the week during Holy Week, all of it with the intent to help us better understand who Jesus is, what kind of king he is, and how he flourished in his humanity.

And I would point you to him. Jesus was in the center of the will of God. That’s connected to flourishing. That’s kind of what it means to live life as God intended. Jesus had deep relationships.

He was connected relationally to the people around him. Jesus was a healthy person. In fact, everywhere he went, he was an agent of healing. He was that person. Jesus was a person who lived purposefully.

In fact, his life was incredibly effective because of his commitment to the will of God. And so when you look at him, Jesus lived that abundant life that he describes for us. And so I will constantly during this season point us to him. Now, with that said, you remember last Sunday morning, we just looked at the genealogy of Matthew’s gospel in Matthew 1, and we talked about how Jesus was born a king. Well, here’s the question.

What kind of king is Jesus? Matthew’s gospel is unfolding in front of us and we’ve just read in Matthew 1 about the genealogy of Jesus. Matthew 2, you read about the birth of Jesus, and so you might be asking the question, well, what kind of king will Jesus become? Or how will he prove himself to be one? Well, if you still have your Bibles open, if you look back, Matthew 3, just a couple of verses before what we just read in verse 13, if you’ll go back to verse 11, Matthews introduced the ministry of John the Baptist.

And so John the Baptist shares this powerful message in his preaching. And if you look at verse 11, here’s what he says. I’m baptizing you with water for repentance. But after me comes one who’s more powerful than I. He says, in fact, his sandals.

I can’t even carry his sandals. And he’ll baptize you with the Holy Spirit and with fire, his winnowing forks in his hand. He’s going to clear the threshing floor. He’s going to gather the wheat in the barn and burn up the Chaff with unquenchable fire. In other words, he is coming mighty and victorious.

And that right there would feed right into the first century expectation of the Messiah. You can imagine some of the Jewish leaders hearing that saying, yes, when that Messiah comes, he’s going to run those Romans out of Israel on a rail. That’s what they were looking for. He’ll show up on, on a steed, majestic, powerful, with an army, and he is going to be our Messiah. As a matter of fact, when you read some of the things in the first century, it wasn’t that uncommon for Jews to say things like this.

Well, it’s like this right now. But when the Messiah comes, that’ll all change. You know where we’re dealing with this right now. But when the Messiah comes, it’s going to be different. And now here we are with this message from John the Baptist and the Messiah has come.

Well, what kind of king is he going to be? It turns out a servant king. In fact, that word service, I think it captures the ministry of Jesus. Jesus was completely committed to serving the Father and obeying his will. And he refused temptation to be deterred from the will of God for his life.

So how did Jesus show up? John the Baptist says, he’s coming with fire, unquenchable fire. And then look at the very next verse, verse 13. Then Jesus came down from Galilee to Jordan and stood in line to get baptized. I mean, seriously, that’s the introduction we get to the Messiah.

He came from this agricultural region known as Galilee, associated with Gentiles because there were so many Gentiles who lived in that part of Israel. And he comes to the Jordan river and he gets in line to be baptized. Well, that just shows us who Jesus is going to reveal himself to be. John recognizes him. John.

Notice that when John sees him, John says, wait a minute, you ought to be baptizing me. Now. How much interaction had Jesus and John the Baptist already had? I mean, did they know each other? Did they see each other as children?

Did they have a relationship as adults? You know, you know, their moms were cousins. You remember that story where Mary went and visited Elizabeth when they were both pregnant? You remember that? Well, the truth is we don’t know.

We’re not really sure how much relationship they had. We don’t know if they saw each other’s kids. We don’t know if they met up in Jerusalem and all the festivals. We’re really not sure. Here’s what Herschel Hobbes, who’s written a great commentary on Matthew, he says, this is the most faithful meeting of two men in all of history.

Jesus and John the Baptist. Cause after this meeting, everything changes. So we don’t really know for sure, but here’s what we do know. John the Baptist knew Jesus. And when he saw Jesus, he said, you know what?

You should baptize me. And here’s what Jesus said. He said, no, you’re gonna baptize me. This is going to fulfill righteousness. And John said, okay.

And he baptizes Jesus. In other words, all Jesus is interested in is the will of God. That shouldn’t surprise us, because that’s what Jesus said about himself in John 6:38. Jesus said, I’ve come down from heaven that not to do my will, but to do the will of him who sent me. And so he’s going to demonstrate a powerful character trait as a king.

