How Can We Know If A Child Is Ready For Baptism?

How Can We Know If A Child Is Ready For Baptism?

We teach our children about God and His Word as soon as their ears will hear.  We work diligently to instill in them Godly principles and truths.  But then when they come to us a few years later and confess their desire to accept Jesus as their Lord and Savior, we wrestle with the question, “are they really ready”?

The Bible says we could all benefit from being like a child when it comes to the Kingdom of Heaven (Matthew 18:3).

Children trust what you tell them.  Children accept information they are given without the desire to prove its validity.  Perhaps we try to make God’s Plan of Salvation too complex and difficult to understand.

What is God’s plan all about anyway?  Isn’t it about believing in the death, burial and resurrection of Jesus, God’s son?

Isn’t it about believing that God accepts the shed blood of Jesus as payment for our sins?

Is it important for a young person to understand who God is and what baptism is and why we are asked to do it?  Of course it is important, but once a child learns and understands these truths and they choose to please God isn’t that enough to start them on their journey of building a relationship with Jesus?

More important than worrying about whether a child is absolutely ready to accept Christ is the importance of living in such a way as to set a good example for them to follow.  “And if anyone causes one of these little ones who believe in me to sin, it would be better for him to be thrown into the sea with a large millstone tied around his neck.” (Mark 9:42).

If a child believes the basic truths of God and the sacrifice of Christ and it convicts them to make a choice to accept Jesus, then the child is ready to be baptized.