Besides the physical ordinance of baptism and the laying on of hands, one must be spiritually born again to gain exaltation and eternal life.
Furthermore, through the believer's spirit the Holy Spirit is able to impart God's life to thirsty and dying men. However, this filling of the Holy Spirit differs from the baptism with the Holy Spirit, because the latter is for the purpose of service while the former solves the problem of life (naturally it will affect service too).
All of us who desire the kingdom of God are, by the Lord's decree, under an equal and rigorous necessity of seeking after the grace of Baptism.
To deny that in a child after baptism sin remains is to treat with contempt both Paul and Christ.
Oh! for this baptism of fire! when every spoken word for Jesus shall be a thunderbolt, and every prayer shall bring forth a mighty flood.
We are in China in obedience to the command of our Lord; and the purpose of our Mission is to disciple and make Christians of this great nation. . . This is a great spiritual work, and to secure success in it we need the abiding presence of the Spirit, and through the Spirit such a full baptism of power as will perfectly fit each one of us for the special work which God has given him to do.
Unless a man be born again of water and the Holy Spirit he cannot enter the kingdom of God. No one is excepted, not [even] the infant.
Then he gave her a kiss on the forehead that felt like a baptism and she wept like a baby.
Religion needs a baptism of horse sense.
Every soul that is born into flesh is soiled by the filth of wickedness and sin. . . . In the Church, baptism is given for the remission of sins, and, according to the usage of the Church, baptism is given even to infants. If there were nothing in infants which required the remission of sins and nothing in them pertinent to forgiveness, the grace of baptism would seem superfluous
We are called to live our baptism every day, as new creatures, clothed in Christ.
Baptism by immersion for the remission of sins is an essential covenant to make with the Lord. Faith and repentance precede this ordinance. Confirmation and the gift of the Holy Ghost follow baptism. Acceptance of these first principles and ordinances may obtain for us a remission of our sins and assure our salvation. In the ordinance of the sacrament, we regularly renew this and other covenants, and by complying with our part of the covenant, we receive the Spirit of the Lord to be with us.
FRYING-PAN, n. One part of the penal apparatus employed in that punitive institution, a woman's kitchen. The frying-pan was invented by Calvin, and by him used in cooking span-long infants that had died without baptism; and observing one day the horrible torment of a tramp who had incautiously pulled a fried babe from the waste-dump and devoured it, it occurred to the great divine to rob death of its terrors by introducing the frying-pan into every household in Geneva. Thence it spread to all corners of the world, and has been of invaluable assistance in the propagation of his sombre faith.
In all religions, the quickening spirit has been symbolically represented as a bird. At the baptism, when Jesus body was in the water, the Spirit of Christ descended into it as a dove.
The ecclesial communities which have not preserved the valid Episcopate and the genuine and integral substance of the Eucharistic mystery, are not Churches in the proper sense; however, those who are baptized in these communities are, by Baptism, incorporated in Christ and thus are in a certain communion, albeit imperfect, with the Church.
Right faith is of necessity required for Baptism, since it is said: "the justice of God is by faith in Jesus Christ" (Romans 3:22). . . Therefore, Baptism without faith avails nothing and thus we must recall that without faith no one is acceptable to God.
We ought to regard the sacrament of baptism with reverence. An ordinance of which the Lord Jesus Himself partook, is not to be lightly esteemed. An ordinance to which the great Head of the Church submitted, ought to be ever honorable in the eyes of professing Christians.
Baptism is faith in action.
Only what coronation is in an earthly way, baptism is in a heavenly way; God's authoritative declaration in material form of a spiritual reality.
Baptism into this Church is a serious thing. It represents a covenant made with our Heavenly Father. It is much more than a right of passage. It is a gateway to a new manner of living, and a new road on which to walk that leads to immortality and eternal life. It was never intended as a dead end. It was intended to open a glorious and wonderful way of life to all who would walk in obedience to the commandments of God.