Humility. And through his baptism, Jesus identified with all humanity, thus demonstrating his humility as the Son of God. Think about where Jesus could have been that day at the Jordan River. He could have walked in the water and stood next to John the Baptist and told everybody, y’all need to repent. And we would have all said, absolutely.

As a matter of fact, he had more authority to do that than John the Baptist did. But that’s not what he did. Instead of joining John the Baptist, he joined all of us. And Jesus got in line and identified himself with all of humanity. Now, let’s be clear.

He submitted himself to baptism, but not a baptism of repentance. Because Jesus had nothing from which to repent. He had never sinned. So he wasn’t being baptized as a sinner. He’s just identifying with sinners.

And he’s demonstrated his humility. Here’s what he actually also did. He connected himself to the ministry of John the Baptist, and he launches a new era. So I want you to think about that this week if you’ll take the time to read John Matthew 3 and think about where we are in history. When you read Matthew 3, Malachi is the last book of our Old Testament, the way it’s arranged for us as Protestants and as Christians.

Well, when you get to the end of Malachi, 400 years pass and there’s no prophetic word from God. It’s a silent era for the Jews. The Jews were longing to hear another word from God, another prophetic word from God. So when you’re reading Matthew 3, it’s been 400 years, and now God’s voice powerfully is communicated through a new prophet. John The Baptist.

And Matthew connects the ministry of John the Baptist to the story of salvation history. And he says this is the fulfillment of the prophecy in Isaiah. A voice crying in the wilderness. And so the story of salvation history now comes alive once again. At this moment in time, when John the Baptist begins his public ministry, what does Jesus do?

Jesus affirms that ministry. Jesus blesses the ministry of John the Baptist. He connects himself to this story of salvation history. He steps into this moment, and now what’s about to happen is a new era is going to be launched. The kingdom of God has now come near and Jesus is going to announce it.

And he connects it to this prophetic role that John the Baptist plays as he bridges the gap between the Old Testament and the New Testament, between the Old Covenant and the New Covenant. Okay, so with that said, y’all still with me? Alright, so here’s what I want us to do this morning. I want us to reflect for just a minute or two, if we can, on the significance of the baptism of Jesus. Why did Jesus get baptized?

It’s recorded in all four gospels, some version of it. Why? Why did Jesus get baptized? What does it mean theologically? And then I want us to take a couple of minutes and reflect upon baptism in general.

What does baptism mean for us as Christians? Okay, so let’s do both of those now. I don’t have time to unpack both of them this morning. So if you’re, if you’re interested in more information about that.

I’ve already talked about the baptism of Jesus in my pastor’s Bible study. It was on February 19th. You can go to our YouTube channel, FBCAT TV on YouTube and you can watch the February 19th Pastor’s Bible Study. And I will explore in depth the meaning of the baptism of Jesus. Okay, so let’s think about it.

It’s a connection to history’s what I would say. The baptism of Jesus is the inauguration of the public ministry of Jesus. It Marks a significant moment in salvation history. Jesus declares that the righteousness of God will now be on display through him, through Jesus, his life, his teachings, his example, his death, his burial, his resurrection. Jesus is proclaiming that in his baptism.

Why was Jesus baptized? Well, this is where Jesus inaugurates his public ministry. He is anointed by the Holy Spirit at his baptism. He’s not anointed king. He’s already a king.

He was born a king. He’s now a king, anointed. And the Spirit of God now descends upon him. And he is going to proclaim the kingdom of God. And a voice from heaven declared, this is my son.

I’m pleased with him. And so the ministry of Jesus is now launched, and he steps into a moment of what scholars typically refer to as salvation. He’s connecting the prophecy of Isaiah fulfilled in John the Baptist to the Messiah. So it is a messianic moment in history, and it is a public messianic moment. It’s where Jesus is declaring something through his humble baptism, and he is going to be revealing himself as the Messiah.

But I want you to notice what Jesus said, what he told John the Baptist. He said, we’re going to do this verse 15, because we now have to fulfill all righteousness. The righteousness of God, in other words, is what Jesus is referring to. And what that means is, is from now on, the full righteousness of God is going to be on display in and through Jesus. The righteousness of God, God’s very character and nature, God’s expectations for humanity, God’s desire for all of us is.

