Little Red Book Ministry

The Ordinances of the Church

“Therefore, brethren, stand fast, and hold the traditions
which ye have been taught, whether by word, or our epistle”
(2 Thessalonians 2:15).

“Now we command you, brethren, in the name of our Lord
Jesus Christ, that ye withdraw yourselves from every
brother that walketh disorderly, and not after the tradition
which he received of us” (2 Thessalonians 3:6).

Our Lord ordained two ordinances for the individual Christian to participate in. These are Christian water baptism by immersion and the commemoration of the Lord’s Supper, often called Holy Communion. These are the ONLY traditions given to the Church by our Lord. Other than these, we are warned against developing traditions in our worship of God (Matthew 15:1–6; Colossians 2:8; 1 Peter 1:18–19).

Over time, traditions become so deeply entrenched that they become more important to us than true worship. Traditions can lead to idolatry and apostasy when they become an end in themselves rather than a means to worship God. We will see in this lesson how that has happened in many instances even with the God ordained traditions of baptism and the Lord’s Supper. Note: In the first two sections of this lesson, the term ‘baptism’ refers to water baptism.