“In the early days of the church….,baptism was a declaration that the believer was definitely identifying himself with that group of people who were called Christians and were despised and hated. To be a Christian meant something. To identify yourself with those who were called Christians meant persecution, maybe death; it meant being ostracized from your family, shunned by friends. And the one act which was the final declaration of this identification was BAPTISM. As long as a man gathered with Christians, he was tolerated, but when once he submitted to baptism, he declared to all the world, I BELONG TO THIS DESPISED GROUP, and immediately he was persecuted, hated, and despised. In baptism, therefore, the believer entered into the fellowship of the sufferings of Christ. A person might be a believer and keep it strictly a secret and thus avoid unpleasantness and suffering, but once he submitted to public baptism he had burned his bridges behind him.” ~ Dr. M. R. DeHaan, Radio Bible Teacher
There are few days in my life when I am more pathetic than the first day back to work after vacation. My personal pity party is quite something to behold. What is lacking is a good old dose of perspective to remind me that my "griefs" pale in comparison to what most of the world faces each day. It took a comic strip to give me that perspective this morning.
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