Is now going to be on display in Jesus through his life, his example, his teachings. But also the righteousness of God will be satisfied through the death of Jesus, his burial and ultimate resurrection. And so the baptism of Jesus through this expression of incredible humility is a profound theological moment in salvation history. Jesus is Marking the beginning of his proclamation of the kingdom of God. It’s also a prophetic moment because when Jesus is baptized and he’s laid down in the water and he’s raised up, it’s a foretaste, if you will, prophetically of the death and burial and resurrection of Jesus himself.

So Jesus is forecasting the kind of messiah he’s going to be. He’s going to be a suffering servant, and he’s going to give his life for us. But he will ultimately, through his death, defeat sin and through his resurrection, conquer death. Hallelujah. So the baptism of Jesus is a theologically profound and significant moment.

Then you get to the end of Matthew’s Gospel, and guess what? Jesus says, all of you now to be baptized. He was baptized, and now all of his followers are to be baptized. Matthew 20:8. At the very end of Matthew’s Gospel, here’s what it says.

Jesus said to them, all authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit and teaching them to obey everything I’ve commanded you. And surely I am m with you always, even to the very end of the age. So Jesus says, go make disciples of all the peoples of the world. And once that occurs, baptize them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.

There’s so much in that that I don’t have time to go into today. There’s a whole treatment of the Trinity. You see, the word name is in singular and it’s qualified in the plural. Father, Son and Spirit. There’s, there’s a lot there.

I just want to focus in on this command from Jesus. Go make disciples, baptize them. And so what is so significant about baptism? Why is it that Jesus said we are all to be baptized? Well, here’s what I would tell you.

Every major denomination baptizes throughout the history of Christianity. From this moment on, we have evidence of baptisms taking place in the ancient church. If you see your 8:30 brothers and sisters, I didn’t have time to discuss some of this this morning with them, but I will just say this. The ancient baptisteries that we have unearthed, that we’ve discovered archaeologically, all of the ancient baptisms were built for immersion. And they’re eight sided for the most part.

They’re shaped like an octagon. And the reason for that is, is because Jesus was resurrected on the eighth day. If you think about Palm Sunday beginning on Sunday and then at the end of that week on Friday, Jesus is put to death. He’s resurrected on the following Sunday. So that eighth day is the symbol of the new life.

So it was very common for ancient baptisteries to be eight sided, representing that eighth day of new life, if that makes sense. But over time, the practice of baptism will change. And throughout history it will be either practiced through sprinkling or through pouring or through immersion. Now, with all that said, let me just talk to you a little bit about what baptism means and let me just do it from this perspective. I want to share with you what baptism means to us here at first Baptism.

Arlington. Let me do it that way from our tradition, because most times many people have questions about baptism. So let me take this baptism of Jesus, the theological significance of it in transition to a conversation about baptism from our perspective. Here’s what I would say about baptism from our perspective. Baptism is an ordinance of the church.

That means it’s been ordained by God, communicated through Christ, to be performed by an agent of the local church. Baptism is an outward sign of an inward reality. It points the congregation and the candidate to the death, burial and resurrection of Jesus. It is reserved for believers only, as it is a public profession. Of faith that ushers the believer into the regenerate church.

It is not salvific nor is it necessary for salvation. However, it is a sign of obedience, humility and discipleship. Now let me just walk you through all of that. From our perspective, is baptism important to us? Well, the name of our church is first.

Okay, so we belong to a denomination historically, traditionally that has embraced a certain view of baptism. What is that view of baptism? Well, let me just walk you through it this morning. First of all, we believe baptism is an ordinance. You know, words, theological words, all have meaning.

Sometimes in some denominational traditions, baptism is referred to as a sacrament. I actually like the word sacrament. However, it’s a word that has somewhat been co opted by our more liturgical brothers and sisters. So we have to be careful when we use it from our tradition. But the word sacrament does refer to an outward sign.

Sometimes it reflects an inward work of grace. So I prefer the word for us to be the word ordinance. The word ordinance comes from the fact that God has ordained this to take place in the life of the church through Christ. Typically, from our perspective, baptism is overseen by the local church. That means that local churches perform baptisms.

