Stand up for Baptism

The greatest day of my childhood was the day I got baptized. My parents joined the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Saints a few short months before I turned 8. I rememeber the faces smiling back at me as I came up out of the water. I remember being told how my friend Billy and I were the cleanest members of the church. (We had gotten baptized the same day.) I remember thinking that it was a good thing to have been Baptized.

Twenty seven years have passed since that day in March. I still feel the same way I did then. It was a good thing to be baptized.

That day I started on a road back to my Heavenly Father. To get back to him all of us have to start there. That gate is called baptism. Following the Savior, the example he set for us to be obedient and be baptized that we might come to him.

This thing called baptism is not just something that we do. It really means something. We are outwardly showing that we want to follow the Savior. We show that we are willing to put off the natural man and become more like our elder brother.

To be baptized is symbolic of the death, burial and resurrection of the Savior. Quite literally we are putting to rest the evil. then we are raised to a new life. We are exercising our faith in the Atonement of Jesus Christ.

Paul taught "Why tarriest thou" if you know you should be baptized... why aren't you? Alma the Elder taught at the Waters of Mormon.

"8 And it came to pass that he said unto them: Behold, here are the waters of Mormon (for thus were they called) and now, as ye are desirous to come into the fold of God, and to be called his people, and are willing to bear one another’s burdens, that they may be light;

9 Yea, and are willing to mourn with those that mourn; yea, and comfort those that stand in need of comfort, and to stand as witneese of God at all times and in all things, and in all places that ye may be in, even until death, that ye may be redeemed of God, and be numbered with those of the first resurrection, that ye may have eternal life—

10 Now I say unto you, if this be the desire of your hearts, what have you against being baptized in the name of the Lord, as a witness before him that ye have entered into a covenant with him, that ye will serve him and keep his commandments, that he may pour out his Spirit more abundantly upon you?

The great thing is that this is where it all begins. This is where it all starts to count. We become responsible for repenting and coming closer to Our Father.