Explaining Baptism to Kids

Gess is 9 now and often asks questions in church. Lately we have had some people come forward for baptism. Gess now wants to get baptized too because others are doing it. She just really wants to be involved in everything we do. However, we are Baptist and believe that the bible teaches only those who are saved should be baptized or partake in the Lord's Supper. It is hard to explain to a child why they can't do these things.

Then I had someone else who told me they had an 8 year old girl ask about baptism because she had seen someone get baptized at her church. Being surprised by the question they were not quite sure how to answer and asked if I could write something up to help explain it. I thought, what perfect timing. This is something I want to share with Gess too, so I did more than just write up a paper. I wrote a small booklet made specifically for young kids to help explain baptism.

This booklet is meant to explain what baptism is and in doing that it touches on how one must be saved. It does not, however, encourage a child to make that decision. It merely explains it and hopefully in terms that are easy to understand.

Kids with special needs like Gess will probably still struggle with grasping some of the information as symbolism in general is a concept that does not come easy. I still hope that this will be a useful resource for them and any child who wants to know more about baptism. Gess did seem to enjoy reading the booklet.


I am making this booklet available to all of you who might also like a tool to help explain baptism to young children. My pastor added some clip art to ours and it really helped to brighten it up and make it more appealing. However, since he has paid for permission for in-church use, I did not want to do anything that might be out of the bounds of his agreement. Therefore this copy does not have any graphics. Feel free to share this booklet with other people and/or your church.

Download Baptism for Kids PDF
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Download Baptism for Kids Word Document

Baptism for Kids is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.
When you print a PDF file you have an option to print it as a booklet. To do this go to File and click Print. On the print menu, under the Page Handling section you will see an option that reads Page Scaling. In that menu there is an option called Booklet Printing. It will give you directions to follow to print on the front and back pages. It's really handy, saves paper and makes it a nice booklet for children to hold. (I never knew this until my pastor pointed this out to me!)

(Please note: I am making this available because I always share resources I think other people might find handy. As I stated above, this booklet was written from the perspective of our beliefs on what the Scripture teaches. I am not trying to offend those who disagree or start an argument about the doctrine of baptism. There is a time and place for that sort of discussion, but my homeschool blog is not that place. Thanks for being gracious about it!)