An agent of the local church doesn’t have to be the pastor of the church, but it’s whoever the church sanctions to baptize. Some churches who are in our tradition, anyone can baptize. Now we have people, we have examples where someone perhaps leads someone to Christ and they’re the ones that baptize them. There’s no necessarily rule for that. But the point is it’s governed by, practiced by, overseen by the local church.

And historically, the way we view it theologically is this. It’s an outward sign of an inward reality. In other words, our view would be that baptism is a symbol. It points to something else. It represents something else beyond just the act of it, if you will.

And it is an outward sign. And it represents publicly what has already happened personally and privately to the one being baptized. So the person who’s being baptized has already made this personal, private commitment that it’s not just a promise toward that commitment. It represents the reality of that commitment already being made. Does that make sense?

The way we understand baptism? Baptism takes place as a public demonstration, if you will, of a private faith where a person being baptized has made that decision internally, privately and personally to become a follower of Jesus. Then it points the congregation and the candidate to a reality beyond just the baptism of that one person. It points all of us to the death, burial and resurrection. Of Jesus himself.

And so when we celebrate baptism and when we see someone being baptized, we are to be reminded that this person has accepted something that we all believe to be true. That is that Jesus has lived the perfect life. He has modeled for us as an example of what God expects from us. And he now has offered up his life on the cross as a sacrifice for our sin. And God has gloriously resurrected him from the dead after accepting him as a legitimate sacrifice as the Lamb of God.

And so, the person who’s baptized, when we see them placed in the water and then brought up out of the water, it reminds every one of us of the death and the burial and the resurrection, Jesus himself. So, it’s a powerful symbol. At our church, we baptize y’all still. Are we still together here? And let me say this.

We’re doing this humbly because every denomination and every local church has the right and I would say the responsibility to draw a circle and say, this is who we are. It’s called self definition. Everybody has to do it, and we do it humbly without pointing our finger at any other denomination and act like that. We don’t accept or care for the way they choose to do it.

So it’s all done in humility. We baptized by immersion. That means we place a person who’s going to be baptized, typically completely under the water and raise them up. Why do we do that? We do that for a couple of reasons.

One is the word baptize itself. It’s not actually an English word, it’s a Greek word. It was transliterated from Greek into English. The baptizo is the Greek word, and it means to completely immerse in water. In fact, it’s as best we read the text, is how Jesus was baptized.

He came straight way up out of the water. And so we baptized by immersion. Believers only. We only baptize believers. In other words, the person that’s being baptized is making a public profession of what they have already privately decided to do.

And so that means that when someone is baptized at our church, they’re baptized as a believer. They’ve made a decision to follow Christ. We wait until they make that decision before we baptize them. You know, there have been, again, a lot of famous baptisms. Y’all.

You know, y’all are a bunch of Texans. So Sam Houston, right? Y’all know Sam Houston? Do you know he became a Christian? There was a pastor named George Baines.

Lyndon Baines Johnson’s, I think is his great grandfather, led Sam Houston to Christ Sam Houston was baptized in Independence, Texas, by Rufus Burleson, who was the president of Baylor at the time. And according to the story, when he baptized, he baptized him in a creek there outside of Independence. When he baptized Sam Houston, he told Sam, he said, well, General, all your sins have been washed away. And Sam Houston said, lord, help all the fishes downstream. So also when he was baptized, he told the preacher, he said, I forgot to take my pocketbook out.

He said, so you baptized my pocketbook? And Rufus Beruson said, I think that’s a good thing. And then Sam Houston said, well, I’ll commit myself to paying half of the preacher’s salary as long as I’m alive. So I think that’s actually a pretty good thing, to be honest with you. But nevertheless, baptism is an important thing.

There have been some significant baptisms, obviously. Well, when someone is baptized the way we understand it, they are then baptized as a believer into the regenerate church. What that means is to be a full member of one Baptist Arlington. We ask that you become a baptized believer. You don’t have to be baptized by us, but a baptized believer, because we are a believer’s church.

That means the people who are part of this church have made a commitment to follow Christ in their baptism. They have demonstrated they have died to their old lives and they’ve been raised to a new life, as the Bible says in Romans. And they are now baptized believers, and they are part of the regenerate church, if you will. So the members of our church are baptized believers. Now, with all that said, here’s what we also would say.

We don’t believe that baptism is salvific. What I mean by that is we do not believe that you have to be baptized to be a Christian. We don’t believe you have to be baptized as a believer, if you will, in order to experience eternal life. What’s the best example of that?

