Is being baptized into Jesus Christ optional for believers?
I personally was taught at age 11 that baptism was "merely" a public declaration of my faith. I accepted Jesus and was baptized at age 11 and at the age of 25 I realized my life was a complete disaster. In 1990 I began an ernest quest to know Jesus and struggled to change my ways. In constant prayer and seeking Jesus in this matter I was led by the Holy Spirit to listen to a particular pastor. I learned many things from this pastor and one of them was the truth about Baptism. He proclaimed that our baptism in "Jesus name" is when we are joined to Christ Jesus, dying with Him and being resurrected with Him to a new life. I immediatly knew that it was a new life that I needed, putting my old life to death and allowing the resurrected life of Christ to be established in me. Baptism is the first physical action that we can do by faith resulting in a spiritual change. By having the knowledge and believing that my old life would die and my new life would begin in the resurrected Christ, I was baptized in Jesus name. My life has never been the same.

Romans 8:1
Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus

How do we get in Christ?

Romans 6:3-5
Or don't you know that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life. If we have been united with him like this in his death, we will certainly also be united with him in his resurrection.

Galatians 3:26,27
You are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus, for all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ.

We are joined to Christ by the knowledge and obedience of baptism. Preceeded by faith we become partakers of His death, burial, and resurection in water baptism.

The old covenant was a physical example of what we are now able to experiance spiritually, through Christ, the mediator of the new, eternal covenant.

1 Corinthians 10:1,2
For I do not want you to be ignorant of the fact, brothers, that our forefathers were all under the cloud and that they all passed through the sea. They were all baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea.

If the partakers of the old covenant had to be baptized into the mediator, then, we as partakers of the new covenant must be baptized into the mediator, Jesus Christ. What would have happened to any of those, had they refused to go down into the red sea and come up on the other side. They would have still been in bondage to slavery. That slavery represents bondage to sin. I am covinced that if we are properly baptized into Jesus we can live a new, born again, empowered life. After they were baptized, the Holy Spirit, represented by that cloud, became their rear guard and a guiding light on there pathway to the, temporary, earthly kingdom. We being baptized into Jesus then recieve the Holy Spirit as a rear guard and guiding light into the heavenly kingdom.

Mark 16:16
Jesus said, "He who has believed and has been baptized shall be saved; but he who has disbelieved shall be condemned.

Jesus is the reality of what the first covenant merely represented. This next passage is the first new covenant sermon.

Acts 2:38-41
Peter replied, "Repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins. And you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. The promise is for you and your children and for all who are far off--for all whom the Lord our God will call." With many other words he warned them; and he pleaded with them, "Save yourselves from this corrupt generation." Those who accepted his message were baptized, and about three thousand were added to their number that day.

The red sea and the cloud of the old covenant are now an eternal reality to all who believe in Jesus. Again and again we find this same event being described in the book of Acts.

Acts 8:14-17
When the apostles in Jerusalem heard that Samaria had accepted the word of God, they sent Peter and John to them. When they arrived, they prayed for them that they might receive the Holy Spirit, because the Holy Spirit had not yet come upon any of them; they had simply been baptized into the name of the Lord Jesus. Then Peter and John placed their hands on them, and they received the Holy Spirit.

Could this be what's missing in the lives of millions who have believed in Christ, and been mis-informed or not informed at all that there new born again life in Jesus begins when there old life dies. We must die with Jesus in baptism and be resurrected with Him to a new life.

Acts 19:1-6
While Apollos was at Corinth, Paul took the road through the interior and arrived at Ephesus. There he found some disciples and asked them, "Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed?" They answered, "No, we have not even heard that there is a Holy Spirit." So Paul asked, "Then what baptism did you receive?" "John's baptism," they replied. Paul said, "John's baptism was a baptism of repentance. He told the people to believe in the one coming after him, that is, in Jesus." On hearing this, they were baptized into the name of the Lord Jesus. When Paul placed his hands on them, the Holy Spirit came on them, and they spoke in tongues and prophesied.

Colossians 3:1-3
"If then you were raised with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ is, sitting at the right hand of God. Set your mind on things above not on things on the earth. For you died and your life is hidden with Christ in God."

This description of our lives being dead and raised are past tense. When did we die with Christ or when were we raised with Christ? Baptism in the name of Jesus is the answer to the question. Then we can know and understand the unseen things above, that we have been promised.

Acts 8:36
As they went along the road they came to some water; and the eunuch said, "Look! Water! What prevents me from being baptized?"

Acts 22:16
'Now why do you delay? Get up and be baptized, and wash away your sins, calling on His name.'