The thief on the cross. Jesus said, today you’ll be with me in Paradise. Acts chapter 16. The Philippian jailer asked Paul, what must I do to be saved? Paul said, believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you’ll be saved.

And so we believe, confessing your faith in Christ, that’s when salvation occurs. As much as we believe baptism is important, we do not believe it is necessary for salvation. And by that I mean baptism as a believer. By rian, we don’t believe baptism of any type is salvific. From our perspective, we believe we are saved by the grace of God through the shed blood of Jesus Christ by grace Only.

However, with that said, we also believe that baptism is a sign of humility. We believe it’s a sign of obedience. We believe it’s a sign of discipleship. Jesus told us to go and make disciples and baptize them. So that that’s why we baptize people as a church.

It’s a powerful, beautiful symbol that we take very seriously. And I would say this. I’m so grateful that every church that I know of that is a orthodox Christian church takes baptism seriously. We all should. Regardless of whether a church practices infant baptism, or they practice baptism by sprinkling, or they practice baptism by pouring, or they practice baptism by immersion.

Every major denomination I know of has a theology of baptism. That’s how important it is. It’s one of the commands that’s been left to us by Jesus. Now, you and I have been influenced by history as well. In fact, this past month or two months ago in January, we celebrated a 500th anniversary of baptism.

Actually, there were a group of young men who were studying the Bible in Zurich, Switzerland in the early 1500s. And they had become convinced that believers should be baptized. And they lived in an era when the entire Western church baptized infants. They had all been baptized as infants. And they became committed after studying the scripture that they should be baptized as believers.

The problem was the town council actually controlled those kinds of things in Zurich at the time. And so January 21st of 1525 that morning, the city council met and forbid this group of men to meet again and have a Bible study in somebody’s home because they thought they were too radical. That night they met anyway. They gathered at the house of a man named Felix Mons. And there were several of them and they had their Bibles with them.

And they said, we believe we’re supposed to be baptized as believers. And so George Blaurock, he looked at Conrad Grablel and said, I want you to baptize me now. They didn’t have a Baptistry. They didn’t have a swimming pool. So Blaurock kneeled in front of Conrad Grable.

Conrad Grablel got a ladle and he baptized Blaurock by pouring. Blauot then baptized the rest of the men that room. And they launched a brand new movement. Nobody knew what to call them because they didn’t have a name. And so the pastor of the town gave them a name.

He called them the Ana Baptist. Anna means to redo something in Latin. The re baptizers. Because all these men have been baptized. Within three months, over 500 more people have been baptized in the next couple of years.

Most everybody in that room was put to death by drowning. That’s how they were persecuted. But eventually that movement would find its way to Amsterdam and they would encounter some folks from England who would become convinced of the very same thing. They would go back to England in 1613 and plant the very first Baptist church on English soil. And eventually some of those folks would make their way across the ocean and come all the way to the US and as I stand here today in 2025, Baptists are the largest Protestant denomination in America.

So we’ve come a long way from that meeting in 1525 at one man’s house in Zurich, Switzerland. And there was so much more in the conversation than just believers baptism. But believers, baptism is something that has been practiced now within the life of local churches for over 500 years. And you and I stand in that tradition. But let me remind you, we stand in it humbly because we follow a servant king, and in his baptism he was humble also.

And so let’s you and I carry our faith humbly as we’re a part of a large Christian family that’s trying to take a gospel that a world needs so desperately so that they can hear the good news of Jesus. So le’you and I commit ourselves to being humble, convicted in what we believe, but also recognizing that we’re part of a much larger family. May that be so. Let’s pray together.

Well, Father, today we bow humbly before you. And I want to thank you for the example of Jesus. Lord, would it be possible that you could lead us to do everything in the spirit of Jesus, to share our convictions humbly, to live graciously among our peers, to walk humbly with you, to walk humbly with fellow believers, to carry our own convictions and to express them as best we know, but doing them with an understanding that is only by your grace that we know you in the first place. So I thank you for the example of Jesus, for his life, his death on a cross, his resurrection from the dead. Today we thank you for his example in humility, submitting himself to be baptized.

Lord, I pray that you’ll find in us a very humble faith where we follow you as best we know how and may you receive the glory from it. And we pray that in Jesus name.